Many Types Of Masking.

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https://youtu.be/36-K-HW3syc?si=SQiFB14liN6c79Qy

Much of what she described I can relate to BUT how come because I am a man and autistic men are not supposed to mask?

I know I mask and watching this shows me I mask in more ways than I expected.

I was going to give the title to this thread a statement I was told around 18 years ago when I was working on the railway and a work collegue who once met me at my house said:

"YOU ARE AN ENTIRELY DIFFERENT PERSON AT HOME TO HOW YOU ARE IN WORK!"

Now I didn't know back then it was called "Masking" or that I was on the spectrum, BUT I knew I masked because I had to! It was the ONLY WAY I could do the job, and why after work and on my days off I was so exhausted which eventually lead me to a major burnout when I decided to leave the railway as everything came crumbling down all at once as it felt my life was collapsing around me! I did not understand what I was going through at the time. I know now!

Amazing video, thanks for linking and sharing. It really made me look back at my past behaviors back before I understood anything about myself in a different way. The first mask I learned to use was feigned indifference, pretending that nothing mattered. This led to my main lifelong mask, marijuana.

Marijuana was my main mask and social tool for over 40 years. It helped me with many social interactions and seemingly with making friends. the effects also helped me internally to manage some of the uncertainty and chaos within my own mind.

The big problem for me came later, after I found I couldn't keep smoking it. Without the marijuana acting as an intermediary I almost immediately realized that I no longer knew how to socially interact with others anymore. I had used smoking a bowl as a way to create and sustain social interactions for so long I knew any other way.