why do I still hit myself?

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It seems most of you have grown out of this. I've worked on social skills, coordination, repetive hand movements, and social anxiety. Those things have all gotten better and to the point where I don't have to try so hard on them anymore. The only things that seem to never want to go away, are obsessive interests and me hitting myself (usually over these interests)

My BIGGEST trigger is playing video games. This has always been a problem area for me and ever since I was a kid, I've not been able to stop myself from playing them. I HAVE TO WIN. If I don't win or take a really long time on a certain part, I seem to revert back to being a child. I've managed to stop hitting myself for a long period of time, but the urge is so strong it's hard to resist. I need help with this. Maybe I've relapsed because now that I've been diagnosed, I know why I'm doing it. Before I knew why I did it, I thought I was going insane. Now that I know I'm not, it's harder to resist. I don't want to lose brain cells though from banging my head into the wall too many times.

The other thing is I'm really confused about is why I couldn't even get a full AS diagnosis ( I'm diagnosed PDD-NOS). My psychologist said that my social skills are to good to be considered AS. Why have I excelled at improving certain things and still completely failed at improving others? It seems like hitting youself is something a severely autistic person might do, yet I'm too high functioning to even be classified AS according to her.

I used to have terrible terrible social skills. A combination of changing schools 14 times growing up, and ballet really helped me improve them. There are times when I feel like social skills aren't even really a problem anymore for me, in fact I feel I have too many people wanting my attention sometimes and I can't deal with it. Sometimes I even start to doubt that I'm even on the spectrum. Then I have a total meltdown over a video game, or a drawing I messed up, or a smoke detector going off. I manage to only have these meltdowns in private. For some reason when I'm around people, I'm able to control myself. If I ever acted like that in front of anyone they would probably never talk to me again. However, if I were to ever be in a serious relationship where I'm around someone for long periods of time, I don't think I would be able to hide it forever.

Can anyone give me some advice? If it wasn't the video games it would be something else, so quitting them won't help.

Yeah I have a similar problem with video games, although i've tried to not hurt myself, and I would "hurt" other things like whatever was around me. And I would try to not damage something too much.
The only times I'd ever hurt myself is if I did something wrong, and the other person was mad at me and I was mad too.

Normally what I do is rip up paper. It's been a good way for me to not damage any more things, like staplers. I've broken tons of staplers, pencils, pens, I even threw a chair once, scissors, books. Stuff like that. And when I hurt myself I hit my leg or scratch the sides of my face or my hands. Usually when I scratch my hands they bleed and that's not too good. Then they hurt like crap later.
Like instead of hurting yourself, try "hurting" other things, preferably easily replaceable things.

Yeah and I do the same thing in public or around people. And when I feel I am about to have a meltdown I excuse myself or I just leave and I go to a private place, usually like a bathroom and just meltdown in there and come back. The coming back part is often the most embarrassing, since the people know I went to freak out or whatever. And I have meltdown..ed in front of some people, like my family, a few of my friends. But never around strangers. That would be weird.

Just whenever you feel you are about to go into a meltdown, don't try to calm yourself down, just let it go, but restrain yourself from doing something too severe (like hurting yourself). Maybe try the paper thing, and I know it may sound kind of stupid but it helps. Also if that doesnt work for you (papercuts are my only problem with that) then hit something else, like a pillow or anything to substitute your own self, of course dont hit anyone else but I'm pretty sure you wouldn't or have never done that.

I hit myself when i get frustrated. Not excessively, usually just a few times, but i do it and it helps release some frustration. From some boards on here i've seen about self-injurious behaviors, it doesn't seem to be as uncommon as you think it is. Everyone's different with symptoms throughout their lives... With me, i've made some imrovements with interacting with people, but i stim way more than i ever did as a kid.

thanks I think I'll try that pillow thing. I don't like ripping up paper because I like to draw and that would be bad. Not only do I not want to waste paper, but I might unintentionally (or intentionally) rip up a drawing, causing and even bigger meltdown.

heh... ive gotten to the point sometimes, where if I get very negative about myself, i would start punching myself in the face, or slam my head off of the nearest wall as hard as possible.

No concussions yet, although quite a few times I have bled ALOT.

the headbanging does tend to help my headaches for some reason as well.

Luckily I only do this when I'm very very upset.. Has to be a major sick to the stomach meltdown for me to do it. When I have done it I would hit myself in the head several times.

The last time I did it was over a year ago. I never understood why I did it but now I know why. I used to think that everyone did it from time to time.. Obviously not.

i headbang when i just have enough stress

I used to hit myself, when I used to feel pressure to act and think a certain way. All that I needed to do, was move out, and than I stopped doing that.