The discussion about the co-option of terms (such as masking) has me thinking about my own experiences with masking.

How are these things related? The power of associative thinking, bbbaaabbbyyy~

So, I thought I'd make a thread.

Masking is somewhat difficult to describe, but way back in August I asked y'all how you defined masking and this what came out of that: https://twitter.com/StructuredSucc/status/1295494867498332161

Also, Pete ( @commaficionado) has a great thread about autism and masking that you should definitely read if you haven't already: https://twitter.com/commaficionado/status/1210260975967969283

Prior to the discussion in August, I didn't have a word to describe how I acted in social situations.

I knew it wasn't authentic and that there was a high price to not doing so, but I couldn't describe what I was doing or why.

Today, I think I have a better idea of that

The best I could describe it was social interactions were this giant flowchart. I picked the parameters and followed a decision tree to the type of response that I was supposed to give.

The problem is that the description sounds static; it isn't. The flowchart keeps changing

Everytime I had a social interaction (particularly types of interactions I rarely have) the flowchart would change, sometimes wildly.

The more I encountered a specific situation, the more comfortable I got with it and the more scripts (actions & phrases) I'd have to deal with it

For example, after giving literally hundreds of presentations, I have a pretty firm understanding of the actions and phrases I need to use during a presentation.

Before a presentation, I clearly and deliberately shift into presentation mode.

The way I speak, act, hold myself, and even my mood change while I'm in presentation mode.

While I like who I am in presentation mode and I enjoy presenting, it isn't me and it can't be.

It's incredibly taxing and I almost always crash shortly afterward

But that's the best case, when I have had tons of experience with a situation and have developed clear set of actions and behaviours.

My life is filled with situations where I have much less experience, and sometimes no experience at all

In situations I have no experience with, I look like I freeze up. I sit very still. I'm quiet. I don't interact, I just watch.

The thing is, I'm not frozen. My mind is running at superspeed trying desperately to understand the social rules of the situation I find myself in

I'm watching to figure our which actions and phrases I can mimic or what patterns I can draw. I'm desperately drawing new areas of the flowchart

If I had to make an analogy, I would liken to a computer with its fan whirring away over some background task.

Once I get more experience with this specific situation, my apparent freeze starts to thaw.

I develop actions and phrase that are appropriate (or at least not obviously offensive) and I can interact a bit more, but I still play it very safe and remain hypervigilant

One of the biggest problems I experience is when a situation I feel like I have some level of grasp on how to interact leads into one where I don't.

For example, I have pretty decent scripts for a business meeting (though I'm not great with them), but...

At my last place of work we had a business meeting that ended with a birthday party for someone in the office.

I'm less comfortable with birthday parties, but I have scripts for them too... but the change from one to the other completely broke me

Instead of being able to combine the scripts of these situations, this registered as a completely new situation.

I froze, locked up, shut down, and the rapid change in gears did bad things to my... everything really. I quickly had to retreat entirely

Just like presentation mode, the mode I switch into for these situations is different and deliberate.

They are made up from things I've figured out from trial and error and things I'm mimicking from others, and they are INCREDIBLY taxing

Before coming to Twitter and before figuring out that I'm probably autistic, I recognized these patterns in myself and developed some coping strategies around them.

I couldn't really describe them well, or briefly, but now I'm pretty sure these were experiences of me masking