List The Ways You Mask

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Forcing eye contact . I do it because I know it's expected of you. It's not easy though.

Trying to be be social when my natural instinct is to withdraw . The taxi driver situation when I used to comment on the football rather than sit silently. Someone mentioned about my trying a group in the library , which could also fit this.

Doing things, because I think it's expected of me /people will think badly of me if I don't, (An expansion of the first one) .


'Laughing(not very convincingly probably) at things other people are laughing at , to hide the fact I often don't get humour/jokes from others very easily.

Would agreeing to go shopping on different days of the week when you'd rather go shopping on the same day of the week each week be regarded as masking? I do it to be more considerate to my stepdaughter ,who takes me, and her plans for the day.

I'm not a very successful masker, but the biggest thing I do now, is adjusting my voice and face in a conversation so I don't seem bored because everyone otherwise assumes I'm bored even if i'm enjoying myself.

Not talking much about myself or my interests at work, because they are interested mainly in the "movie or show of the week," and I don't watch those shows. I find them negative and depressing, for the most part.

Otherwise, I really don't feel I have to mask all that much. I choose activities in line with my interests. A lot of my friends have pets, so I can talk freely about animals to them.

Common sense tells me not to reveal too much of myself. I sometimes think I already revealed too much about myself here. People who know me would recognize my interest in Denis Istomin if they happened to go on this site.

Something you said Firemonkey about not getting jokes. Oh dear... I have put my foot in it with this one...
Like when a joke has been said that everyone else laughs at but I don't get it, and I try to laugh to be polite so I am not seen as being thick... But somehow everyone knows, and I am not only thought of as thick through not getting the joke, but seen as stupid for laughing inappropiately! I feel like running and hiding!
Not an easy one that... It has even happened to me online. How does everyone know I typed "Haha" when I didn't get the joke?

^ smh

smh

Sometimes people use jokes when they feel the hard truth is too hurtful. Making light of an issue is more hurtful to me. Yes, the truth stings, but being made fun of hurts worse.

I play a role of the shy person

I don't always try to get things or else I give myself away because I don't want to be asking too many questions so I roll with it

I hold back asking "strange" questions

I leave areas when I get overwhelmed and go for a walk

Make myself look at someone and I look at their hair or their lips or nose or anything on their face

Most of my ways of blending in is channelled internally. Restraint, regulation, resilience, to be above and beyond my own instinct as an autistic as opposed to be against it, etc. This isn't masking.
Masking is about the huge mismatch between the internal and external expressions -- this is an uncommon thing for me to deal with, let alone let it happen in the first place.

I do not have a 'role'. I do not have a persona to speak of, nor any kind that I'd even want. I'm just that unpredictable or confused.
If there's ANY I'd want, I'd want to be someone who is more aware and more in control, which is, essentially me with no EF problems -- a someone who almost never gets confused.
Except it's impossible to replicate that and no amount of masking would mimic that state of self that I sought so hard.


If masking is involved, the terms of my willingness to responsibility and duty for a temporary higher priority over anything else, but almost never personal or social.
The over-prioritized 'responsibility' is a script-like AI for me to follow with deep compensation. And that's just it really as long as I'm willing to break myself if I cannot afford or perform my own preferences of deep compensation.
Last I tried for few days straight with no day break, I snapped days after despite 'doing well' at the previous days. That's all I could hold out only and only if it's on it's highest priority which isn't, again, common.

I don't do a lot of shallow compensations, because it feels too awkward and more inauthentic -- if not this funny echoaliac like quoting while playing dress up gets funnier than it should or shouldn't.
And I hate the idea before I found out it's terms for it.

The worst, the most direct and most common would be ignoring that I had any working memory issues and auditory processing problems, and pretend that I don't have it -- because it's already annoying to ask what it's being said and done again, and even more annoying to bother anyone with it.
This is more about pride and frustration than worry. And I'm so sick having to do or deal with it either way.

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