"How many girls mask autism spectrum disorder, like me?"

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http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg2 ... PqMd-E5tc8

A lot of what she said make sense
it's not just that we have to learn masking, we are less allowed to show our struggle
always Accused of being drama queens or attention seekers or simply being a " woman ".
I really hope people becomes more aware of how much Pressure women face from others or even from other women that they are more likely to learn how to "fake" being normal or hide their real personality.

I didn't always. As a kid I embraced the different full-on, but over time , I decided to try and mask my disorder as much as possible, and to stop telling people about my diagnoses unless I already know that they also have diagnoses, and sometimes not even then. The thing that sort of sucks is that even when I try to be "normal" people, (adults) are always telling me that my Aspi-ness is really obvious, and think that I make no effort to try and act neurotypical. It is very tough, because it seems to me like we should all be able to live in a world where we can be accepted for being our different selves, but perhaps a world like that doesn't exist yet. I think it will someday, though.

I definitely masked mine, especially at school. I didn't have the diagnosis then, but forced myself to fit in and be 'normal'. Probably the reason why I didn't get a diagnosis until later on.
I have read that females are often harder to diagnose because they can easily hide it.

I didn't until I was diagnosed. Minus the struggling part because what everyone says is 'No one can help you but yourself' suck-it-up phases and 'oh I'm sorry but *insert optimistic comment here*' sorry-can't-help phases. After diagnosis, I tried proving too many things because I was an ignorant bigot that time.

I do had friends before all of the above, but I didn't initiated that. They kept it. Unlike most NT kids I met, those childhood friends of mine are more open-minded. And my mom (until now) is still keep telling me to 'act like a lady' but not up to the point to NTs' standards of femininity.
True, I do masked my sensory issues and struggle when I was no longer a sensory-seeker. Because like at the above, I kept believing that no one will able to help me.
As for my obsessions, at youth I'm not much of an information collector or learner because my focus is at somewhere else, until I found out that I can actually do.

The age where High School starts... (To K+12s that would be around Middle School) I wish I can destroy them all.

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I can hide it most of the time, though sometimes it shows. I have been slowly becoming accepting of having aspergers.

There's a paywall over the article now.

I didn't know I had it, but I gradually realized I was different somehow and tried to fit in, badly. Then I spent my 20s actively masking it by reading books and practicing skills like eye contact and voice tone and whatever. THEN I sunk into a deep depression and didn't feel that I knew who I was...and realized I needed to stop pretending. Now the depression has lifted and I am stuck not being sure if I'm being socially appropriate or not -- just like I was as a teenager. But the difference is that now I know why people don't like me and I can just not care (socially) -- or mask it if I must (at work).