Masking is a common coping mechanism employed by autistic people in an attempt to fit into a neurotypical society. Examples of masking include forcing oneself to smile at the "appropriate" times, looking between someone's eyebrows instead of making uncomfortable eye contact, and suppressing stims like hand flapping, even though they're comforting. Megan Rhiannon for NPR hide caption
Social psychologist Devon Price explains that masking is any attempt or strategy "to hide your disability." Price's new book, Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity, explores masking, and how to "unmask" and live more freely.
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In addition to hiding from others, Price says masking is also a coping mechanism. "You know that if you show your discomfort with eye contact, people will find you untrustworthy and treat you very differently," he says.
"To this day, all of the assessments that we use for diagnosing autism, even in adults [are] still based on how to identify it in white cisgender boys, usually very young ones," Price explains. "So what that means is, if you're, let's say, a young autistic black boy, you are far more likely to get diagnosed with something like oppositional, defiant disorder. You're more likely to be seen as a behavior problem."
"If you're a girl, if you're a person of color, if you're gender nonconforming," Price says, "you're more likely to be seen as a problem to be contained."
Price, who is transgender, compares it to how queer people are forced into a cisgender heterosexual world: Nobody chooses to be closeted, but they are born in the closet. In the same way, nobody chooses to wear a mask, but is born with a mask.
Devon Price is a social psychologist and the author of Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity. Left: Photograph by Collin Quinn Rice; Right: Harmony hide caption
Conversely, expressing joy can be healing and get you back in touch with your true self.
Rekindle an old passion or find a new interest and experience complete joy around it. Find a community to experience that joy with you.
Because autistic people often spend their whole lives trying to fit into a specific societal mold, it can be easy to lose touch with who you really are or what is really important to you. Price suggests trying the Values-Based Integration process, an exercise from autistic life coach Heather R. Morgan.
Autistic adults' suicide rates are three times higher than that of the normal population, and autistic women have almost double the suicide rates of autistic men (South, Costa, and McMorris, 2021). Some research has shown that the average lifespan of an autistic adult is 58 and this is largely due to suicide rates.
But what about autistic adults? We know that autistic adults are significantly disadvantaged with regard to social relationships, physical and mental health, and overall quality of life. (Howlin and Moss, 2012). How do we change this?
This act of masking has been shown to contribute to anxiety, meltdowns, burnouts, self-loathing, and depression in autistic adults. There is a direct correlation between masking and poor mental health outcomes for autistic people.
This is the most important part of mental health for autistic people. We must learn to be ourselves and love ourselves as we are. We must accept that some neurotypicals may dislike us and we must be ourselves despite this.
I was diagnosed with autism very late in life. I had an entire life before my diagnosis and that life was driven by masking. I was married to a doctor. I had three children, and they all went to an affluent Catholic school. I spent most of my life watching the other wives of wealthy men around me and trying to mimic behaviors I thought would appear most normal to them. For the most part, this worked. I had the same friends for 10 years and they liked the masked version of me that fit in with them.
I worked relentlessly to keep up with my mask. I never talked about my past. I tried to hide my stims and my preferences. I pretended to eat food I hated and to drink alcohol and poured glasses of wine down the drain when no one was looking. I worked hard not to infodump or say anything weird. I tried to limit my social interactions to less than three hours because I knew that after three hours, the mask would slip and the real me would come out and I lived in constant fear of this.
When I finally began unmasking, it was agonizingly apparent how little any of these people cared about me. They all fled very quickly. I tried to have coffee with one of them last week and she made it apparent that the unmasked version of me was a horror show.
I spent 10 years of my life biting my lip until it bled, giving myself regular panic attacks, and focusing on trying to appear normal so I could be liked and nobody really liked me at all. They liked the mask and if I had ever shown any part of myself, they would have run away. The mental health toll this took on me was unfathomable. I was constantly anxious, depressed, and overwhelmed. I had to watch every behavior. I have fewer friends now but the friends I have love me for myself and I never have to mask. The anxiety is gone. The depression is gone and the feeling that there is something horrible hiding in me that should be hidden is gone.
So when we address the growing evidence that autistic adults struggle with having a decent quality of life, we have to embrace the notion that to really support autism awareness and want what is best for autistic people, we have to provide spaces in which they can unmask and be themselves and we have to learn to stop teaching autistic people to try to learn neurotypical social skills and instead start loving and embracing them for who they really are.
Jessica Penot, LPC, is the founder and director of Tree of Life Behavioral Health in Madison, Alabama and the author of 10 books including the bestselling novel, The Accidental Witch.
Devon Price lists this tip in his book about unmasking for autistic people. So often, neurodivergent people are told that their interests are irrelevant or that they are a waste of time. But special interests and hyper-focuses are fantastic sources of creativity and joy. Learning how to let yourself take true pleasure in these activities is a fantastic way to learn about your true self.
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Have you, a friend or family member been living with undiagnosed autism?For every visibly Autistic person you meet, there are countless 'masked' people who pass as neurotypical. They don't fit the stereotypical mould of Autism and are often forced by necessity to mask who they are, spending their entire lives trying to hide their Autistic traits.
In particular, there is evidence that Autism remains significantly undiagnosed in women, people of colour, trans and gender non-conforming people, many of whom are only now starting to recognise those traits later in life. Blending cutting-edge research, personal insights and practical exercises for self-expression, Dr Devon Price examines the phenomenon of 'masking', making a passionate argument for radical authenticity and non-conformity. A powerful call for change, Unmasking Autism gifts its readers with the tools to uncover their true selves and build a new society - one where everyone can thrive on their own terms.
'Unmasking Autism is at once a most deeply personal and scholarly account of the damage caused by autistic (and all) people leading masked lives, and how unmasking is essential to creating a self-determined, authentic life... This is a remarkable work that will stand at the forefront of the neurodiversity movement.' - Dr Barry M. Prizant, author of Uniquely Human.
'Price's accessible and compassionate writing shines, and readers will feel encouraged to embrace a new understanding of themselves. Its potential to help masked autistic adults, especially those from systemically marginalized backgrounds, makes this book essential for most collections.' - Library Journal (starred review).
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