Masking

Thanks Elizabeth. Read your post.... that line about other people being inefficient.... right there with you  Hoping I'll reach that flow state.... although I'm always happier expressing myself in writing than face to face with other people. 

Thanks for the acknowledgement 

Thanks for sharing that, Riddler. Sending you lots of support as you wait for the diagnosis. :-)

Elizabeth

Hi, Ethan, thanks for sharing all of that. You sound thoughtful and strong. 

Elizabeth

Hi Ethan, I really appreciate you taking the time to compose such a comprehensive response.

Thanks for this. It's got some thought provoking bits

The idea of a mask is something I connect with a little too easily - I read RD Laing's the divided self at university and that book made much more sense to me beyond an intellectual curiosity. It wasn't written with autism in mind - but the idea of constructing a "false self" to navigate the world unsettled me a bit-- because I realised that's what I was doing. 

I'm going to vote both (although reading @aidie 's reference I think I've more or less done all those during my time on this earth)   I noticed for a while at work how I used to slip into a "role" in certain social situations. It's as if part of me was saying "I'm in the role of the cynical one here so I'm going to say X". Growing up I had no sense of self or identity so I'd imitate the outlook I saw by characters on television - sometimes reciting lines word for word when I thought they fitted. Getting older and into music it was less about identifying with a group who shared similar interests - although that was part of it - but it was more about adopting a whole persona with which to relate to the rest of the world. 

I suppressed a lot of what I thought and felt at the time (then occasionally there'd be an "outburst") and I pretty much followed that routine as I got older. I know everyone puts on a bit of a front in social situations or everyday work interactions but I seemed to do that far to often with far to many people. If a situation that was novel, unpredictable or out of my control, presented myself I'd either avoid it or exhaust myself trying to keep together through it. I also waited for the other person to initiate a conversation, then I'd try and figure them out and "fit in" with the conversation.  

I've opportunity now to share with a work colleague some of my struggles in the context of understanding how I'm different and why certain things are more challenging than others so more of "me" is coming through. Over time I think that'll make things easier. I'm also becoming more aware of situations which will be challenging for me which I'll need to work out strategies to navigate. I doubt I'll ever get to a place of being a social butterfly, or having a relationship with someone but I'd like to think I can move beyond acquaintance and colleague to relationships rooted more in friendship. Although I'd sooner surround myself with animals - when I retire I'll probably adopt a load of cats to live out my days.

I'm getting there, occasionally I've picked up on a social  cue and explored it - sometimes I've missed it entirely (mainly because there were other competing demands in the situation so my focus is elsewhere). Sometimes I've spoken out and been a little too blunt. I feel out of my depth a lot and I think people are coming to understand I'm just not socially motivated and that if they share things with me I'm more likely to want to offer advice to "fix" the problem than be an empathetic listener. 

found u this article about Masking

kids.frontiersin.org/.../frym.2019.00129

Thanks Elizabeth, I’m also mid 40’s, but waiting for diagnosis. Which I’m struggling with.

Hi, Riddler:

Thanks for your great question. I mask both consciously and unconsciously, and perhaps because I’m in my mid-40s most of it unconscious, especially at work. I’ve just done it for so long.

My conscious masking comes when the person with whom I’m interacting is causing me stress, whether at work or in my personal life. In both cases, I have to actively choose to mask and deliberately choose how to. I do this rather than, for example, choosing to stand up and walk away, or telling them point blank they’re annoying me and wasting my time, or asking them to leave my workspace, or speaking my mind in another way I would if I wasn’t masking. 

I have the more “stereotypically male” form of autism and high test scores on the related testing categories, according to the psychologist who diagnosed me. The more I read about that, the more I smile and recognize myself. I have a lot of friends and good relationships with colleagues, but if I didn’t mask, I would probably have almost no friends.

The people with whom I interact at work, especially, would probably be shocked to know what I actually think and how I actually want to react to them sometimes. Half the time I just feel like I’m interacting with people who overreact and are oversensitive to essentially everything, My gut reaction to them is usually that I don’t know what the problem is and why they are so overwhelmed by and inefficient about everything.

When I get home from work I’m absolutely exhausted because it feels like 95% of my effort expended that day at work related to masking. And I say that as someone teaching high school students all day. The teaching part feels easy. The masking is brutal.

On a final note, because I choose to have personal relationships and I choose to have really good working relationships with my colleagues, I know masking is necessary. And I genuinely care for these people, which might not sound like it’s the case based on what I’ve said above.

It’s just that, and I don’t like saying this but this is the brutal truth about it, I just don’t have the empathy for others that appears to exist in other people. So I’ve had to learn to cultivate empathy within myself, and my expression of it, through masking. It’s not a bad thing at all. My psychologist encourages me to keep in mind the positive benefits of pushing myself and being willing to be vulnerable and build deep relationships.

Doing that feels stressful and forced and unnecessary for me at times, but then at other times I feel extraordinarily connected to people and I really enjoy our interactions and my need to mask suddenly drops. I am suddenly able to just “flow“ in my interactions with them. Suddenly the masking isn’t needed and I feel so comfortable with them that I’m able to just be my true self.

When I get to that point, it’s golden. And I know it’s that point my psychologist wants me to pursue. Fortunately I have multiple friends and family members and multiple colleagues with whom I am able to enter this “zone” most times I interact with them. I feel like my psychologist having challenged me to push myself has permitted me to really enter this place of flowing, naturally empathetic relationships. I’m really relieved to have been able to get to that place because up until the last few years that was not my experience, socially or at work. And that was a very isolating and brutal feeling and a difficult way to live.  

I’m sending you lots of support. Thanks again for your awesome post. And I’m not masking to say those things. :-)

Elizabeth

I think it can be both. At the start, my mask was definitely a conscious thing that I had to build up but then over time I felt like it became something unconscious that I could no longer control which was not only massively draining but also left me feeling at odds with this fake person I was presenting myself as. I am currently in burnout and only very recently became aware of autism but as Charlie Timm says, the more you aware you become, the greater degree of control you will achieve (or at least that's how I feel). I know I will always need the mask, and suffer the consequences that come with it, but having conscious control of when and how much I use it is something I hope to do in the future.

I tend to tell new friends early on. Most of the older ones know too, but still I guess we've set thungs.

I mask less with people I've met since realising I'm AS. It hasn't changed with older friends, guess patterns are hard to break.

I've experienced this as something that changed in parallel to my awareness of how the autistic mind works. The more I know the more I can consciously affect my reactions and behaviors. 

Also, the more I've accepted my autistic self, the less need I've felt to fit in, which naturally decreases the number of times my masking appears. 

I know I do it consciously, but suspect NTs do that too. The unconscious one is the dominant one. I didn't think I masked until I met an AS friend with whom I unmasked. The difference is clear to me. I am now unmasked, or less masked, with a few people.