The 4 Types of Autistic Masking

Although the concept of masking/camouflaging has been discussed since the end of the last century (e.g. by Lorna Wing in 1981), much of the research is still relatively new and we have a lot to learn! This video is definitely not an exhaustive list of the types of masking. These are just a few categories that really resonated with me and also seem to fit many anecdotes I've heard from the community.

If you're masking another type of neurodivergence, these may apply to you too, but I only have the personal experience of masking as an autistic person. I've also been reading and researching autistic masking specifically. I don't know how much of this would apply to other groups.

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Masking: is it

00:00 Masking isn't real?
02:14 Are you quite stoic or withdrawn?
07:32 Do you people please?
15:15 Is socialising intuitive for you?
16:25 The most exhausting mask
23:14 Masking & wellbeing
24:15 How does masking feel from the inside?

📖 *Books I'd Recommend about Autism 📖 :

Different not Less by Chloe Hayden (read if you want to cry):

Unmasking Autism by Devon Price:

*These are affiliate links. The channel will receive a small commission if you buy anything on Amazon after clicking through with this link. There's no extra cost to you; any money will go towards putting out more content. I'd love to post twice a week and put more time into research for these videos. Thank you so much - I really appreciate every like and comment!

DISCLAIMER: I am a second-year psychology student and a late-diagnosed #actuallyautistic individual. I am not a qualified healthcare professional.

[imautisticnowwhat]

This is obviously not an exhaustive list, but what do you think of these categories? Do any of them reflect your experience?

Also, you can probably spot a bit of crossover between these different types/feel you perform more than one in the same interaction.


But it’s something I’m sure I’ll talk more about in future. Masking can feel like such an elusive, abstract topic sometimes.



Thank you for being here! See you on Christmas Eve 💛🎄

[dcornect]

When you're masking and someone goes "I love your personality" and you think "Good. I made this one specifically for you. You were supposed to enjoy it, just as planned."

[ExistenceUniversity]

I masked so hard I didn't realize that all the videos on what autism is like were just my life and I thought I was normal and that autistic people were not explaining themselves well.

[Mental_Health_Gym]

One potential analogy for masking would be using makeup to cover a pimple. Being good enough at doing your makeup to hide the pimple doesn't magically make the pimple go away; it still hurts if you poke it.

[iheartporcupines]

I kinda just stumbled on autism videos, mostly because my husband and I have been noticing subtle behaviors in our toddler that have start to make us question. But now I've been ugly crying in my cubicle 2 days in a row watching these videos because for the first time in my life I'm hearing people articulate my inner experience and my whole life suddenly makes sense. I'm just flashing back to a billion scenarios that have always baffled me but I now understand. My mind is completely blown. Thank you so much for this video. I've never felt so unexpectedly validated.

[jalight]

I really can't belive that I went through life for 36 years beating myself up for not being able to do the things everyone else seemed to do so easily. Then autism gets brought up by my wife, I dismiss it, because there's nothing wrong with me of course, I'm just an idiot and failure, and then come to find out there's nothing I've ever heard or seen that's described my experience in life better. Really grateful to all the people getting out there and sharing their experiences helping us all out.

[Franimus]

Hot take: The wheelchair analogy would be more appropriate if they had back problems instead of being paraplegic. The difference between someone who takes care of themself by using the wheelchair and refusing to risk onjuring themself further vs someone gritting their teeth and screaming on the inside and making themself worse.

[teclinsoro]

my sister is autistic, so i started watching this video to try to understand her perspective better. i came out of this video realising that i may need to schedule myself an autism assessment 😅

[sleepingroses]

The idea of monotropism as an explanation of autism really applies to social situations! For me, one-on-one or sometimes two is inherently less difficult, more fulfilling, and less exhausting.

[tinkrtailr]

Holy shit, I just realized one of my masking behaviors. When someone mentions a subject they're interested in or an emotion they're feeling, I immediately respond with an anecdote about how the same thing happened to me. It's to make me seem more relateable, like, I've always known that I just didn't realize it was masking until just now.

[blazedinfl]

" I'm here, I'm human, and I can make this noise with my mouth that humans make when they talk to each other"

i really felt that

[撲殺]

situational mutism masking needs to be talked about more often

[coldservings]

I have a bad knee--torn meniscus that I'm trying to arrange surgery for. I generally wear a leg brace and sometimes walk with a cane. Most times I walk with a pronounced limp. I can, however, force a normal stride. I can even ignore the pain and run for a bit. The problem is, those things tear up the interior of the knee more and, at the least, aggravate the existing injury that I pay for with increased pain later.

That's masking.

[victoria_m]

“ask people questions” is a technique that i learned in Sims games. i will praise this series till my death of how helpful it was for me in learning socialising

[coolthings_]

God, when you spoke about your experience in college it really hit home

I was spent grade school being "that kid" being generally weird cause it got positive reactions from people (looking back, I think a majority were laughing AT me not with lol)

Then when college came I basically reinvented myself cause I wanted to fit in, I spent so much time and money on trying to dress trendy, listening to music that was popular, basically studying the hippest slang and fads

It basically came crashing down when a girl I wanted to ask out told me that I "tried too hard" then realized that all my efforts were for nothing and people saw right through me.

Spent the latter half of my 20s being a depressed loner, filled with self loathing, feeling like I didn't belong in this world.

Now I found out I'm autistic, and that I spent a good portion of my life masking without even realizing and that was the reason for my downward spiral.

I'm now picking up the piece and learning to love myself again and being my true self as well. It's a good feeling honestly.

[RaveNightflame]

Periodically, I'll convince myself that I'm just weird and have very inattentive ADD.
I stumble upon a video like this about autism and just sit with my jaw open for 25 minutes as I am forcefully reminded of and called out on a lifetime of thought patterns and behaviors.

This video was like getting sucker punched into my childhood, then getting whiplash from abruptly reeling back to my present behaviors.

You did a great job formatting this video and describing in detail the internal side of these behaviors. Well done!

[saratran]

I masked with a hyper positivite personality and was labeled hypomanic and then would crash out of exhaustion from faking and get burn out, but it was labeled depression. I was labeled bipolar 2, but stimming and unmasking is helping way more than any meds did. I never felt myself even on meds. I used to say for years to my mom that I wish I could take this mask off. No one understood what that meant. Not even me until recently.

[skyleralmanza]

I had to start masking as early as 5 years old because my adoptive mother would physically hit me for "acting like a r-slur, " and years later when i got diagnosed at 13, they hid it from me and i found out other ways years later. Being forced to mask over that and then hiding the diagnosis has been extremely detrimental

[silvercandra]

My partner recently pointed out to me that I seem to go nonverbal whenever I'm stressed, and that that's probably autism.
I went from being a really outgoing kid, to just entirely blank and quiet... one time someone told me they "didn't know I had feelings".
So yeah, I definitely had and still have to an extend, that stoic mask on.
By now I've refined it a lot more though, so most of the time, people just notice that I'm rather soft spoken and maybe a bit shy, but no one that isn't actually close to me would ever expect me to be autistic.
One phrase I keep hearing is "You don't seem autistic, you hold eye contact perfectly well!"... _yeah, because I studied how to do it for the past 15 years. I reverse engineered social interaction and succeeded, thanks for noticing._
I've also noticed that people get surprised hearing me talk about the things I enjoy, or just seeing me in casual clothes... it'd just be nice if they stopped making it sound so weirdly negative.
At least now, I've found a friend group, mostly consisting of ND people, who is encouraging me to drop the mask at least sometimes...
I started wearing makeup more often (despite being a guy), using it make myself look like a corpse, because I just like it, I'm planning to start wearing more clothing that I actually like, rather than what makes me fit in (once I stop being broke that is), and I let myself go off about my special interests sometimes.
It seems to be a long process, but it's actually making me hate myself a bit less, so I think even though it's exhausting sometimes, I'll keep going.

Don't mind me casually writing a paragraph about my experiences that probably no one will read.

[hfriend]

I feel like masking is kinda like how everyone has a customer service voice that's a little inauthentic, but instead it's like putting on your customer service personality that is inoffensively beige.