I Upset Others When I Mask Less

Masking versus sensitivity

I’ve had three different clients this week bring up roughly the same issue, and I thought I might address it, because it’s something that I see coming up over and over. And it’s this.

Sometimes as Autistics, when we go through one of those phases where we’re going to try not to mask as much, or we just don’t have the energy to mask that day or that moment, or we’re wiped out, or we’re in burnout, or whatever reason, we’re just being a little bit more ourselves, a little less masked. And sometimes other people can have kind of a big reaction to something that we say, and yet what we said is entirely the truth, and it wasn’t actually mean.

It wasn’t that we were genuinely being hurtful. And we know intellectually that this reaction from the other person really was their issue. It was something in them that was coming up that was creating this big reaction.

So we have this situation where we’ve said something that was really probably just fine, and the other person had a big reaction to it, but we know that if we had masked more, the situation would have gone very differently and it wouldn’t have become an issue.

So what’s happening here? A lot of times, when my clients come to me with these situations, the message that they’re taking away from it is basically, ‘Oh, I guess that means that I need to keep masking. Unmasking is not okay.’ I’m taking a different message from it.

I’ll admit that when I was first unmasking, I took that same message from it, but I’m thinking about it differently now that I’ve had a lot more experience with it and have processed through more of what’s going on.

And I think that the core of it is this. There is a difference between unmasking and being insensitive. And I might phrase it the opposite way as well. Masking is not always sensitive, and sensitivity is not necessarily the same thing as masking.

Okay, I’m going to explain this more. So when we’re masking, we’re putting in a lot of effort to try and present ourselves in a way that the other person can handle, that will go over well, that they will see as appropriate, and that the things are going to work well, and they’ll take us seriously, or they will be okay with what we’ve said, or whatever it is.

So we’re putting in a lot of energy to manage that, to structure the situation, to come off in a certain way. And as we’re doing that, we are actually taking a lot of information into account about the other person.

We’re thinking about what they’re thinking, and how they’re going to take something, and their background and their history, as much as we know about them, and how things have gone with other people that we know that might have similar situations. And we’re trying to take that into account in order to get it just right as much as we can.

Masking less

When we play with masking less, one of the goals of that is to use less energy in our social interactions, and a completely normal transition phase of that masking less is using less energy and just not thinking about all of those things, because it feels like all of those things are what masking is, and masking can be that.

But there’s another phase that after we practice just not using quite as much energy for every single interaction, which I think is a very good thing, being more authentically ourselves – which I think is a very good thing. What I started incorporating back into my interactions with people, at some point – because I also went through that phase where things didn’t always go as smoothly because I was masking less – what I’ve started incorporating back in is more sensitivity, more attunement to the other person.

Thinking about what’s their history? What is it that they need? What will go over well? Things like that.

Not in a way that is covering up who I am, but in a way that is just responsive to wanting to be kind to the other person, to knowing, “Oh, this topic is sensitive for them. Oh, they have a history around this issue, so I want to tread lightly there because I genuinely, actually care that they’re okay right now. And if I say this, then they will not be okay. But if I say this, they’ll probably be okay.” And I can still be completely honest. I can still be entirely myself, and I’m noticing how I come across to them and what will affect them. And what they need to be okay right now.

I can negotiate that and navigate that. And it’s not always the same, and I’ll admit, I don’t always do it perfectly, but it’s improved my relationships so much. And it’s genuinely not masking because I’m not putting up a false front. I am not compromising who I am or what my truth is, and I’m not saying things just because society demands it. I’m saying something because it is the truth, and I can give a portion of it that is what the other person can tolerate at the moment.

I can maybe even give more of it, or all of it, if that’s what they can tolerate at the moment. But I’m a little bit more aware of that. I’m still using some energy to do this, but because I’m not masking myself, I have more energy available to me so that I can use some energy to be more aware of the other person.

Is this distinction making sense? I’m not sure how well I’m expressing this. I just wanted to float this idea that there is a version of being sensitive to the other person, to being aware of the other person, to being attuned with the other person, that isn’t the same thing as masking. It takes a little bit more energy than being very raw with someone, but I find that that little bit of upfront energy usually is less than the amount of energy that it takes to handle or mitigate the bad reaction and the break in the relationship that happens in time when I’m not sensitive to who they are and what they need.

And because relationships have become, in this process, more important to me than, honestly, they ever have been in my life, I’m willing to put in a little bit of work for the sake of the relationship, because I care about this person and I want them to be okay.

Okay, so that’s my thoughts at the moment. I’m curious how this is landing for you. I would love to read your thoughts in the comments. Yeah. And if you are interested in some of my other videos, I’ve got a bunch throughout YouTube and here on the blog. But I will leave it there. Have a neurowonderful day.