I started aggressively unmasking a year or so ago and now will often mention somehow that I'm an Aspie to people. The ones who've known me a long time just go "ohhhhhhhhhhh ok that makes sense" and the others form their own opinions; but in general I've been better received than I was before. I mentioned it to my daughter's Kindergarten teacher and over the last few months have been talking to her quite a bit about tomatoes and just gave her some big tomato plants I started 3 months ago indoors. 4 to her and 6 to the room-mom. They've both warmed up considerably. The room-mom is also going to help me learn how to do my daughter's hair. That'd have been nearly impossible for me to accomplish as a masked-person... but as myself it strangely worked out. I probably have it easier to some degree because I'm already divorced and have income now, so I'm dealing much less with the ramifications of it. I also live in a town of 500 people and ditched all my social media stuff. As long as the guy who owns the local market likes me (I give him tomato plants) and my kid's teachers like me (now I also give them tomato plants) and there's a handful of other people I've found who I can also rely on (and I also give all of them tomato plants)... everyone else can kma. (...and no tomato plants for them)
I went through therapy. The issue was because I had childhood trauma and got used to 'fawning' and 'running'. So it damaged my ability to confront over time and started people pleasing. Then I started with boundaries, because I saw people started going through me like on carpet. Now I'm learning how to build good connection with people. It must be mutual, not to throw all the good at once, just a step at a time and see what I receive back. It's hard, but I see progress.
I'm sorry about your past. I'm glad that you're figuring out how to reclaim yourself. I had significant childhood trauma as well and it's still a struggle. I have so many bad habits as it relates to interacting with others. Good luck on your journey 💛
In my household growing up I absorbed the lesson that the most important thing is to be “liked” and to get along with others…be “nice” - I think it came from my mom probably being autistic (and genetically passing it to me) and she learned to be likeable and taught the importance of this. As a result I am very socially adaptable, but these are a series of personas and aren’t me being myself. ** yes - a lifetime of projecting what other people need. I sort of thought everyone did that to get along with others, but I guess not.
I think a lot of people present a "false self", autistic or not. However, I think there's a difference. It seems to be a matter of survival for us autistics to learn how to be liked. For NTs, it seems to be motivated more out of insecurity. That's just my take. I also have a parent that is likely autistic. They'll never get diagnosed but it's obvious. I suspect my grandparent is also autistic. My parent was kind to a fault and definitely had rigid rules for being liked, even if the other person wasn't worthy of such kindness.
I love your videos. Following a late diagnosis (58) I am trying to understand the terminology used in autism. I have a real problem with the words "masking" and "camouflaging". Both of these words imply that a person has awareness. Society did not even consider that women could be autistic when I was growing up. How could it even be possible for a child, teenager, or even adult, who has no knowledge of psychology, to be aware that they are autistic, in this situation? I am reaching the conclusion that the correct terminology is conditioning. But honestly I am still in the process of trying to learn about all of this. Why does this matter so much to me? Words are powerful and important. At best, masking and camouflaging can be considered a survival tactic. But to me, at worst, the words masking and camouflaging can imply that the behaviour is calculated, manipulative. Some years before I was diagnosed, a woman actually stated this to me, quite directly, while talking about another autistic woman. She said, in a condemnatory tone, "they mask!". And what followed was a rant about how manipulative and calculated the behaviour was. Here is the stigma. I would be interested to hear other thoughts on this, because I am trying to understand, and every time there are references to masking, I feel like I am experiencing some kind of trauma response, because it feels unjust.
This is an excellent comment, thank you! I think you're right that conditioning might be a better term, both because we often don't know we're autistic and because masking implies some level of choice. I don't find the term camouflaging as problematic. However I do think "conditioning" is more accurate and helpful from an advocacy standpoint. Thank you again 🙏
@@ProudlyAutistic Yes, thank you - this makes sense, "because masking implies some level of choice" - this helps to clarify my thoughts. Thanks again for your videos, they are important to me. 💖
Yes! I was having this exact thought earlier today - hearing masking and having a negative response. For me, it is the fact that the same terminology is used in the world of narcissism. We often hear, "they dropped their mask" and "the mask slipped" as tell tale signs that someone has high narcissist traits, if not full blown NPD. When the autism researchers talk about masking it does the autistic community no favours! No wonder we are often mistakenly called narcissistic. I agree we need to use a different word and conditioning sounds perfect. In many cases we were trained (deliberately or not) and had to adapt in order to survive. I'm in the last stage of receiving my formal diagnosis at almost 52. I'm very happy to have found this channel. My Cat Q score is 156!
Yes, I have been accused of being manipulative a lot. Before I understood that I am autistic and what meltdowns were, people would say that I was throwing a tantrum when things weren't going my way. It has always been assumed that my behaviours are my choice to manipulate the people around me, rather than that I am lost and confused and don't understand what is happening. I don't want the idea that I have been pretending to be neurotypical as a survival mechanism to be used as further proof that I am a manipulator.
In terms of impact, I realize that the outcome is the same. While someone with some antisocial or cluster B traits may be doing it with conscious intentions to manipulate others and modify their behavior to gain the upper hand in a social situation, a young high-functioning autistic individual is doing it more unconsciously at a survival level to simply fit in and get basic social and emotional needs (barely) met. In either case, you are molding how you come across to others to be perceived more favorably, and hopefully, this modified presentation is more palatable to an otherwise critical crowd that might ostracize or bully you. Personally, I have had this pointed out to me by people with toxic traits close to me with their own disordered thought patterns and behaviors due to their own traumas. If I was too candid, blunt, or over-explained why I was doing something or saying the last thing I said when they made a comment, they would huff and puff that I was manipulating them and trying to change how they felt about me. Obviously, I was not doing anything with any malicious intent, and I just didn't want to deal with one of their tantrums due to their mood swings caused by their own reactions to the jobs they hated and the aftermath of the miserable habits they had used to cope with it all. Eventually, I learned to embrace being even more direct and to stop attempts of learning indirect communication because it was futile and exhausting and unpleasant, to hold my tongue and not to give details unless I was asked explicitly (which only happens rarely with these two more recent cases, and those who are more perceptive of my own mood shifts would be able to address me with more consistent compassion), and to disengage from conversations and go silent until the topic was changed because feeding my energy and attention to someone's pet argument is not how I will be spending my time. Once you stop masking and establish boundaries within yourself of what behavior you will absolutely no longer tolerate for the sake of not being alone, others will be the ones that need to adapt because quite frankly, I don't need to deal with the adult tantrums of others. They can go regulate themselves, and only address me when they are done frothing at the mouth and clean themselves up, lol. In short, masking is indeed a manipulative survival tactic that is useful when we are stuck in environments that are not friendly to our sensitive nervous systems. It can be activated consciously or unconsciously. As long as you are not using it to harm yourself or others, it's just another tool to navigate a society that is not always configured in a way that helps us to get our needs met. Eventually, as an adult, if you're high-functioning and independent enough, you can mask less and less as you can have more autonomy over what environments you frequent and what company you keep and what interactions you entertain. And you can also start to heal from the traumas of dealing with situations that forced you to mask just to make it to the next moment because no one really was there to tell you how to do something else in a clear step-by-step fashion. It's all trial and error.
Im a little frightened that if I stop fawning that I will unintentionally hurt or offend everyone around me. As a child I was told off/corrected constantly so fawning and people pleasing is my natural way of being. I feel like if im not on edge trying to check that i havent hurt or upset someone then it will be inevitable and i will be a monster.
I think delayed processing has something to do with this. Someone will speak to me in a way I don't like, but it will be at least twenty minutes before I can put my finger on exactly what I didn't like about it. At the time, I just take it and try to appease the person so they will go away. It's not healthy, but I haven't discovered a solution yet.
Yes!! I put on an agreeable mask and capitulate in the moment, only to realize many hours later, sometimes in the middle of the night, that I was really angry. I do this with aggressive types (bullies) automatically. Contractors and pushy sales types are the worst for this.
@@ProudlyAutistic please do , I would describe myself as very switched on and alert but sometimes peoples words just dont hit and it takes me forever to understand
Yes. Social things are hard for me, though it doesn't appear so at the time, to others and to myself. I will start to feel bad later in the day and will spend the whole next day recovering from it. I've learned to spend much less time with people because it comes at such cost. If I don't process it, then I can get into a state of overwhelm. I've lived much of my life in overwhelm, and am giving myself lots os space. It's best for me to be totally away from people for a number of days, like camping alone. When I do that I start to feel like more myself. I never knew about this before camping.
One of my things I grew up with. Maybe not fully diagnosed when young. But some work was done. But in late 70’s early 80’s there was some wisdom out there that we could outgrow it. So for many years I told myself I had outgrown it. Only in my 50’s did I start watching these videos and learning many new things.
It's funny, I think the "outgrowing" was just us learning how to mask. So we didn't get better as much as we learned how to hide it. Good luck on your journey 💛
I'm really new to this. Though I've been unpacking how my brain is different from other people's for a few years now, I've only been open about being autistic for a few weeks. Videos like yours really help! Most people in my life didn't know me before my mid-teens. That's when I learned how to be a rock performer, something I relentlessly studied before going on stage. How my favorite musicians stood on stage, how they moved, how they interacted with the audience. I noticed how people really LIKED me when I was performing... people in the clubs didn't see me as the shy, awkward, nerdy kid I'd always been... they saw me as a confident rocker, and were way nicer to me! So I decided to become that guy off stage as well, and my life kinda... changed. I started having more friends, got invited to more parties, that kind of thing. My brain always worked really fast, so I used that to become the life of the party, telling jokes, making people laugh. And as I've moved through my 53 years of life, I've altered that character, but I've always been on stage. About a decade ago, I figured that, since people really liked that guy, I should inhabit the role... even when I wasn't around anyone else. Think like that guy, act like that guy 24/7. And I got burned out like the pyre at Burning Man. Now, I'm getting to know myself again, for the first time in 40 years. Thank you for helping me on the journey.
Add to this being raised evangelical Christian and female. Fawning gallore. Not having any diagnosis, just the expectations of being subservient. Thank goodness my father raised me to be a critical thinker as I can't imagine how much worse off I would be. So glad to have escaped that and now learning about being AuDHD. Unlearning to fawn is difficult, but important life changing work. Thanks for such great content!
For me fawning was a mechanism I learned within my family and my community just to blend in and have a normal social life because otherwise I would be very lonely. It was a survival mechanism. Now I fawn less but I realised its very hard to find find similar values and interesting connections. Its hard..
This is a huge issue for me. Thanks for mentioning that it's something you've been working on for 10 years, it was very encouraging. I feel like I'm not progressing or growing enough and it's incredibly frustrating for me.
I did that for 13 yrs in a marriage, and haven't done it (much) since for the last 17 years because I'm around such easy going people. I do find myself doing it with difficult people still, slip right back into old patterns. I'd rather just avoid those people than have to put up boundaries in order to just be real and be myself.
This is very helpful. You have a great perspective and explain it so well. You identify and address the root cause in a very informative and succinct manner.
Wow! Thank you so much! A lot of good, useful information, paced right, direct, easy to understand, and in an appropriate length of time! While watching, I said over and over to myself, 'Yep, I do that/experienced that too.' LOL On the spectrum, we are not wrong. Just different, like being left-handed instead of right-handed. I am just nerdy and the social exception to the normal rules. Yet I'm someone who strives to be exceptional at life. I called it 'masking to the extreme' -- which you described as "social camouflaging"! A perfect way to put it! Thank you! Your info helps! 😀
Your CLARITY IS UNREAL!!! I have watched a few videos and am BLOWN AWAY BY THE *_depth and clarity_* of your videos!!! Subscribed and going to binge watch!!! I melted down today *_appeasing the puppet masters_* and came home mid day and fell asleep out of PURE *_mental exhaustion!_* I know all this so it doesn't help personally... but it is VASTLY VALIDATING!!! It is SoOoOoo on POINT!!! 🙏🙏🙏 P.S. I prefer the scientific term "camouflaging" vs "masking". It seems a subtle and possibly nascent point nut i don't think so. It is just more *_accurate!_* P.S. the world dosen't like my new confidence since I now know I'm autistic!
Thank you for your support. Yeah, masking is technically a subset of camouflaging. I think assimilation is the worst one as it's when you throw yourself into situations because you feel that's the expectation.
@@ProudlyAutistic Wow. Masking is a subset of camouflaging! That's interesting! And *_assimilation._* I've never heard of that in this context but that's an absolutely perfect description it it!!! It is *_WHAT I STRUGGLE WITH IN LIFE THE MOST!_* It's everone elses world... I just live in it.
The way you are putting stuff out I really feel, my mum is a caring person (more so now ) but she is a grade a karen and extremely nit picky, she essentialy dismissed all my feelings and problems as if I was lying her saying theres no way that feels like what im describing as it's never happened to her ive got to be making it up to "get out of school", and then I lived at my dads from 12-17 and he was just abusive extreme mental and emotional abuse, just him getting home I never knew how he would be and because of all of this my whole experience of autism has been a mask slowly cementing into my face, there was lots of problems when I was a kid and until just recently finding out I had autism I didnt even understand or relate to my own childhood, I forever described myself as just a confused angry kid that didn't understand anything, my mum even years later would bring up things i did as a kid as some sought of gotchya to make me feel bad but I stopped feeling bad as I was essentially completely disasociated from my child hood self. I've got lots of problems to figure out now but for the first time in my life ive been trully understanding of my childhood self completely being able to feel like I can relate feels great, because things were getting pretty bad for me, the walls were closing in and I was at a lot of emotional ends I struggled with alot but am glad to start understanding as ive been diving into this stuff head first for about 4 months now and nothing has ever clicked in place, im just thankful to have an amazing partner who excepted me for all my autism long before i even knew i was autistic Thanks for your content I really appreciate what you put out
This video is so good! Very helpful because you are able to express in words what this feels like. This is spot on to how I grew up. It started to shift as I got older and definitely after giving my life to Christ I started to completely cut people off! First the narcissist parent then others. This I might of had help with if I was diagnosed as a child. My whole life has been a struggle not knowing about myself and how to get help.
43 and finally accepted my autism diagnosis 2 months ago. Just watched your identity response video from 5 months ago and commented. Fawning is how I get by a lot of the times. It's terrible. I definitely fawn out of habit. It's going to be a long process to undo it!
It's difficult. I'm about 5 years into the process. A lot of it is about establishing boundaries with people in your life and identifying the type of environments that set you up for success. Good luck on your journey! 💛
We are following the path of least resistance, and making ourselves sad because we are unable to ever be ourselves around others. I concluded that the answer was to just not be around others as much as humanly possible, which allows me to be myself more. I don't believe that people will just like me for being myself. All evidence shows this to be the case. 'We're not interested in accommodating your weird needs, you just need to pretend to be more like us'. I don't want to be like them, so I will just stay away from them. Being in constant solitude can be very unhealthy but it is preferable to being in constant conflict, surrounded by people that strongly dislike me.
I relate to this. This gets into the conversation of whether many of us are naturally introverted or if we've learned to be that way because our natural extroverted personality was draining and exposed us to hurtful situations.
@@ProudlyAutistic Well, the problem with this theory is - I don't have any Autistic friends either - only people like you on TH-cam, but not in the real world. It might be just that I don't encounter them enough to form any offline friendships. I think that if I met you that we might be very good friends... but not necessarily.
@jaseman I relate to your comment so much. I'm so weary of being vulnerable and reaching out to others and it not being reciprocated even within good associations with people.
@@ProudlyAutistic Take into consideration that these things are necessary to protect you from being easy target to psychopaths and reputation destruction. I know people/girls with autism. Their "natural" behaviour isn't just "introverted" or just "different". It is objectively antisocial that ignores and stumps over social norms that allow other people to help them. Do as you wish, but if you plan on having friends that care about you, learning and sticking to some social graces is necessary. Otherwise everyone will be your enemy (for good reason, no-one wants to be friends with someone that makes a tantrum out of being requested to return a book they have been lended to, or spend time with someone that blows cigar smoke in people's faces including children), and you will alienate people that want to be your friend. It seems you are at least a bit more "normal" than the girls/women/bots/men with autism I know in real life. I am sorry to hear that you had to put yourself last, but as a really well intentioned outsider to the people in my life with autism, I have not seen that "put themselves last" behaviour at all. The best analogy that I could find is this (I swear it is based on real events) is like a male colleague complaining and making a tantrum that he has to clean/wash himself because he does not understand that his abhorrent mouth smell and body odor, keeps people from staying at atleast 1-2 meters away from him. Even now he still believes he does not "sweat" or needs to change anything about his hygiene. (Based on real events). I am really sorry that it has been so hard for you and that you were bullied. No-one deserves that, but resistance to change or adapt to feedback brings in other people to bully or reject if the person does not adapt to the norms he/she does not understand. Your inclination to avoid conflict is to your own protection since you are a woman and are easier victim to rape, pregnancy, etc. Men with autism are a lot more disagreeable, and it is not in their favour. If you manage to surround yourself with higher functioning autistics and make a good team, that is awesome. But the vast majority are not high functioning, and cohabitation or working in teams with them is very straining. Interacting with them will give you a better perspective as how valuable and important "fawning" and "camouflaging" is.
New to your channel here and only a few minutes in. Is it possible that we are talking about autistic people being surrounded by narsisistic people. It sounds like youre describing a lot of gas lighting an emotional manipulational abuse being wrought upon the supposed autistic individual. Just a thought...love your channel
I was raised by a narcissist, so yeah, that's something to keep in mind when watching my content. However, I found the lingering trauma of growing up (unknowingly) autistic to be very similar to surviving narcissistic abuse. Constantly being told that you're wrong and not valid does something to a person. It doesn't have to be perpetrated by a narcissist. Just someone who doesn't understand why you don't act like them. Thank you for watching 💛
Hi Karen, I hope it's OK I'm writing here not about this video but rather about something you said during your interview on Orion Kelly's channel. I believe you said your therapist was about to diagnose you with borderline personality disorder and last minute on the fly spur of the moment changed her diagnosis to autism. I find this quite disturbing because it suggests that had you two had a different interaction in that session, it would have ended with a bpd diagnosis. How fragile and unreliable is a psychiatric diagnosis? I feel like your life was in her hands and how is this OK? I wonder how you feel about it. Thank you for reading and for sharing your story.
You're right, it does raise questions about the accuracy of diagnosis. Had I not had a near meltdown over a coworker, I would have been diagnosed with BPD. However, autism had been part of the differential diagnosis. I had mentioned to her that I struggled with selective mutism and other social challenges. It shows that even good providers can easily make mistakes. Bottom line, they need to be asking the right questions. I'm not sure how receiving the wrong diagnosis would have impacted me. I thought BPD seemed relatable but didn't perfectly describe my experiences. Had I received a BPD diagnosis, I probably would have chalked it up to everyone being different and believed my therapist. I'm not sure whether I would have pursued the issue further. Everything snapped into place when she said autism and I'm confident it's correct.
I don't think it's so much formally unmasking as it is not forcing yourself to conform to other's expectations when they make you uncomfortable. It's asserting your boundaries and expecting them to be respected or at the very least, trying to find common ground.
I started aggressively unmasking a year or so ago and now will often mention somehow that I'm an Aspie to people. The ones who've known me a long time just go "ohhhhhhhhhhh ok that makes sense" and the others form their own opinions; but in general I've been better received than I was before.
I mentioned it to my daughter's Kindergarten teacher and over the last few months have been talking to her quite a bit about tomatoes and just gave her some big tomato plants I started 3 months ago indoors. 4 to her and 6 to the room-mom. They've both warmed up considerably. The room-mom is also going to help me learn how to do my daughter's hair.
That'd have been nearly impossible for me to accomplish as a masked-person... but as myself it strangely worked out.
I probably have it easier to some degree because I'm already divorced and have income now, so I'm dealing much less with the ramifications of it. I also live in a town of 500 people and ditched all my social media stuff. As long as the guy who owns the local market likes me (I give him tomato plants) and my kid's teachers like me (now I also give them tomato plants) and there's a handful of other people I've found who I can also rely on (and I also give all of them tomato plants)... everyone else can kma. (...and no tomato plants for them)
I went through therapy. The issue was because I had childhood trauma and got used to 'fawning' and 'running'. So it damaged my ability to confront over time and started people pleasing. Then I started with boundaries, because I saw people started going through me like on carpet. Now I'm learning how to build good connection with people. It must be mutual, not to throw all the good at once, just a step at a time and see what I receive back. It's hard, but I see progress.
I'm sorry about your past. I'm glad that you're figuring out how to reclaim yourself. I had significant childhood trauma as well and it's still a struggle. I have so many bad habits as it relates to interacting with others. Good luck on your journey 💛
In my household growing up I absorbed the lesson that the most important thing is to be “liked” and to get along with others…be “nice” - I think it came from my mom probably being autistic (and genetically passing it to me) and she learned to be likeable and taught the importance of this. As a result I am very socially adaptable, but these are a series of personas and aren’t me being myself. ** yes - a lifetime of projecting what other people need. I sort of thought everyone did that to get along with others, but I guess not.
I think a lot of people present a "false self", autistic or not. However, I think there's a difference. It seems to be a matter of survival for us autistics to learn how to be liked. For NTs, it seems to be motivated more out of insecurity. That's just my take.
I also have a parent that is likely autistic. They'll never get diagnosed but it's obvious. I suspect my grandparent is also autistic. My parent was kind to a fault and definitely had rigid rules for being liked, even if the other person wasn't worthy of such kindness.
I love your videos. Following a late diagnosis (58) I am trying to understand the terminology used in autism. I have a real problem with the words "masking" and "camouflaging". Both of these words imply that a person has awareness. Society did not even consider that women could be autistic when I was growing up. How could it even be possible for a child, teenager, or even adult, who has no knowledge of psychology, to be aware that they are autistic, in this situation? I am reaching the conclusion that the correct terminology is conditioning. But honestly I am still in the process of trying to learn about all of this.
Why does this matter so much to me? Words are powerful and important. At best, masking and camouflaging can be considered a survival tactic. But to me, at worst, the words masking and camouflaging can imply that the behaviour is calculated, manipulative. Some years before I was diagnosed, a woman actually stated this to me, quite directly, while talking about another autistic woman. She said, in a condemnatory tone, "they mask!". And what followed was a rant about how manipulative and calculated the behaviour was. Here is the stigma.
I would be interested to hear other thoughts on this, because I am trying to understand, and every time there are references to masking, I feel like I am experiencing some kind of trauma response, because it feels unjust.
This is an excellent comment, thank you! I think you're right that conditioning might be a better term, both because we often don't know we're autistic and because masking implies some level of choice. I don't find the term camouflaging as problematic. However I do think "conditioning" is more accurate and helpful from an advocacy standpoint. Thank you again 🙏
@@ProudlyAutistic Yes, thank you - this makes sense, "because masking implies some level of choice" - this helps to clarify my thoughts. Thanks again for your videos, they are important to me. 💖
Yes! I was having this exact thought earlier today - hearing masking and having a negative response.
For me, it is the fact that the same terminology is used in the world of narcissism. We often hear, "they dropped their mask" and "the mask slipped" as tell tale signs that someone has high narcissist traits, if not full blown NPD.
When the autism researchers talk about masking it does the autistic community no favours! No wonder we are often mistakenly called narcissistic. I agree we need to use a different word and conditioning sounds perfect. In many cases we were trained (deliberately or not) and had to adapt in order to survive.
I'm in the last stage of receiving my formal diagnosis at almost 52. I'm very happy to have found this channel. My Cat Q score is 156!
Yes, I have been accused of being manipulative a lot. Before I understood that I am autistic and what meltdowns were, people would say that I was throwing a tantrum when things weren't going my way. It has always been assumed that my behaviours are my choice to manipulate the people around me, rather than that I am lost and confused and don't understand what is happening. I don't want the idea that I have been pretending to be neurotypical as a survival mechanism to be used as further proof that I am a manipulator.
In terms of impact, I realize that the outcome is the same.
While someone with some antisocial or cluster B traits may be doing it with conscious intentions to manipulate others and modify their behavior to gain the upper hand in a social situation, a young high-functioning autistic individual is doing it more unconsciously at a survival level to simply fit in and get basic social and emotional needs (barely) met. In either case, you are molding how you come across to others to be perceived more favorably, and hopefully, this modified presentation is more palatable to an otherwise critical crowd that might ostracize or bully you.
Personally, I have had this pointed out to me by people with toxic traits close to me with their own disordered thought patterns and behaviors due to their own traumas. If I was too candid, blunt, or over-explained why I was doing something or saying the last thing I said when they made a comment, they would huff and puff that I was manipulating them and trying to change how they felt about me. Obviously, I was not doing anything with any malicious intent, and I just didn't want to deal with one of their tantrums due to their mood swings caused by their own reactions to the jobs they hated and the aftermath of the miserable habits they had used to cope with it all.
Eventually, I learned to embrace being even more direct and to stop attempts of learning indirect communication because it was futile and exhausting and unpleasant, to hold my tongue and not to give details unless I was asked explicitly (which only happens rarely with these two more recent cases, and those who are more perceptive of my own mood shifts would be able to address me with more consistent compassion), and to disengage from conversations and go silent until the topic was changed because feeding my energy and attention to someone's pet argument is not how I will be spending my time. Once you stop masking and establish boundaries within yourself of what behavior you will absolutely no longer tolerate for the sake of not being alone, others will be the ones that need to adapt because quite frankly, I don't need to deal with the adult tantrums of others. They can go regulate themselves, and only address me when they are done frothing at the mouth and clean themselves up, lol.
In short, masking is indeed a manipulative survival tactic that is useful when we are stuck in environments that are not friendly to our sensitive nervous systems. It can be activated consciously or unconsciously. As long as you are not using it to harm yourself or others, it's just another tool to navigate a society that is not always configured in a way that helps us to get our needs met. Eventually, as an adult, if you're high-functioning and independent enough, you can mask less and less as you can have more autonomy over what environments you frequent and what company you keep and what interactions you entertain. And you can also start to heal from the traumas of dealing with situations that forced you to mask just to make it to the next moment because no one really was there to tell you how to do something else in a clear step-by-step fashion. It's all trial and error.
Im a little frightened that if I stop fawning that I will unintentionally hurt or offend everyone around me. As a child I was told off/corrected constantly so fawning and people pleasing is my natural way of being. I feel like if im not on edge trying to check that i havent hurt or upset someone then it will be inevitable and i will be a monster.
I think delayed processing has something to do with this. Someone will speak to me in a way I don't like, but it will be at least twenty minutes before I can put my finger on exactly what I didn't like about it. At the time, I just take it and try to appease the person so they will go away. It's not healthy, but I haven't discovered a solution yet.
Yes!! I put on an agreeable mask and capitulate in the moment, only to realize many hours later, sometimes in the middle of the night, that I was really angry. I do this with aggressive types (bullies) automatically. Contractors and pushy sales types are the worst for this.
This is an excellent point! I think I might need to cover this in a video, thank you 💛
@@ProudlyAutistic please do , I would describe myself as very switched on and alert but sometimes peoples words just dont hit and it takes me forever to understand
I have a serious delay issue
Yes. Social things are hard for me, though it doesn't appear so at the time, to others and to myself. I will start to feel bad later in the day and will spend the whole next day recovering from it. I've learned to spend much less time with people because it comes at such cost. If I don't process it, then I can get into a state of overwhelm. I've lived much of my life in overwhelm, and am giving myself lots os space. It's best for me to be totally away from people for a number of days, like camping alone. When I do that I start to feel like more myself. I never knew about this before camping.
One of my things I grew up with. Maybe not fully diagnosed when young. But some work was done. But in late 70’s early 80’s there was some wisdom out there that we could outgrow it.
So for many years I told myself I had outgrown it. Only in my 50’s did I start watching these videos and learning many new things.
It's funny, I think the "outgrowing" was just us learning how to mask. So we didn't get better as much as we learned how to hide it. Good luck on your journey 💛
I'm really new to this. Though I've been unpacking how my brain is different from other people's for a few years now, I've only been open about being autistic for a few weeks. Videos like yours really help!
Most people in my life didn't know me before my mid-teens. That's when I learned how to be a rock performer, something I relentlessly studied before going on stage. How my favorite musicians stood on stage, how they moved, how they interacted with the audience. I noticed how people really LIKED me when I was performing... people in the clubs didn't see me as the shy, awkward, nerdy kid I'd always been... they saw me as a confident rocker, and were way nicer to me!
So I decided to become that guy off stage as well, and my life kinda... changed. I started having more friends, got invited to more parties, that kind of thing. My brain always worked really fast, so I used that to become the life of the party, telling jokes, making people laugh. And as I've moved through my 53 years of life, I've altered that character, but I've always been on stage.
About a decade ago, I figured that, since people really liked that guy, I should inhabit the role... even when I wasn't around anyone else. Think like that guy, act like that guy 24/7. And I got burned out like the pyre at Burning Man. Now, I'm getting to know myself again, for the first time in 40 years.
Thank you for helping me on the journey.
Add to this being raised evangelical Christian and female. Fawning gallore. Not having any diagnosis, just the expectations of being subservient. Thank goodness my father raised me to be a critical thinker as I can't imagine how much worse off I would be. So glad to have escaped that and now learning about being AuDHD. Unlearning to fawn is difficult, but important life changing work. Thanks for such great content!
For me fawning was a mechanism I learned within my family and my community just to blend in and have a normal social life because otherwise I would be very lonely. It was a survival mechanism. Now I fawn less but I realised its very hard to find find similar values and interesting connections. Its hard..
I relate to this a lot 💛 I've found as I get older, I care less about other's opinions.
This is a huge issue for me. Thanks for mentioning that it's something you've been working on for 10 years, it was very encouraging. I feel like I'm not progressing or growing enough and it's incredibly frustrating for me.
I did that for 13 yrs in a marriage, and haven't done it (much) since for the last 17 years because I'm around such easy going people. I do find myself doing it with difficult people still, slip right back into old patterns. I'd rather just avoid those people than have to put up boundaries in order to just be real and be myself.
This is very helpful. You have a great perspective and explain it so well. You identify and address the root cause in a very informative and succinct manner.
The opening statement is so true
I can't tell you how much this video affected me. I had never heard of fawning. Now I realize I do it. Thank you for the information on this❤
Fauning lowers self esteem and makes me feel even more pathetic.
Yeah....it's not good. I hope you're in a good place now 💛
Wow! Thank you so much! A lot of good, useful information, paced right, direct, easy to understand, and in an appropriate length of time! While watching, I said over and over to myself, 'Yep, I do that/experienced that too.' LOL
On the spectrum, we are not wrong. Just different, like being left-handed instead of right-handed. I am just nerdy and the social exception to the normal rules. Yet I'm someone who strives to be exceptional at life. I called it 'masking to the extreme' -- which you described as "social camouflaging"! A perfect way to put it! Thank you! Your info helps! 😀
I'm glad it was helpful! Yup, different, not disordered. I love the left-handed analogy, I think I need to do a video about that.
@@ProudlyAutistic Please do incorporate the left-handed analogy in your videos!
We are not wrong. But for me autism is a disability not just a difference.
Your CLARITY IS UNREAL!!!
I have watched a few videos and am BLOWN AWAY BY THE *_depth and clarity_* of your videos!!!
Subscribed and going to binge watch!!!
I melted down today *_appeasing the puppet masters_* and came home mid day and fell asleep out of PURE *_mental exhaustion!_*
I know all this so it doesn't help personally... but it is VASTLY VALIDATING!!!
It is SoOoOoo on POINT!!!
🙏🙏🙏
P.S. I prefer the scientific term "camouflaging" vs "masking".
It seems a subtle and possibly nascent point nut i don't think so.
It is just more *_accurate!_*
P.S. the world dosen't like my new confidence since I now know I'm autistic!
Thank you for your support. Yeah, masking is technically a subset of camouflaging. I think assimilation is the worst one as it's when you throw yourself into situations because you feel that's the expectation.
@@ProudlyAutistic Wow. Masking is a subset of camouflaging! That's interesting!
And *_assimilation._* I've never heard of that in this context but that's an absolutely perfect description it it!!!
It is *_WHAT I STRUGGLE WITH IN LIFE THE MOST!_*
It's everone elses world... I just live in it.
The way you are putting stuff out I really feel, my mum is a caring person (more so now ) but she is a grade a karen and extremely nit picky, she essentialy dismissed all my feelings and problems as if I was lying her saying theres no way that feels like what im describing as it's never happened to her ive got to be making it up to "get out of school", and then I lived at my dads from 12-17 and he was just abusive extreme mental and emotional abuse, just him getting home I never knew how he would be and because of all of this my whole experience of autism has been a mask slowly cementing into my face, there was lots of problems when I was a kid and until just recently finding out I had autism I didnt even understand or relate to my own childhood, I forever described myself as just a confused angry kid that didn't understand anything, my mum even years later would bring up things i did as a kid as some sought of gotchya to make me feel bad but I stopped feeling bad as I was essentially completely disasociated from my child hood self.
I've got lots of problems to figure out now but for the first time in my life ive been trully understanding of my childhood self completely being able to feel like I can relate feels great, because things were getting pretty bad for me, the walls were closing in and I was at a lot of emotional ends I struggled with alot but am glad to start understanding as ive been diving into this stuff head first for about 4 months now and nothing has ever clicked in place, im just thankful to have an amazing partner who excepted me for all my autism long before i even knew i was autistic
Thanks for your content I really appreciate what you put out
🏆 Amazing Video ❤️ Thank you.
This video is so good! Very helpful because you are able to express in words what this feels like. This is spot on to how I grew up. It started to shift as I got older and definitely after giving my life to Christ I started to completely cut people off! First the narcissist parent then others. This I might of had help with if I was diagnosed as a child. My whole life has been a struggle not knowing about myself and how to get help.
Excellent video - thank you.
43 and finally accepted my autism diagnosis 2 months ago. Just watched your identity response video from 5 months ago and commented. Fawning is how I get by a lot of the times. It's terrible. I definitely fawn out of habit. It's going to be a long process to undo it!
It's difficult. I'm about 5 years into the process. A lot of it is about establishing boundaries with people in your life and identifying the type of environments that set you up for success. Good luck on your journey! 💛
👍🏻👍🏻👍🏻
7:34 So true.
We are following the path of least resistance, and making ourselves sad because we are unable to ever be ourselves around others. I concluded that the answer was to just not be around others as much as humanly possible, which allows me to be myself more. I don't believe that people will just like me for being myself. All evidence shows this to be the case. 'We're not interested in accommodating your weird needs, you just need to pretend to be more like us'. I don't want to be like them, so I will just stay away from them. Being in constant solitude can be very unhealthy but it is preferable to being in constant conflict, surrounded by people that strongly dislike me.
I relate to this. This gets into the conversation of whether many of us are naturally introverted or if we've learned to be that way because our natural extroverted personality was draining and exposed us to hurtful situations.
@@ProudlyAutistic Well, the problem with this theory is - I don't have any Autistic friends either - only people like you on TH-cam, but not in the real world. It might be just that I don't encounter them enough to form any offline friendships. I think that if I met you that we might be very good friends... but not necessarily.
@jaseman I relate to your comment so much. I'm so weary of being vulnerable and reaching out to others and it not being reciprocated even within good associations with people.
Great video!
Thank you 💛
@@ProudlyAutistic
Take into consideration that these things are necessary to protect you from being easy target to psychopaths and reputation destruction.
I know people/girls with autism. Their "natural" behaviour isn't just "introverted" or just "different". It is objectively antisocial that ignores and stumps over social norms that allow other people to help them.
Do as you wish, but if you plan on having friends that care about you, learning and sticking to some social graces is necessary. Otherwise everyone will be your enemy (for good reason, no-one wants to be friends with someone that makes a tantrum out of being requested to return a book they have been lended to, or spend time with someone that blows cigar smoke in people's faces including children), and you will alienate people that want to be your friend.
It seems you are at least a bit more "normal" than the girls/women/bots/men with autism I know in real life.
I am sorry to hear that you had to put yourself last, but as a really well intentioned outsider to the people in my life with autism, I have not seen that "put themselves last" behaviour at all.
The best analogy that I could find is this (I swear it is based on real events) is like a male colleague complaining and making a tantrum that he has to clean/wash himself because he does not understand that his abhorrent mouth smell and body odor, keeps people from staying at atleast 1-2 meters away from him. Even now he still believes he does not "sweat" or needs to change anything about his hygiene.
(Based on real events).
I am really sorry that it has been so hard for you and that you were bullied. No-one deserves that, but resistance to change or adapt to feedback brings in other people to bully or reject if the person does not adapt to the norms he/she does not understand.
Your inclination to avoid conflict is to your own protection since you are a woman and are easier victim to rape, pregnancy, etc.
Men with autism are a lot more disagreeable, and it is not in their favour.
If you manage to surround yourself with higher functioning autistics and make a good team, that is awesome.
But the vast majority are not high functioning, and cohabitation or working in teams with them is very straining. Interacting with them will give you a better perspective as how valuable and important "fawning" and "camouflaging" is.
Your content is very informative.
Great video! very insightful😁
New to your channel here and only a few minutes in. Is it possible that we are talking about autistic people being surrounded by narsisistic people. It sounds like youre describing a lot of gas lighting an emotional manipulational abuse being wrought upon the supposed autistic individual. Just a thought...love your channel
I was raised by a narcissist, so yeah, that's something to keep in mind when watching my content. However, I found the lingering trauma of growing up (unknowingly) autistic to be very similar to surviving narcissistic abuse.
Constantly being told that you're wrong and not valid does something to a person. It doesn't have to be perpetrated by a narcissist. Just someone who doesn't understand why you don't act like them.
Thank you for watching 💛
That was a big part of my life and I'm learning that I don’t deserv3 ro be a doormat
I'm glad you came to that conclusion 💛
Hi Karen, I hope it's OK I'm writing here not about this video but rather about something you said during your interview on Orion Kelly's channel. I believe you said your therapist was about to diagnose you with borderline personality disorder and last minute on the fly spur of the moment changed her diagnosis to autism. I find this quite disturbing because it suggests that had you two had a different interaction in that session, it would have ended with a bpd diagnosis. How fragile and unreliable is a psychiatric diagnosis? I feel like your life was in her hands and how is this OK? I wonder how you feel about it. Thank you for reading and for sharing your story.
You're right, it does raise questions about the accuracy of diagnosis. Had I not had a near meltdown over a coworker, I would have been diagnosed with BPD. However, autism had been part of the differential diagnosis. I had mentioned to her that I struggled with selective mutism and other social challenges.
It shows that even good providers can easily make mistakes. Bottom line, they need to be asking the right questions.
I'm not sure how receiving the wrong diagnosis would have impacted me. I thought BPD seemed relatable but didn't perfectly describe my experiences. Had I received a BPD diagnosis, I probably would have chalked it up to everyone being different and believed my therapist. I'm not sure whether I would have pursued the issue further.
Everything snapped into place when she said autism and I'm confident it's correct.
Do we just unmask and deal with the consequent conflict and people not liking us cause they think we are rude and bitchy for not smiling?
I don't think it's so much formally unmasking as it is not forcing yourself to conform to other's expectations when they make you uncomfortable. It's asserting your boundaries and expecting them to be respected or at the very least, trying to find common ground.
@ProudlyAutistic thanks for responding. I am so proud of you for being able to make these videos and share them with us despite all you endure.
I thought i was pretty decent at masking, turns out i just try to talk as little as possible, not get noticed and fawn a lot.
Same 😕💛
❤