I have an obsession with flipping the pages of a book or stack of paper (Post-It note pads are a particular favorite). The flipping is similar to the way you flip pages of animation in a stack of paper. I do this repeatedly, to the point where I have developed a callous on my pinky finger, which rests on top of the book or pad I’m flipping. I also have carpal tunnel-like symptoms from years of doing this.
There seems to be a term for everything, and being a former trichotillomaniac, I would not be surprised if there were a name for this page-flipping obsession also. Anyone know what it is called? If it’s up for grabs, I will invent a term and write a book about it and flip its pages relentlessly.
This post is like 21 years old now but I was googling this exact question and I feel the insane need to say that I have the same thing! Down to the trich part! (although it’s still an ongoing fight sadly)
But instead of flipping it like an animation, I like to flip through the pages individually and feel the papers being worn out slowly, it’s kind of soothing and it feels nice.
My brother used to do this, and maybe still does. Specifically, I think he liked to flip the corner that had the page numbers, and to watch the numbers change. He did it so much with one of my books that the pages were darkened in that corner.
I would call this a form of “stimming” which is an activity usually associated with autism but I think it’s common among a lot of people (or a lot more people are neurodivergent than we think). It’s not just stuff like fidget spinners. Whistling, petting a cat, chewing gum, clicking a pen, there are a lot of habitual behaviors that people do for reasons that maybe they don’t fully understand. For mattgg 20+ years ago, it was flipping through stacks of paper and feeling the pages as they go by.
It’s stuff like this I point to when folks say “Where did all of this Autism talk come from? It didn’t exist a few years ago!” Yeah, people were autistic 20 years ago, we just didn’t have the framework to describe how their differences and eccentricities fit into a larger category. In decades past, a person who struggled to cope whenever their regular routines were interrupted might be called rude or stubborn, now we know some folks just have different brain wiring.
In grade school I was a compulsive retractable ball-point pen clicker. How or when I stopped I can’t say.
My other quirk, and it drove my mom crazy, was putting sticky stuff like maple syrup in my hair and waiting for it to harden, then enjoying the crunchy feeling of running my hand over it. Haven’t done it for years, but - might try it again and see if it still has the old appeal.