Masking And Autism

When someone with autism masks, they are trying to blend in with people who are neurotypical. They want to be accepted and not be looked at differently. They want to fit in as much as they can. During this time, someone would start to pick up social cues from people around them. They do what they can to make sure their autism isn’t known to whoever they are around. It can eventually lead to anxiety because they are trying to be someone they are not. 

In a lot of situations, there is a reason someone masks such as safety and acceptance, employment and education and just everyday social interactions. During those moments, someone is excessively quiet, compliant, or passive and will have intense exhaustion after social events.

Masking in a way is a form of a disguise. It helps us hide what we don’t want people to know. We want to be seen as “normal” but sometimes it's not always easy since trying to fit in with the world is difficult. We have to put up a front in hopes that we can be accepted.

It's hard since we are stepping outside of our comfort zone, but it becomes challenging because it feels like we’re playing a part or putting on a performance. We tend to rehearse what we were planning on saying since we don’t want to sound like we don’t know what’s going on and have to pretend that we’re not affected by the loud noises that are happening around us.

It starts to affect our mental health because we want to belong, but we’re so focused on pretending that it starts to make us physically and mentally exhausted. We start to lose who we are. We need time after socializing to recharge. 

We want to be able to engage and be able to make friends, but it's hard because we don’t know if someone is going to accept or if they are just being nice. It's frustrating since we never know someone’s intention when it comes to accepting someone.