Listen to our podcast to gain insights into autism masking—a complex phenomenon where autistic individuals mimic neurotypical behaviors to fit societal norms. Discover effective strategies to support your child's authentic self-expression while navigating social expectations. Empower yourself with knowledge and tools to foster your child's well-being and promote acceptance within your family and community.
To watch the full webinar with Stacy, download the Autism 360 app at Autism360.com and gain invaluable insights.
Autism 360 App - 7 Day free trial
Listen to our podcast to gain insights into autism masking—a complex phenomenon where autistic individuals mimic neurotypical behaviors to fit societal norms. Discover effective strategies to support your child's authentic self-expression while navigating social expectations. Empower yourself with knowledge and tools to foster your child's well-being and promote acceptance within your family and community.
To watch the full webinar with Stacy, download the Autism 360 app at Autism360.com and gain invaluable insights.
Autism 360 App - 7 Day free trial
All right. We are here to talk about autism and masking. Masking is one of those words that is just starting to pop up everywhere, right? We didn't hear that word a few years ago. We hear the word now and sometimes we think we know what it is. Sometimes we don't know what it is and we don't want to ask. And even if we know what it is, what do we do with it? What do we do with that information? So we are going to talk about that today. All right. Really quick. Who am I? I am Stacey Baton and I am all about accepting and appreciating everything autism. I am determined. To shift the narrative and the perspective on autism. I am an autism educator. I am an advocate. I'm an ally of the autistic community. And I'm very concerned about the mental health of autistic individuals, which is why we are here today. And just a side note for context, someone asked why I was doing the presentation on masking when I'm not an autistic individual. And I said I'm not doing a webinar on masking from my perspective as an autistic person. I am presenting this webinar to help parents understand their kiddos, but also to help everyone realize what we need to do to make a more inclusive environment for autistic individuals, because we have a lot to do with. How they are included and how they are accepted based on our responses. So that is why I am talking about autistic masking. All right, you are going to gain an understanding of what masking is. We will uncover some of the challenges as well as the unique opportunities it creates for your family because it really does create some unique opportunities for your family. I will share some really practical strategies for navigating masking. I am not sure what that means. But it was in the title, so I'm going with it within navigating masking within the home, the community, as well as the school setting. You will also have an opportunity, of course, to connect with others and ask questions and we learn from each other's questions. All right. Masking is the term that is used in the autistic community. However, other terms have been used by various researchers. Some folks call it camouflaging, right? And camouflaging I learned from Karen Rose is actually really what autistic folks are doing, but I think masking is a little easier to say. Let's go back. Rewind. What is this masking thing? What is this masking thing? And why is it so important for us to understand? Karen Rose out of the UK, one of my favorite individuals, And he defines autistic masking as the conscious or unconscious suppression or projection of aspects of self and identity and the use of non native cognitive or social strategies. And this is a quote straight from the book that him and Amy Pearson. Just wrote or just published and it's called autistic masking, understanding, identity management, and the role of stigma. Now, this definition is like, what, does that mean? I can see the definition, but what does that really mean? What does it really mean? It actually means these other words combined together. So I think of camouflaging, right? Trying to fit into the environment. If we think of animals that camouflage or people who hunt. Adaptive morph morphine if you think about you go into an environment and the easiest one for me to think of in terms of analogies is going to someone's church, right? That you're not accustomed to the religious rituals in the church. So you do this sort of adaptive morphine, right? You follow and do what everyone else is doing because you're not really sure what you're Then we have this compensation, where you're compensating for something that you're not able to do, so you do other things. And one of the examples that I can think of that I feel is a compensation is, it's very difficult for a lot of autistic individuals to look at you while they're listening to you talk or responding to you. So we don't demand eye contact. We let it flow naturally. For those who feel like they need to, because of compliance, they will compensate when they're out and instead of them naturally giving eye contact, they will overcompensate, they'll compensate to make sure that people know they're listening and they'll do this really close look on the face, like really wide eyed straight to you. So that's a compensation. Then we think of impression management, if we have ever gone to a job interview we want to put our first impression. So if you are masking as an autistic individual, you are trying to give an impression, which more than likely is that you are not autistic or that you can appear neurotypical and. That's part of masking, right? That sort of encompasses. And then, of course, the self monitoring which for autistic individuals can look like making sure you're not fidgeting, making sure that you're not doing your fingers the way you do them in order to stem or making sure that you are not rocking back and forth. So that's self monitoring, right? And when I think of all these terms by various researchers, I think, Ooh, all of those together. It's like masking. And the concept is you're trying to fit in. You're trying to fit in. You're doing all of these things, trying to fit in. exhausting. It's so exhausting for autistic individuals. When you think of that exhaustion we think of the impact, so exhaustion in terms of fitting in and a lot of times people will say we all have to mask at certain times, right? We all have to fit in. We have to fit in because society has told us we have to fit in, but that's not allowing everyone to be their own individual person. And when it comes to an autistic individual, there are certain, safety security things around not being able to be their true self. So if we think of that impact on masking, that exhaustion comes from forcing your body to be still despite the need that you need. To move to focus. Children can learn not sitting in a chair. When I allow my students to move their bodies while they're learning with me, they're so attentive and so engaged. But if I were to force them to sit and keep still, they couldn't focus. Because they need to regulate to focus. So that's exhausting to try to keep your body still all the time. And what are they doing this? Where are they doing at school? Sitting. The other exhaustion is that verbal communication demands. Now, when we think of communication there's various ways to communicate, but typically what will happen is the person speaking to the autistic person, Person is expecting a verbal communication response. They're looking for the verbal, they're demanding the verbal, whether it's in therapy or in just a general conversation. That's exhausting when your communication is not reliable. And I'm sitting here talking to you and my words are flowing. My communication is usually very reliable. An autistic individual, even though they may have verbal communication, even though they may be able to communicate with their AAC device, sometimes executive functioning is not where it needs to be. And sometimes they just don't have access to their words. So that verbal communication, especially when it comes to greetings, right? Saying hi, saying bye, asking someone how they are it's exhausting. When they're working really hard to do that, and it's not their natural self socializing with peers. This is a big one in terms of masking because everyone else, usually the adults, and this is also adults with autistic adults, right? Spouses and friends and family. The socialization is expected. And of course, what amazes me in is that if you are not autistic and you are an introvert, that term that we hear all the time. It's okay if you don't go to the parties, but if you are an introvert and you're autistic, then you must find a way to go to the parties, even though it's not what you would want to do. It's not your natural self to socialize with large groups and your peers and have small talk. So doing all these things and masking as an autistic individual is exhausting. And the reason that they're doing it is to fit in. The next is that autistic burnout. And we're finally talking about autistic burnout and how that relates to children. And I'm glad that we're talking about that because when children have to mask all day at school, when they have to mask the entire time in ABA therapy, when they have to mask all the time. In a social skills class, they are enduring sensory overload. They are having forced eye contact. They are having to hide their autistic identity and they are suppressing a lot of their sensory needs, especially stimming, which is very important. So when all of these things are into play because of the demands of others, it leads to autistic burnout. That's the impact of masking. And then we get to the point where they've been masking for so long. They've been masking all of their life. They've been masking the first 5 years of their life. They've been masking the entire first grade. And now we have anxiety and depression over years, right over time that settles in because. They're not able to be their true personality. They're not able to express and talk about their interests because someone has decided, oh, we can't talk about trains. We have to talk about various activity topics. Why I'm not autistic. And I talk about the things I'm interested in. If I am at an event, social event, and, you're going through the groups, the tables and visiting and meeting people. If someone starts talking about sports, I'm leaving that group. I'm going to another group that is going to have a conversation about something I'm interested in. Autistic individuals have the right to be able to do that, but a lot of times they're trying to fit in. So they hide that right? Because they got pushed back. As my students said, I'm always yelled at when I talk about my favorite topic, right? That's not fair. And it leads to long term anxiety and depression, because it's telling the person that their interest is not valid. Their excitement for something is not valid when we put compliance demands in, right? You must do this at the time that I say, you have to do it. I'm not saying people should be able to do whatever they want to do. But when children, teens and adults are in a constant state of having compliance demands over time, anxiety and depression. Settle in. And we don't want that to happen. We don't want that to happen. We want our autistic adults to grow up mentally healthy, right? We want them to have a healthy mental status. Life is hard enough. Let's not create more opportunities where they have to mask the other situation is when they have to tolerate unsafe or uncomfortable situations, whether that's a therapy setting, whether it's a class setting where there's too many kids in the classroom, Or going to an errand on your own, going into the grocery store on your own as a young adult, it's a lot, right? You have to do it. You're an adult, you're responsible, and you do it, and then you crash. Because anxiety and depression, I'm not trying to paint this sad picture of autism. I'm not trying to say that autistic individuals want you to feel sorry for them. What I'm saying is, if we truly want autistic individuals to have an inclusive, safe environment. To grow and interact and be in, then we have to understand what we can do so that they don't have to do those things that cause autistic burnout, anxiety, depression. So they don't have to become exhausted even more than they already are. So that's why I'm talking about this in terms of it's not to feel sorry. It's what can we do? And of course, masking. Leads to wrong diagnosis, late diagnosis or no diagnosis, right? All the time. All right, so now this is the question I get all the time from parents. How do I know if my child is masking? I'll give you a few examples and from the words of a really good friend of mine who just happens to be autistic, they said we mask a lot, right? And you may not always know we're masking, especially if we have been masking for a long time or since you have met them. You don't know that's not their true self. So we'll look at some examples and it could be an individual who is very sound sensitive and they try to avoid reacting to the noises. So it's almost like sitting in a conference and the speaker is really loud and it's overwhelming and you're trying to participate as an autistic individual listening to the presenter. And it's just really taking a toll on your sensory system. But you're going to sit there, you're going to suck it up, right? Because you're an adult, but that's masking and not being able to feel comfortable putting noise canceling headphones on or not feeling comfortable stepping away to stand in the back of the room leads to masking that leads to exhaustion over time, autistic burnout. And then we have the anxiety depression set in right a child who engages in stemming, but will not stem at school. They will sit on their hands to avoid stemming, or they will avoid rocking. Right and I actually have this example from a student of mine that I work with in the afternoon, and she stems the entire time. She's in the lesson with me. And her mother is always really sad because she's never seen her stem at school. She wants to fit in. She doesn't want anyone to say anything. Teachers have always corrected her. So she's masking all day. And I feel that they don't even know the true little girl that I work with. Because she is funny and delightful, but at school, she's quiet and holding it together to not stim. She's masking. It's exhausting. All right. A teen who struggles to process language might pretend they understand the conversation, right? And that's the autistic teen who is within the group. They don't really say a lot, but they're shaking their head and acting as if they really are understanding the conversation. That's masking. They're not feeling they can be their true self and they want to fit in a team at a social event with peers will use scripts to avoid talking about their special interest. So they will practice saying things that are of interest to other kids to avoid talking about their special interest. Because as 1 of my students said. Nobody wants to hear it anymore. And I get it. I'm not saying that everybody has to listen to the same story about trains. There are ways that we can work it out and compromise. But we also have to respect the fact that every human being has a right to choose who they want to talk with, who they do not want to play with, who they do want to engage in social engagement with. Talk about whatever they're interested in. And naturally over time, we start to anything else you make adjustments as needed. That should be an internal motivation. The other is a child will attend a birthday party and join in the games, even though they are extremely dysregulated. And typically, after doing this masking, what happens either they melt down and you have to leave the party or as soon as you get home. It's not fun, right? Crash and burn because they masked to participate. It doesn't mean they didn't want to go to the party. They probably did want to attend the party, but the party was not a sensory safe environment, but they did it. They masked. They participated. The result is crash burn, right? Another 1 or the last 1 is an adult will eat foods that are not sensory safe just to fit in at work. Someone brought brownies or someone made potluck lunch, and usually they bring their lunch for their sensory safe foods, but they will eat those foods. I have a example of a friend of mine. She's autistic and her husband is not, and it's really funny. On Wednesdays, he cooks a new recipe, and she's Ugh he always wants to cook something new and he knows I will eat the same food items, right? These are my sensory safe foods, but they have an agreement. She tries it. If she doesn't like it, then she lets it go. And that's what they worked out, right? They're compromised. They're adults. They're married and they that's what marriage is about compromising. But when you are an adult in the workplace, right? You haven't worked out that deal with your coworkers. You want to fit in. You don't want to always feel like you're asking for accommodations and. You just eat those foods, masking. All right. How can I stop, prevent, stop or prevent masking? Parents say this all the time. I know that masking is not good for my child. I know it's not good for me as an autistic individual. How do I stop it? How do I prevent it? And the answer is. You can't because we cannot control the environment all the time everywhere. But what we can do is we can minimize the opportunities, or let me rephrase that. We can minimize the amount of masking and autistic individual has to do by doing some simple things. And one of them is simply to demonstrate acceptance. Demonstrate acceptance, I always take a lot of pride when my students stem when they're in a lesson with me, because that tells me they feel comfortable being their true self. I let them stem and sometimes it's a lot of movement, right? It's visually distracting for me, but I am capable of holding it together because I don't have a neurological system. That's overloaded. So I allow it. I don't call attention to it. It's what they need to do in order to focus and attend. And it's perfectly fine. And I always say to parents, we can't control everything in the world. We cannot make everyone do what we want them to do to support the needs of autistic individuals. We can at least control when we're with that person, and we can at least accept them for who they are, because when they come to us, when they come home to parents, that big, bad, ugly world out there is the door shut and you can be your true self. Now, I will say something in regards to the true self. A lot of folks will push back on the concept of masking and say things like, Everybody has to mask, right? Everybody has to give an impression in the workplace. I'm different than I am in my house or out with my buddies at the bar. Yeah, but when you're with your buddies at the bar, you're not necessarily masking. You're just your casual self when you're at work. You are just your work self. Masking for autistic individuals is not being able to be who they are. Not being able to regulate their sensory needs because everyone thinks it looks wrong. Or weird. So that's the difference in terms of it's not so much that you put on your work persona, your social persona, your married persona, your parent persona, your family persona. We all code switch based on where we are, but you're still your authentic self. Within the dynamics of the relationship of who you are. With so masking is very different for autistic individuals. And I always say that all of us have, even when it comes to sensory, the differences, I am not going to go into meltdown shutdown. And my autistic friend could possibly get into that if they're sensory overloaded. So thinking about the concept of everybody has to do that. It's a little different, right? So acceptance of that is really important. We may not understand it, but we have to accept it. The other thing is not to take meltdowns or outbursts or the autistic person's need for isolation as a personal attack. Don't look at it as it's. About me. It's at me or they're always yelling at me. I almost feel sometimes and I tell this to moms. Moms always get the true child, right? They always get the true child. They are quiet with grandma and then they come home and with mom, they are a totally different person. That's because. They know they can be who they are. They know that they're going to be supported. They know that if they have an outburst mom accepts them and won't take it personally. Not every mom, but most of the time. Thinking in terms of when there is a reaction, a response, or the autistic person does not want to hang out with you after school, your child wants to go in their room. I know it's hard. You want to spend time with your kiddos, but let them have the time because they have been masking all day at school and they're tired. They're tired. Allowing them to. Do what they need to do, especially when they have let me rewind that to do what they need to do to re, regulate. Allow them that time. And don't take it personal because with others, they typically have to do a lot more masking than they have to do with parents. Parents should be a safe space. The other thing that you can help to do is preparing a script. Now, what does that mean? Preparing a script can mean something simple as, what am I going to say in response when people say, why aren't you with the group, right? Or what am I going to say as a parent when someone says, why is your child not participating in the group? You prepare a script, right? You prepare something to say, and it can be something simple. It can be something educational, or it can be something that is just a simple advocation for your kiddo. You can also, depending on the age of your child, prepare them with the script, right? I teach my students how to ask for a break. I teach them how to explain that they need more time to process. We practice those scripts because when they're in that moment of, Oh my gosh, I feel like I need to mask. Oh my gosh, I feel a lot of pressure. Oh my gosh, I'm feeling close to sensory overload. If you have to think of what you have to say to advocate for yourself, it's really hard. So we practice, so then it's wrote, it comes up, the script is there. It's really important to help. And the other thing is, sometimes the script can be as simple as, I'm choosing not to mask in this environment. And I hope that's okay because this is what I'm going to do and that has been done several times within the podcast that I host when we have autistic guests, they will come and say, I'm not masking during this podcast. I'm like, we don't want you to mask. We want you to be who you are. So that's a script within itself. The other thing that you can do to help you're not going to stop and you can prevent or, and I got not going to stop totally, but you want to minimize, right? The amount of time that your autistic person in your life has to mask. So come up with work arounds. Let's say that stemming is very necessary in the workplace when you are in a meeting. Some autistic folks feel a little bit more self conscious than others, so they will develop a workaround for stimming. They may have a fidget that they hold underneath the table. They may sit in a certain position so that they can move their leg in order to regulate where they're not going to knock into someone. A workaround can be having a supportive role with someone helping you. And I'll give an example in terms of, I'm talking about the workplace, because I know that we talk a lot about kids, right? Kids don't have as much autonomy. We have to provide them with those things. But in terms of a work around in that supportive role, I had a coworker who Neurodivergent coworker, and she had quirky things that she would do during the meeting and we didn't have a team that was as supportive and understanding as they should have been. So she got a lot of pushback. And she was having trouble dealing with that. And she wanted to not. She didn't want to mask more, but she wanted to figure out what she could do. So she wasn't ostracized. So we came up with a signal. And when we had meetings, I would sit in a certain spot. That was right across from her. And then we had hand signals where I would cue her if she was starting to do something that she wanted to work around. So thinking in terms of what you can do to support your kiddos for those work arounds. I had an example of 1 of my students. said he really wanted to be on stage for the school play, but it was really overwhelming and he knew it wasn't gonna be able to do it and he couldn't mask through it. So he took a role of being backstage and helping with the backstage things, right? Still participated. He just worked around to avoid masking so he could just be himself. Another one is advocate, advocate for your child, advocate for your child with family and friends. That's where we can start. School's a whole nother thing. Yes, we advocated school and that's another PowerPoint. That's another webinar, but advocating for your child with family and friends. And I say that because your family and friends should be the group of people that are supporting you. I know everybody's not on board, but that should be the folks who are supporting you. So if your child needs to move and jump around at a family event, then you should advocate for your child to be able to have a space to do that at grandma's house, have a tent or a sensory area for your child to go to. So they don't have to mask because over time, what does that do? They can only sustain it for so long. Meltdown, shutdown. And that's not fun for anyone. So sometimes it's uncomfortable to advocate. Sometimes we don't know the words and that's where you can work with other parents to get ideas or your child's therapist or there's lots of stuff on social media. So advocating for your child will help your child have situations where they don't have to mask, right? And that's what we because we know masking is going to be required in many places. The other thing is you have been modeling advocating for your child. You also want to teach them to advocate for themselves as they grow. When you model advocating for your child is watching, they're watching you stand up for them. They're watching you support them. They will be able to do that for themselves. They try to, right? By leaving the room, by walking away, by pushing things away, by saying no, but everybody says no, you have to follow. No, we have to do this. So they try to advocate, they try to communicate what they need or don't need, and they're not always heard. So teach them to advocate by modeling, and then find other ways to help them communicate that advocation. All right, so the message is, we can't make the concept of masking go away, we can't make the situation so that autistic individuals never have to mask, but we can do things to minimize the amount of time an autistic individual has to mask. So this question was something I'd never really thought about, but someone asked me this question and I said, that's a pretty good question. I'll put it in the PowerPoint. Is masking ever a good thing? Masking can keep an autistic individual safe. Keeps them safe. One of those examples is black and brown folks. In the United States and in other parts of the world, but specifically, and this is talked about a lot on social media, black and brown. Individuals specifically black and brown males in the United States have a lot of bias and so they already have to mask whether they're autistic or not. But if you are a black. Are brown autistic male. Your masking has to go to another level to keep you safe. Their stemming in public looks different is perceived differently than someone that is of a different race. And even though it's not right, it's just the reality. So the masking for that individual keeps them safe and safety is important, right? Safety is important. Sadly. So that's where masking can be a good thing, right? Cause it keeps you safe. Sadly, many autistic students have to mask all day at school just to stay out of trouble. And it's really sad because they're going to get on red light or they're going to get a behavior mark because they got out of their seat. They're getting out of their seat because they need to move their body to regulate. So in order to not get in trouble, in order to pick from the treasure box, in order to not get another nasty note to mom, they mask all day at school. It's a good thing because they say out of trouble, but over time it's not so good. But it's a good thing if everyone wants them to stay out of trouble, masking is often necessary in the adult workplace. And I gave an example of that earlier, but it is necessary in terms of. Sometimes masking is required in order to not be left out of opportunities to be promoted. Masking is often necessary in the workplace so that an autistic individual doesn't feel. That staring glare from coworkers because they have an accommodation available to them right now. Hopefully 1 day we won't have to do this. And at least adults in the workplace will be able to be understanding and accepting of neurodivergent individuals. And who cares if somebody stands while they work and amazes me how the standing desk is all popular. But when it comes to students. Children standing in the classroom. It's not popular. So adults can stand at work, but students can't and students are children. They're not even neurologically all done. But this is the society we live in and we're learning. And hopefully we can make some changes, but masking is good in terms of keeping someone safe, staying out of trouble from a child's perspective, because kids don't want to be in trouble and it is necessary for the workplace quite often. To answer that question, yes, it is all right, The first reminder is we have to understand that masking requires a lot of work for the autistic individual, a lot of work for the autistic individual, a lot of work for the two year old, a lot of work for the five year old, an exhausting amount of work for the adult and the teen. That's a lot. We have to remember that. And if nothing else or if you, today's rewind my words day, if you take nothing else from this presentation, please take into account and think about and remember that autistic individuals are working extremely hard to navigate an environment that was not designed for them. They're not broken. The environment's just not designed for them. So they're working very hard. Give them a little grace if there's a meltdown or an outburst and do things to prevent it. There's lots of things we can do so that we don't have those situations occur. The second reminder is recognize when your child is masking and support their needs. So let's say that you notice that your child is masking. You know that they need to stem and you notice that they're trying not to, and you can see that look on their face. Depending on where you are, either give them something to hold in their hand and fidget with, bring things, be proactive, right? If you're a teen or an autistic adult, bring things that can support your needs so that, if you can minimize your masking in a certain scenario. Then that sort of lessens the exhaustion, right? It doesn't make it as difficult. So it's really thinking about knowing the autistic individual, knowing yourself as an autistic individual, and knowing what you need to do to prepare when you're going into situations where you may have to mask. Another reminder is don't shame masking. But also don't contribute to it being necessary. A lot of times and this is something new. If someone masks, then someone will say, why are you asking? Why are you asking? Just be your true self. Everybody's different, right? Everybody's not comfortable getting looks. Everybody's not comfortable getting pushback. So don't shame someone for masking because they're trying to get through the day, right? But don't contribute. To the necessity of them having to mask the last is give yourself a little grace and know that you can always reset towards acceptance. And I say that because as a non autistic person we have to give ourselves grace when we may be. I shouldn't have done that, right? Or I can't believe I put them in that situation where they had to mask all day and now they can't go and have fun on the weekend. Right? Reset look at your strategies. Decide what you're going to do to be proactive and move towards acceptance. Sometimes acceptance is 3 steps forward. One step back, two steps forward, one step back, right? But it's a process, it's a process and it's a journey. And it's important for us as non autistic individuals to, and autistic as well, to accept the differences, to accept autism. And, it's funny. I just thought about the fact that I'm saying it's important for non autistic folks to accept autism. It's important for autistic folks to accept autism. Doesn't mean that all the, that autistic individuals are not open to unmasking, unmasking takes a lot of what did someone say? It wasn't braveness. Auti and Elle explained it in terms of, she has to Build up a lot of energy through sensory regulation in order to go into an environment that she knows she has to mask in. So it's almost like getting your battery charge, because, you're going to use a lot of energy to mask. Thinking in terms of, we all have to accept that. Masking is necessary, but also what can we do to avoid individuals having to do that so much. And the way that we can remember those things in terms of how we can support why we need to be cognizant of masking why it's important to understand masking is because we have to remember the impact masking has on autistic individuals. We have to remember the impact. I cannot stress enough. I want. The next generation of autobiographies written by autistic individuals to not be about trauma. Life is hard enough. Life is little moments of trauma, right? It doesn't always have to be devastating, but it's hard enough. For autistic individuals, they are constantly put in positions where they are just having to mask, not able to stem, not able to regulate, and that takes a toll on them. And nothing saddens me more than reading. An autobiography and things that were done could have been prevented. Nothing saddens me more than watching an autistic colleague push really hard through grad school masking to be what everyone thinks they're supposed to be to fit in with the academia to prove that they can and then they burn out and they can't. They have a degree and they can't, they can communicate, they can have, they have a job skill or a certification, right? To do a job, but they can't because of anxiety, depression, and autistic burnout. It's not worth pushing through the masking to get to what people want you to be because it can't be sustained. It can't be sustained, there are several autistic teens and young adults that masked and pushed through and got through high school, went to college and crash suicide attempts, anxiety, depression. We can avoid that, right? Life goes on if we don't finish school on time. Life goes on if we don't make the perfect grades life goes on. If we do things differently, it really does. I'm not saying it's easy. I want you to understand the impact. Masking has on autistic individuals, because we talk about inclusive settings. We talk about we want to include. But then we don't put them in situations where they can unmask. We have to contribute as well, because I don't want any more anxiety, no more depression, no more autistic burnout. No. Yes, it's going to happen because of life, but if we can contribute to minimizing that, then why not? Why not? All right question time. I love question time. So 1 of the questions is can you cover masking within the, oh, the pathological demand avoided a profile of autism? I'm not really sure if that was discussed in the webinar specific to and what I will say is this. I don't know if I have time to necessarily go into that because that's a really different angle. In, in terms of what this webinar is trying to help everyone understand and the focus of this webinar. But I'm going to and Jesse, you are on this zoom. If you could note, I think that would be a great. Topic for another webinar, because I do think that is important for us to discuss masking within PDA errors. And I think that takes a whole nother webinar. And ah, What are the types of stimming? Is leg shaking one? That's a really good question, Marie. And, when I'm glad you brought that up, because stimming is probably one of the things that is masked the most, right? Not wanting someone to see you move your hands or a lot of times, the rocking and what's really funny is When you see autistic adult, I don't mean funny, like humorous, funny. Funny in terms of when you see an autistic adult rocking and they're able to have a conversation with you and talk to you, but the minute they stop, they can't communicate as efficiently because the rocking helps them to regulate, helps them to process. It helps them to maintain in the environment so that they don't have a meltdown. That's the benefit of stemming. It's a wonderful thing. It's a really wonderful thing. So examples could be moving hands, rocking. Some people stem with fidgets. Some people stem stems are so many different things. Some people dance and that's their stem. Some folks script and repeat something over and over again. Stemming is, we should probably do a webinar on that. I think we do have that on the list, but stemming can look different for individuals and it has many different purposes. Another question is, how do I help when stimming is hurtful to the person, like picking their nails until their bleed? Picking nails until you bleed is very difficult to watch. It is very difficult to stop by saying things like, stop don't pick your, and explaining how it's harmful. It's just really hard, that doesn't work, right? Which I'm sure you know that, because you've probably tried that. And I'm going to stop sharing. All right, so when I think about the nail picking in terms of I don't want them to have to mask, but I also don't want them to pick their nails until their bleed because that brings on a whole nother dynamic socially. What you want to do is you need to figure out by getting a sensory profile and finding out why do they need to pick their nails? What in their sensory system needs support and it's not always as simple as, oh, they only need tactile. There's a lot of things connected to that neurological feeling of picking until you bleed. And more than likely, when it gets to that point, it's because they have been in masking high masking environments. Maybe school all day or a rigorous therapy or 40 hours of ABA that requires masking. Sometimes the result is that underlying anxiety that can come with autism when you're not supported. You're going to do those things in order to cope, right? But the key to minimizing harmful stems is you have to know what their sensory needs are. You have to understand how their sensory system works. And that is the only way to provide the support that they need. Yeah, playing the drums is very regulating. It's I like that you share that example because 1 of the things that's really hard for whether you're autistic or non autistic is when someone's deaf Unmasking is an auditory stim, right? Auditory stims are great for the autistic individual that needs them so that they don't have to mask, but it is extremely disruptive at times to the other folks in the environment, right? So how do we balance that? It just depends on the person. It is sometimes very necessary, but I always say. In fact, I'll give a scenario. A lot of times when I'm in a zoom meeting and let's say the kiddo is in the room or the kiddo walks in the room and they start doing verbal stems and they're saying the same thing over and over again, or they're saying the, or they're banging on something, right? They're trying to regulate. So I tell the parents well, and they'll say, oh, stop doing that. Stop doing it. And I say, no, I understand exactly. Why they're doing that my voice, me being present in their environment, even though it's through zoom, it's still a sensory overload. It's a different voice. It's a different routine for them. I'm not usually they're not usually, every day. I'm not on zoom with their parents. So I am sensory overload. I am new sensory information. I have interrupted their time with their parent so they are verbally stimming, unmasking themselves and being their true selves. In order to avoid a meltdown, so I say they can do it. I just filter it out. I'm not saying sometimes it's not exhausting because sometimes it is. That's where you just give them a space to do it. Just say, okay, I can't my sensory systems getting overloaded. Do you need some time? I have a student that when I start to see that scripting verbal stemming, I will just simply say, do you need 90 seconds or 2 minutes? And they tell me 90 seconds, or they tell me 2 minutes. Sometimes they say 30 seconds. And I give them that I sit quietly, and I'll let them do whatever they need to do. And then they come back and say, they're ready. I just give them a little time. And that is, an example of. Allowing someone to be unmasked, right? They can only unmask if we allow them, which means we have to respond in a way of acceptance. That's a simple way to put it. Ah, so this is a question about a 19 year old has decided to be non binary, does not like to be she or her and everyone has to address her as them or they. Is this a typical reaction from masking? It's interesting that you say that because there is a lot of masking that goes on from the perspective of those in the LGBTQ community. Lots of masking, right? Lots of being who people want them to be instead of being their true selves. And I don't necessarily think that technically, I would say, maybe, yes, it's a reaction. They're tired of masking. They don't want to mask. They have recognized. I've been masking all this time and I no longer want to do it because it's exhausting. And so accepting their request and. Doing what they request will be very helpful. Right acceptance is important, even if you don't agree with something. When you at least accept it. And say, okay, I don't understand it. I may not agree with it right now because I don't understand it, but I accept it if this is what you have said, because that goes a long way. And then you can work out the kinks when we fight against things where someone has asked us to do things like, please don't I'll give an example of a work individual who their accommodation for the workplace as an autistic adult was please don't. Come into my space from behind. I need to know that you're coming in. Please knock. Please say my name. I need time to know that you're going to be in my visual space because it startles my sensory system and I respond. It throws me off. So when they request that. Co workers should say, okay, I'll make an effort to do that more consistently. That just goes a long way. Don't agree with it, maybe don't understand it. And usually we don't agree with something right off the bat because we don't understand it. I hope that answered your question. All right. The next question is my 17 year old wants a career as an actor and she feels safe playing a role that doesn't involve acting. Is this an example of how to adapt to society through masking? Is it a good choice for a career that I've been supporting? Yes. Yes. Yes. And yes, many actors. are coming out and letting us know and recognizing that they are neurodivergent, ADHD, or autistic. I have several autistic young adult friends that are pursuing acting as a career because it's just easier. It's just easier, right? If I'm going to have to mask, at least I can make money off of it, but yes, it is a form of masking, especially if you've been doing it for so long. It just becomes something you have gotten used to and so you can filter it into something that is productive. I guess it's making lemonade out of lemons. Okay. What should we do? If the child is not doing task at school and complaining of writing very boring? Writing is not a task at school. Writing is hard for a lot of autistic individuals. It takes a lot of motor planning, executive functioning, motor planning, executive functioning. We have technology. They can write using technology. That's an accommodation and writing is boring. I love it when. We want people to change their opinion on something, like teachers will say I want them to like math. How do you do that? How do you get someone to like something they don't like? I like chocolate. My son does not like chocolate. Do I need to force him to like chocolate? No, that's more chocolate for me, right? But when someone says something is boring, especially a child, I just say, oh, I'm so sorry. How do you think we can make it exciting? What would make it easier? Ask them. Kids really have a lot of solutions for themselves. You'd be surprised. They come up with the solutions. We just have to be open to it. And tasks at school support. This is one of the struggles in an in school environment. Autistic individuals are exhausted in schools having to mask. They're not getting access to their sensory needs. They're having to sit. They're coming home, right? Totally dysregulated. All right. Um, at school teacher and wellbeing office to make them sit on the wobbly chair during listening time. That's fine. I think that kids should be able to move. I don't know who decided we have to sit in a chair to learn. You don't need to sit to learn. There's no rule about sitting is the only way to learn something. People drive and listen to podcasts and learn. You can stand and learn. You can move and learn. In fact, a lot of children learn better when they are moving. They really do. A question is one of my seven year old stims is hitting forehead. He says it feels good, but often his teacher tells him to stop. Ah, inclusive school, getting on the same page. He's not actually hurting himself. So this is sensory input, right? You get lots of proprioceptive input when you do that, right? It feels good. My thing would to be given as much of that sensory input throughout the day, like pillow fights. I have a kid that has a pillow and they go into their sensory space and they bang the pillow on their face or they smush their face in the pillow. They get that sensory need met, and then they come back to the to the table. 1 of my students just sits at his table with a therapy van. And they just put it on their body when they need to where they need to. I know sometimes people say, masking and the other kids, if they unmask, they're going to get picked on. This is the deal. If we don't start accepting different. Modeling accepting of different, if we as adults, don't start explaining to nonautistic children, why Mary has to spin explaining what autism is and what stemming is autistic individuals will never have an inclusive environment. We'll never have it. They'll never have it. We have to start saying it's okay. If they do this. If it's not hurting anyone, right? You all understand that. I know everybody gets uncomfortable. It looks different. I don't want them to get picked on. But if we talk about it. Then they don't get picked on. Children pick on other kids when they don't understand something. Children just pick on kids. That's gonna happen. But we have to start talking about it and accepting it. I remember when, deaf children were thought to be, they can't do anything. Now there's sign language everywhere. Rap concerts, right? Sign language everywhere. It's acceptable now because we started to say it's okay. We need to do that for autistic individuals as well. Stemming, rocking, moving, communicating differently is okay. It's okay. It really is okay. All right. That's the only way for us to get environments that are not going to force them to mask all the time. All right. Transitioning headstart. How do I advocate for them to be a classroom academic level? I will say, in order to advocate for your child and inclusive classroom setting, you have to know what your child needs. You know what your child needs and you go in with a plan. You go in and say, listen, my child does much better when they sit. Near a wall, my child does not much better when they have their fidget. My child does much better after they have had movement activities. My child does much better if they have noise canceling headphones. My child does much better when they have pictures to communicate for backup. Let them know what your child needs. That is how we advocate. Letting folks know what your child needs. Ah, okay. This question is a great question. How do I teach my child to not mask when as an adult, all I really know is only to mask. Shelby, you can't necessarily teach them not to mask, but what you can do is this, you can guide them towards resources, right? There's a book behind me on masking autism, autistic masking. I will say autistic masking is a little bit more made for, it's not a leisure read. It's a class. It's really great for like a college course, but yeah. That's a good book. Good book. And then we're not broken and other things. The more autistic individuals understand their autistic identity, the easier it is to let go of masking, right? To feel comfortable enough to say, I need this, or I'm not going to do this. Masking is inevitable. All autistic individuals say, I have to mask sometimes. But when they become adults, they can choose when they want to mask. And the key to that is understanding autistic identity. That's why it's important for your child to know they're autistic. That's why it's important to talk about autism. That's why it's important to talk about autism. That's why it's important to talk about autism. We can't hide it. We can't mask it, right? Talk about it, put it out there. That's important, but I do appreciate that you are thinking of the mental health of your adult child and the least amount of support leads to masking, which leads to mental health issues. But if they're supported, it just makes it much easier. And we decrease the potential of having mental health difficulties when they're adults. All right. It's interesting. Someone brought up masking in a webinar that I watched in terms of the first three dates, masking the first three dates. And then they truly get to know who you are on the fourth date or masking until you get married. And then you find out who the person really is. So masking is not good for either party. And we want to know a person's true self. We want to know their true self. So Jesse, I'm scanning through to make sure I don't miss anyone's question. I know that some folks are just chatting, which is great. I love the interaction and the engagement. The interesting thing is, I talk about masking in terms of we need to accept masking. There are some autistic individuals, some neurodivergent individuals who don't accept someone being truly autistic and just being their authentic self either, right? So it's not people are people, human beings are human beings. And all I can say is, if we want to have a relationship with another human being, we should allow them to be their true self because that's the only way to have an authentic relationship is to know who they really are. If there's someone else, then you're not really in a relationship because that's not who they are. All right. So go forth. Watch the replay learn more about masking. And if you have a child of a certain age, have discussions and ask them, do you understand what masking is? Do you know when you're masking? And you can help them with some supports around maybe not needing to mask and how they could decrease the amount of times they have to mask. There are a couple of questions I'm just going to answer really quick. Someone says, speaking of the true self, does an autistic person sometimes lose their true self because they never could? Yes. And yes. I have a wonderful podcast where Dina Gassner addresses that. And it usually happens a lot with women who are late diagnosed. Yes, they have trouble finding who they really are because they've been masking their whole life. All right. Thank you all so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Bye.