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How long does it take you to get back to being yourself after mixing with other people

Billy87

How long does it take you to get back to being yourself after mixing with large groups of NT people and masking, particularly at work? 

I find it takes me a couple of days until I get back to being me again. Like I finished work for the week on Wednesday and on Thursday I was still being the person I was when I was masking at work. I couldn't stop myself. Took till today before I felt like I finally got back in touch with myself again and felt like me

Does this happen to anyone else? Almost like the pretending to be normal is a switch you can't switch off

  • Usually a day. I attend a meeting, every Wednesday evening, in Belfast. Thursday mornings result in a bit of extra sleep, as a result.

  • It depends on too many variables to answer this Billy.  Sometimes, no time at all....sometimes minutes...or hours....or days.

  • Though in a different situation, I can relate to this. I'm homebound due to disabilities and I only go out for medical appointments. I've found that I can't schedule more than one appointment per week. Being around crowds and noise in hospitals plus having to communicate and interact (appropriately) with receptionists, doctors and/or medical test technicians makes me very tired from the physical, mental and emotional exertion. 

    Knowing now that I'm Autistic has created more strain mentally and emotionally because I am more aware that I need to behave a certain way to interact with people (i.e. mask). I'm now more aware of the dichotomy between my Autistic self and my masking self. I feel confused. I come home exhausted from all of this and with remnants of masking still in my head (I have been unmasking at home, which has helped me).

    So, like you said, pretending to be normal does indeed mess with my unmasked self and it takes a day or so to get back to my own mental and emotional comfort zone.