Layers of the Mask:
Everyone’s Favorite Cover-Up
May 1st, 2025
It feels like everyone who knows anything worthwhile about autism is talking about masking right now. How common it is, how we do it, why we do it, and the consequences. But not a whole lot is being said about what that mask is actually made of, either because we don’t know, or we assume it’s different for everyone. And I believe the mask is different for everyone, to an extent. But as I’ve been working to demystify the concept of ‘the mask’ for my own sake, I started to notice a pattern. I think while the details of the mask differ from person to person, the underlying structure of it is more-or-less the same. And that goes for neuro-typicals as well as neuro-diverse.
The research seems to agree that that for a lot of people, we learn to mask when we’re kids, become proficient in it as young adults, and then lose motivation or sustainability for it in our later years (Miller, Rees, Pearson, 2021). As kids we begin to experience small moments of social trauma (rejection, criticism, exclusion) and (consciously or not) come up with ways to cope with or avoid those moments. Masking is mostly, on a deeper level, a response to stigma. Stigma about being different, but also stigma about things that are actually universal: making mistakes, needing rest, disappointing people.
Thus, the mask is born. And there are really only two things that work really well in our culture for covering up the unwanted parts of ourselves and making peace with those who have the power to make life hard and hurtful. Only two kinds of people that get all of the rewards: people-pleasers, and hyper-productive professionals/students.
As kids or teenagers, we make note of the things we do and say that garner praise (a good grade on an exam, reading a book above our level, making friends, avoiding conflict) and we learn to develop and enhance those parts of ourselves so they’re the only parts people notice. Gender is a big part of the mask, too, whether you’re a man, woman, or nb. We use the mask to reaffirm our validity in our chosen gender role, or the role society has assigned to us. As a side effect of all this, we usually internalize beliefs about perfectionism: that our mistakes or failings are unforgivable. That we are unforgivable, unloveable, or never good enough; Because we always know, don’t we, that there’s a version of us we are hiding away. A version that might be more real than the one we put forth.
The person beneath the mask is complicated and contradictory. Some parts of the mask may very well be real. But it’s never the whole picture. Competence is balanced with fumbles. Isolation comes with a need for connection. Seriousness is traded out for silliness. Masks make a lot of friends, they get good grades and high-paying jobs, but they don't have much fun. They eventually burnout and they come with a lot of mental health problems. That’s because masks separate us from an authentic sense of identity. And somewhere buried under the mask, there's always grief. Often when we try avoiding the parts of us that are most criticised or rejected, we end up leaving grief unprocessed. This is part of why removing the mask is so hard: you aren’t just contending with the inevitable social backlash. You are relearning a version of yourself you have forgotten. And you are processing grief which has been sitting stagnant for years.
“Without a reference point, many people assume that the difficulties they experience are either universal or that there is something “wrong” with them for finding things that everyone else appears to do effortlessly, so hard.” - Miller, Rees, Pearson, 2021
People-Pleasing
It makes sense that people-pleasing is a part of most people’s mask. People love people-pleasers, they’re convenient, unfailingly polite, kind, and often go above and beyond without asking for anything in return. People-pleasing makes any number of unwanted characteristics easy to forgive or ignore. But there’s an uglier side to people-pleasing, one I’ve written about before.
“Niceness and people-pleasing involve trying to control the social situation” - Dublin, 2023
At the end of the day, people-pleasing is about control and superficial reassurance. It affirms to us that we are good, worth-while people without ever forcing us to question why we don’t believe that implicitly. It helps us feel safe without ever forcing us to question where the danger is really coming from. In a way, masking is really about making yourself convenient and digestible for everyone else. In Mille, Rees, and Pearson’s study (2021) one woman spoke about using memory to recall details about people, allowing her to engage with them in conversation. Another participant spoke about how masking is just like learning the language neurotypicals use, one that doesn’t come naturally to autistics. This is a skill that takes years to learn and is never perfect. People-pleasing forces us to work incessantly for years at keeping the peace. Which means that keeping up an acceptable mask requires not only doing your own work, but everyone else’s too.
Productivity
People-pleasing and productivity have a lot of overlap. People like people that get a lot of work done without much complaint. Research shows that people with higher ambitions often need to mask more. For example, students in pure science programs, or obtaining a higher level of education, seem to need to camouflage more (Alaghband-Rad, Hajikarim-Hamedani, Motamed, 2023). This is probably also true in jobs with a high status level. Many people on the spectrum feel that they need to mask in order to be, and stay, employed. That employment is more important than being comfortable or keeping stress low (Pryke-Hobbes, et. al., 2023). I’ve seen work culture get in the way of people's values and self-expression again and again. Our obsession with professionalism is often prioritized over our mental health, our efficiency, our boundaries, and even our identity.
“My mask, as a people-pleasing, unfailingly polite person, has been instrumental in realising my dreams…. My masked self is a boss. She is tailored to meet the requirements of the situation at hand, at the top of her career game, well-groomed, and evokes great responses from others. Her only real failing is a complete lack of sustainability.” – Reframing Autism
And maybe we can never do away with the mask entirely. At least not in our current culture. Like I said earlier, there may be parts of the mask that are real and valid and useful. But there’s a big difference between using the mask as a default, and pulling it out as necessary, with intention and awareness. Between using a mask which cuts you off from important parts of yourself, versus using one that fits comfortably.
“And yet, the mask remains an important component of our arsenal. The mask can confer safety via conformity or camouflage. It can be absolutely key to certain types of achievement, employment and standards of living, in a society with a currency of social expectations.” – Reframing Autism
It’s important to keep in mind, however, that not all masks can be removed and replaced at will. Sometimes when I talk about burnout or autism, the concept of skill-regression comes up. The idea that we can lose skills when our burnout levels get too high. But I wonder if some skill-regression also happens when we start unmasking. Research shows that for some, things that were easy with the mask on may become much more difficult with the mask off (Miller, Rees, Pearson, 2021). I’ve seen this happen with myself and with clients, particularly in and around Covid isolation. I think this is because motivation and sustainability can’t quickly return to the impossible levels it took years of work to get them to. And because once the mask is removed, and we’ve reconnected with ourselves (our identities, our emotions, our bodies) we can’t simply go back to ignoring them again.
Identity and Grief
Masking has a lot of downsides. Perhaps the most concerning is the way it negatively impacts our sense of identity. A lot of masking isn’t conscious. But whether it’s conscious or not it acts as a barrier, a brick wall, between your authentic self and the self you behave as. Masking makes a lot of people feel disconnected from their true sense of identity. And this happens with both neuro-typicals and neuro-divergents (Miller, Rees, Pearson, 2021). Masking is an ongoing affirmation that our real selves are not welcome and are worth less. A part of us knows that every time we pretend we are doing it because we are not welcome. The more we cover up, the more we lose touch with our innermost selves. As time goes on, we miss out on opportunities to allow our authentic identities to grow and change. Parts of ourselves become neglected and stagnant. (I believe this is part of the reason why social anxiety is so common in masking autistics - we lose the skill of tolerating being imperfect in visible ways, even when it’s those imperfections that define our uniqueness.)
There’s a lot of loss associated with masking (Miller, Rees, Pearson, 2021). Loss of ourselves and our identities, yes. But also loss of time that we could have spent being real, and connecting with people in real ways. Loss of fulfilling relationships. Loss of the acceptance and validation we are trying so hard to earn. Loss of the freedom which would have allowed us to be ourselves without undue social consequences. Grief about life being so much harder than it needs to be. Grief for the reality of the world that we live in. Grief at not having our needs met or validated. But the most profound grief associated with masking, I believe, is the grief we feel for the younger versions of ourselves which were so sure they were unloveable that they began on this journey of appeasement and covering up in the first place. The grief for our younger selves being unseen and unappreciated and unsupported - despite the best intentions of those who cared about us. So after managing our people-pleasing, putting down boundaries around productivity, and getting to know ourselves better, the hardest step of unmasking is acknowledging all these losses. And just letting ourselves be sad about it.
Sources
Alaghband-Rad, Hajikarim-Hamedani, Motamed, 2023. Camouflage and masking behavior in adult autism. Front Psychiatry. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC10060524/
Dublin, 2023. Autism, “Niceness,” and People-Pleasing: A journey towards authenticity and equanimity. Medium. https://medium.com/blue-notes-to-myself/autism-niceness-and-people-pleasing-8a31aa9881ca
Megan Neff, Neurodivergent insights. What is Masking in Autism? Autistic Masking Explained https://neurodivergentinsights.com/what-is-masking-in-autism/
Miller, Rees, Pearson, 2021. "Masking Is Life": Experiences of Masking in Autistic and Nonautistic Adults. Autism Adulthood. https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8992921/
Reframing Autism. “I Like My Masked Self Better Than My Real Self - Whoever That Even is” https://reframingautism.org.au/i-like-my-masked-self-better-than-my-real-self-whoever-that-even-is/
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