Did I loose my mask after a mental break?

I got quieter though this is more like my natural alone state so if it is slackening of inhibitions I suppose that would make sense. I'm yet to see what I am like in a larger social setting given that I'm been stuck in the house for more than a year now so I'm basing this all on how I seem to be with my family and those closest of friends who could garden visit.

Good luck with your diagnosis!

Yes I recognize this feeling, to strain an analogy, it's almost like when talking with people outside of myself the phone line I used to use isn't as clear anymore.

An example of this is my mum (Who I work with) who often gets annoyed with me saying I'm not listening to her because I just won't understand the question she asks me. According to her I used to understand what she meant but now I don't. The sort of question I mean here is one like this, I was working on a project and she asked "Do you think he'd like a blue one" and I couldn't figure out who he was or what object was blue, because the context wasn't in front of me or at the top of my mind.

I'm not sure this is exactly what happened this time but you did make me suddenly aware of something. Every 3 to 4 years, usually triggered by some event or other, I'd go through a "broken period and come out the other side a slightly different person each time. I've never looked at it through the lens of it being a deconstruction and reconstruction of the mask, mainly because I wasn't actually aware I was masking, but I think you're right that's what was happening. The difference between those and this time was the mask didn't seem to come back up properly.

I became louder after mental illness which makes me appear more neurotypical - maybe my inhibitions went and maybe yours have too - making you more relaxed about who you are.  (I'm currently waiting to see if I will be diagnosed with autism.)

I'm not sure this is quite what I meant above however, I do recognize what you're describing here, I went through some of it when I got my ADHD diagnosis and it seems to be happening again now. Once the people around me know what's going on I end up acting more as I do in private. I suspect with me it's because of the slackening of the social pressure to "Act normal" and I have to say it makes me feel better that I can openly fidget and stim without the comments which were always my hardest part fitting in.

Hiya,

I don't know about masking.  I'm still trying to puzzel out if I do, have ever done, or how to tell if I am.  I don't go to parties if I don't feel happy, because pretending is just too much strain, for sure.

If it's any help though, I had a real trauma about five years back and I feel I lost something in my emotional landscape then and have never really got it back.  I can't define it exactly, but the bit of me that used to respond sociably and positively to the outside world seems to have gone walk about and won't quite come back.  

Pax said:

My question is, having Recently researched Autism I had a lightbulb moment, is it possible I lost some of my mask during my mental break or healing process? I know I still mask sometimes and to some extent but I was wondering if anyone else has experienced this or thinks this is likely?

In that social camouflaging and personal masking is learnt during childhood, the theatrical cloak, mask and wig set tends to get outgrown and like a suit of armour fragments and falls apart ~ hence some people have midlife crises and second childhoods and all that as the childhood pretence becomes incompatible with the realities of life.

My attempts at camouflaging and masking only ever remained stable for a couple of years, and completely destabilised every four years, in very approximate yearly terms. So the only real camouflaging and masking I do now is on this website and others in terms of anonymising my individuality, which is very useful in terms of studying my previous and relinquished patterns of hiding in plain sight. 

I feel quite to same to you I'm only recently diagnosed with ASD about a month ago now but I had a bout two months before where I was just in a really and place mentally which lead me down the road of research and I discovered I was autistic, and got my diagnosis to confirm and since that point I feel very different.

It's hard to put my finger on it exactly, I recently said in a another post that I almost feel like I'm not not the same person as I was pre-diagnosis, I have learnt so much about my self during my research, during the diagnostic process and still am now. And I really am different to who I was before.

I've had the same experience as you from my mum in particular noticing things about me, how I'm behaving etc. I've been finding in a way it's a bit harder to mask because I'm so much more aware of self now which is crazy because I was super aware of myself before too it's just another level.

O