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The Use of Masks

TheCatWoman

We're told and generally led to believe that masking is bad, but is it really?

Everybody uses masks or faces to go about thier everyday lives, there could be a inner looking blank face for when we're on publc transport. A Work face that looks professional and in control. The face we show in private to our nearest and dearest, a slightly despairing face when we need help. If everybody does this NT's as well as ND's then why's it bad when we do it, or more importantly why are we made to feel bad for doing it?

All our masks and faces are an authentic part of us, just a different facet, a diamond is no less a diamond for being multifaceted.

Maybe we should start to see masks and faces as a dressing up box and using them to help us do the things we need to do. Be a bit like Mr Ben, go into the changing room with a costume and come out through the door as a lion tamer, or a train driver. I've found this approach to be really empowering and I think its how I've survived my first 50 undiagnosed years. One of my most important masks is my brass necked one, I put it on like a collar and it allows me to say things that I would think outrageous and unsayable if I wasn't wearing it, sometimes what comes out of my mouth when wearing it can get me in trouble, but because I've got  brass neck I usually come away unscathed. But it's also what allows me to speak the truth to power, to ask for what I want and need, to not be victim. I still come home and take it off and put it back in the dressing up box and go through all the usual worrying about what I said and did etc whilst I was wearing it, but then I think I'd feel that anyway, so I make it serve a purpose, in helping me to stand up for myself.

Parents

  • The thing with masking is how detrimental it can be. Yes people might say that masking has it's benefits but the trouble is just how much energy it takes. Constantly feeling that you can't be your true authentic self and express how your feeling is harmful. I think that us autistic people need spaces where we feel free to be ourselves and that often happens when we're in the company of other neurodivergent people. And I think it's also important for me to mention the fact that some of us can't mask, or at least not half as much as others. For me if there's a loud noise I will cover my ears instinctively. If I'm excited I will flap without even thinking, it's just an automatic reaction for me.

Reply

  • The thing with masking is how detrimental it can be. Yes people might say that masking has it's benefits but the trouble is just how much energy it takes. Constantly feeling that you can't be your true authentic self and express how your feeling is harmful. I think that us autistic people need spaces where we feel free to be ourselves and that often happens when we're in the company of other neurodivergent people. And I think it's also important for me to mention the fact that some of us can't mask, or at least not half as much as others. For me if there's a loud noise I will cover my ears instinctively. If I'm excited I will flap without even thinking, it's just an automatic reaction for me.

Children
  • in reply to NAS79491

    I see conciously using masks as empowering and that any mask is a facet of me, I'm not pretending as such, I'm just allowing a part of me to come to the fore.

    I agree that "having" to mask all the time or for large chunks of the day is draining, physically and emotionally and obviously we need place and people who we can relax around.

    Whilst I will jump when startled or cover my ears around loud noises, I don't stim, I realise this makes me a bit unusual, I also avoid getting excited where possible as for me theres no such thing as good adreniline because I have cPTSD.

    One of the reasons I started this thread was to try and start a conversation about masking in general and as we seem to do it regularly and often conciously, so if we do it conciously why not try and make it work for us? Obviously we're going to feel knackered afterwards, but personally I'd rather be knackered with some benefit. I also think that so many of us feel so disempowered about masking and it's something we can't change, so how do we take our power back? For me its taking ownership of my masks, creating and changing them to suit me in the situation I find myself in.

    How would others take back their power from somethng that you can't change?