Tips for unmasking/finding the "real" me after diagnosis at 52

Good way of putting it.

Martin said:

It is the real me, but either with or without a level of effort.

Belnarlo said:

it might be helpful to focus on identifying what drains and fills my energy instead.

It certainly will be better for your psychological health. I've found life far more relaxing since I retired and choose to spend 99% of my time alone. No more worrying what others think and trying to people-please. 

Hi Belnarlo 

I was diagnosed 4 years ago and am nearly 62.

well...

there are "versions" of me that appear in different circumstances and with different people - some one might consider to be more "authentic" than others.  I relied on scripting a lot in "pre-unmasking" days - jokes or stories or facts that I had in store...  I still do but not so much.  I was one of the sort of masking people who necessarily spent a lot of time using internal speech to chat with myself about what I was observing or experiencing and how I should change my behaviour to prevent the autism showing - in my case I subsumed a lot of this into analysing my posture and movements (I have a background in movement arts and sciences).

It is said that as one unmasks the energy that one previously put into running a separate stream of analysis mentally becomes released.  In truth as I started to unmask i found that i was much more aware of the chatter inside my head involved with masking -some of it no doubt because I was forced to consider that I was!  i think the underlying complexity may be linked with one's emotional state and perhaps some of the "demons" that have developed the years of doing one's best to fit in.  Personally I said some things that I immediately regretted when i dropped my mask - especially when being in or close to burnout.  It is difficult to track one's progress and observe changes - situations are often very complex.  Personally I lost contact with (or maybe never had) subtle or nuanced insight into my own emotions - maybe because i was putting a lot of energy into thinking about how other people were and how I should present myself...

  I think that trying on being you in low risk situations is a great start and for many people is where they end up too.  self monitoring is a weird thing - being oneself is a strange thing too - who else can one be? well we can spend a lot of time and effort being what we imagine other people are and trying to be like them which is really tough if fundamentally one is not.  And there is a lot of social pressure to do this - especially in work or other settings which have a lot of "unwritten" social rules...  As you asked for a tip i would suggest "interoception".  The aspect of using how one's body feels is perhaps a good way at working out whether one is happy or sad or anxious etc

best wishes

Phased

I agree with this perspective, and it is the one I am trying to adopt since diagnosis 4 years ago.

I am more relaxed at home in my own environment, but fortunately can socialise if necessary and put in the required effort. Many years of learning those social skills through trial and tribulation, but still make errors of judgement. I try not to beat myself up now about errors.

I ensure I give myself adequate recovery time after socialising, as it does require extra effort, which gets very tiring. I'm also kinder to myself when I consider whether or not to attend a social occasion. I rarely go to things now out of a sense of duty - I go because I want to - I leave when I need to.

Fortunately, I have a very understanding wife who is fine with me needing to remove myself, or not attend things. My close friends likewise.

Late 50s here and diagnosed AuDHD last year. I strongly relate to the vibe of this post vs anything else on "unmasking". By this age, we are just who we are - not a Kinder egg with a mystery "real" personality inside. I have made a conscious effort to try to connect with my physical sensations this past year and how they relate to what I'm doing (I struggle to connnect with more nuanced emotions in myself). This is getting me somewhere re. truly understanding what fills vs drains my bucket. I now feel I have permsssion (from old age too ) not to constantly look people in the eye when talking to them. And I've reflected on past experiences that led to e.g. migraines and M.E. and now understand some of this may likely have been down to "over-extroverting" (though I am actually an extrovert).

I tend to agree but have decided its the fitting in in social settings is just too hard, so now can't be bothered.

Well done. I got diagnosed at 59. I also read "Unmasking Autism" and I deliberately didn't do the workbooks, as I knew they wouldn't make me feel positive.

For me, masking is any time I perform learned (not instinctive) behaviour in order to fit in with neurotypicals. Before I knew I was autistic I had no idea. Now I know, I know that I don't have to fit in all the time and can take time out from people in order to de-stress. 

Most importantly I can mask if I want to, and if I choose to do so, it's now because I don't want to frighten neurotypicals - not because I am afraid of not being accepted by them!

Belnarlo said:

I love this view

Me too.

Belnarlo said:

will adopt it in my journey.

All the best. 

I love this view and will adopt it in my journey.

Personally, I believe that I am the real me whether or not I am trying to fit in with societal expectations. I am the real me just relaxing at home, I am still the real me when I am using my hard-earned social skills in order to function in a social setting. It is the real me, but either with or without a level of effort.

Thanx for this "alternative" view. Since the post I did find some articles that suggested instead of focusing on finding how I was masking, it might be helpful to focus on identifying what drains and fills my energy instead. That resonated more (after the fact) than identifying why I started masking, it never occurec to me that pushing to unmask was an energy drain!

While I'll follow the threads to find energy drains, I'll add chasing unmasking as one of the drains for sure. it's nice to hear masking isn't necesarrily the "evil" some literature had been telling me  

If the 'masking' is not making you distressed and the pressure to 'unmask' is. I think that there is a clue there. 'Masking' is only a problem if it is causing distress, otherwise it is just a collection of learned strategies and coping mechanisms you have amassed to make life easier in society, which obviously is geared to the 'majority neurotype'. 

I was baffled by how to go about 'unmasking', then noticed that my 'masking. worked well, and was useful. Except for occasional exhaustion caused by overdoing socialising, the learned strategies that make up my 'masking' have had no deleterious effect on me, so I gave up on 'unmasking' as a bad job and something that was of no use to me.

I am fairly newly diagnosed - in late 30s. I find the whole conversation about masking very difficult to understand. I can think of plenty of people who aren’t autistic and who seem to mask things all the time. Isn’t that what everybody does? Apparently not.

Hi.  Congratulations on your diagnosis.

Although I'm not personally interested in 'unmasking' I know that there have been various threads on the subject here, so maybe my comment will ignite interest.

Otherwise, if you use the search function you may find older threads of interest.

All the best.