WHERE TO GET THE BOOK: http://libgen.is/book/index.php?md5=F6B31A8DAFD6BD39A5986833E66293E6
People have been kind enough to link the audiobook in past posts, so hopefully they'll do that here, too.
In this chapter, Dr. Price goes over the various aspects of what exactly masking is. The various strategies that typically make up the mask, what their purpose is, and some insight on how to examine your own mask and see what it is you've been protecting yourself from. He starts by relaying more of Crystal and Timotheus's experiences, as well as some of his own, and the various things they were protecting themselves from. There's even an exercise you can go through to try and pinpoint the traumas that taught you which parts of yourself were unacceptable to the normies.
He talks about Camouflaging (blending in) and Compensating (covering for a perceived deficiency) and how most masking behaviors fall in one of the two categories. How all-pervasive these adjustments are in the life of a masked Neurodivergent, and how much it deprives us of and limits us.
Then there's discussion of the "being well-behaved" double-bind, where you can't possibly be autistic because they weren't able to penetrate the dense layers of masking that have become so intrinsic to your behavior that you've lost sight of who you really are. There's also discussion of ABA therapy, with fun things like spraying children in the face with water for not making sufficient eye contact, or talking "too much" about their special interest. Punishments for fidgeting, echolalia, compulsive chewing etc. Kids trained to repeat "please" and "thank you" over and over and over again until they reach an acceptable tone, to sit or stand on command while the therapist snaps their fingers at them like a dog. Painful electric shocks administered as "aversives." And of course, training children to exchange hugs and kisses for candy. There's no way that can create some incredibly harmful incentives for socially unsavvy kids!
And of course, this segues to the phenomenon where ASD seems to be primarily defined by caretakers in terms that center how much the patient inconveniences everyone else. DSM be like "the fuck is this guy's problem? what a fucking dork" and how this rather cruel enforcement of social norms is something those who dodge the ABA bullet pick up on naturally. Don't be cringe, or it's acceptable for people to deliberately hurt you. Look at the obviously Autistic guy and obsessively monitor his behaviors so you can not be like him and develop a deep-seated internal hatred of yourself. It's what the normies want.
From there, Dr. Price addresses specific things maskers tend to compensate for with over-correction. There's a handy-dandy chart of the undesirable qualities we wish to avoid being labeled as, and the strategies we use to avoid them.
This is a rather short chapter; roughly the length of the introduction. But there's certain to be a large excess of certifiable literally me moments within, so I like to think Dr. Price is pacing this shit a bit so we don't have to cry our eyes out completely every chapter. 
DISCUSSION QUESTIONS:
-
Any particularly striking quotes or passages for you?
-
Which of these anecdotes hit you the hardest, due to a personal memory?
-
Are there any aspects of yourself you realized you were compensating for that never really made themselves clear to you before?
-
You doing okay there? If you're a person who needs to read this book, there's probably a lot of really nasty shit rising up in your memory as a result of reading this chapter. People here care about you. The world's not completely cruel and nasty. There's bright spots too.
Next chapter, we start going into the costs of masking. It ain't cheap. But we'll put that aside for next week.
Tag post and my own thoughts to follow, hopefully within the time frame while it's actually still stickied.
EDIT: By the way, if you're having trouble keeping pace, absolutely feel free to discuss prior chapters in the comments. This shit is entirely informal and I'm sticking to a post a week as a personal challenge to demonstrate to my brain that sustained efforts can have an emotional and social payoff.
CARCOSA@hexbear.net (a sticky would be appreciated)
ReadFanon@hexbear.net
Othello@hexbear.net
Wertheimer@hexbear.net
roux@hexbear.net
voight@hexbear.net
LarsAdultsen@hexbear.net
BreadMaster5000@hexbear.net
NoLeftLeftWhereILive@hexbear.net
Pluto@hexbear.net
PointAndClique@hexbear.net
Jobasha@hexbear.net
FodlegBob@hexbear.net
Magician@hexbear.net
ByteFoolish@hexbear.net
YearOfTheCommieDesktop@hexbear.net
Orannis62@hexbear.net
homhom9000@hexbear.net
the_itsb@hexbear.net
optissima@lemmy.ml
AdmiralDoohickey@lemmygrad.ml
AlbigensianGhoul@lemmygrad.ml
sevenapples@lemmygrad.ml
JohannaChittarra@hexbear.net
voight@hexbear.net
ForgetPrimacy@lemmygrad.ml
lapis@hexbear.net
Context@hexbear.net
quarrk@hexbear.net
pinguinu@hexbear.net
un_mask_me@hexbear.net
Thanks for doing this book club. I have come to suspect I may be autistic and this community and this book have really helped me explore that. I have wanted to start interacting with other autistic and neurodivergent people for a while but have been afraid. So, this has nothing specifically to do with this chapter but just wanted to put myself out there so I can start interacting with the community more and relate to others and learn more about myself. I'll try to have something more valuable to add to the discussion about the book in the future!
Planning on doing a general discussion/break/catch-up post for my next one, as this one doesn't seem to be getting engagement and the sticky is not in the cards, and also a couple people have expressed the pace is going a little fast for them. I think I'll try gathering up the exercises in the chapters thus far and see if anyone wants to share their insights.
I am on an Autism reading binge, and I just read the ABA chapter in NeuroTribes, by Steve Silberman. Absolutely horrifying stuff, in much more detail than what we get here. In fact, everything about that book is making me so glad I was never diagnosed as a child. It would have helped my adulthood to have known, absolutely, but I'm glad that when I was a kid they all just shrugged and said, "Well, at least he's obsessed with reading. That's probably a good thing."
The one thing I remember being yelled at a lot for when I was a kid was being "anti-social." And I'd blow up at anyone who would interrupt me while I was reading - especially if they committed the cardinal sin of walking up to me on the playground to ask me what I was reading. Leave me the fuck alone, you fools! So it was a great source of pleasure, after reading Unmasking Autism and beginning to question everything, when I browsed an Autism subreddit and the top post that day was "Does anyone else hate when people interrupt you to ask what you're reading?" Yes, indeed, these are my people.
By the way, my current Autism reading binge has some recurring characters. Timotheus Gordon, Jr., is also quoted extensively in Eric Garcia's We're Not Broken.
Camouflaging really makes me think back to my high school days. Aside from my self isolation I used to have two groups of friends. There was one group where I was a bit more comfortable being myself, being loud and wacky and being able to share in some of more "nerdy" interests, and another one which were from a similar background as me (most of us with parents with the same country) and closer to what image I had in my head of what "cool kids" were like back then. I was a bit more reserved around them to try and fit in better. Thinking about it now I wonder if this constant back and forth may have lead to my self isolation.
I'm honestly still not entirely sure of who I am yet. Its something I think about constantly because I've spent so much time repressing different parts of myself. I think there's a lot during my childhood that kind of created the person I am these days. And some of it was from advice that I don't think was all that malicious. One of my favorite teachers in elementary school always told me to think before I spoke and I don't think there's anything inherently wrong with that. Its really made me think more of how what I say may affect other people, but I also think that I subconsciously took that to an extreme where I'll choose to silently let things stew inside my mind that end up just tormenting me.
I also remember that in elementary school I used to be a bit more forward with my attempts to make friends and that lead to a few situations where people rejected me and it made me think a lot about how to make friends and toning it down.
In adulthood I've been told about how robotic I can be. And I could identify some of those things in the exercise sheets, but when it came to describing what aspects of myself I'm trying to mask it was a bit tougher. Even now I'm not entirely sure who it is I have underneath the mask.
Reading about ABA really makes me feel for autistic people that have had to go through that shit. Its like damned if you do (getting diagnosed and "treated"), damned if you don't (living with a mask). The fact that abusive methods are still used to this day is just mind blowing to me.
-I highlighted so many passages in this chapter, but the one that stood out to me most:
I think for most masked Autistic people, there are key moments in childhood or adolescence where we learn we are embarrassing or wrong. We say the wrong thing, misread a situation, or fail to play along with a neurotypical joke, and our difference is suddenly laid bare for all to see.
That moment when the unspoken rules are broken and 'they' turn on you, hasn't gotten any easier. I thought as an adult, even with a fuck-ton of therapy to help with relationships, being more open with being weird, and even finding truly accepting friends... it's still hard when you are looked at with a mix of disdain and derision. Idk if it will ever get easier, but learning to stand up for myself and ask for help has been beneficial in small doses.
-For the personal memory:
she was a well-behaved, sweet kid, and a total teacher’s pet. Yet behind her smiling, agreeable façade, she was coping with constant social confusion and loneliness
Crystal's story continues to resonate with me in particular; sweet child, loved by the adults for being quiet/soft spoken, completely alienated by their peers once they realized something was 'off', and then the bullying into normalcy. I had frequent emotional distress, stomach issues and sensitivity, asking to skip school because of how overwhelming everything was without being able to say what exactly was so difficult about literally everything that everyone else seemed to do so easily...yeahhh. I could go on and on...
-For any aspects of yourself you realized you were compensating for that never really made themselves clear to you before:
Just so many...I feel like I have 4 me's: the work-sona, the me for my family, the more authentic me with friends, and the me who's me when I'm alone and most comfortable. My true Autistic self hasn't really seen the light of day in decades, and the burnout is real. This book has helped reframe so much of the toxic traits I've adopted to appear neurotypical.
Are you afraid of seeming stupid? Or childish? When you were young, did people accuse you of being cruel? Did you come to believe you were finicky, or selfish?
I was told all these things, out loud to my face, most of my life by parents, 'friends', extended family, coworkers. I've always loved small toys, which I would keep in my pocket or in a pocket of my bag. (I didn't know what stimming was but I was absolutely using the mini toys to stim when alone.)
On a work trip out of town where several people shared adjoining rooms, my toy was discovered while I was out. I came back to a makeshift noose around the toy's neck, hanging from the ceiling, and all of the ladies I was bunking with were sitting in wait to see my reaction at my discomfort, and laughed at and chided me when I got upset and refused to laugh it off.
Though masking is incredibly taxing and causes us a lot of existential turmoil, it’s rewarded and facilitated by neurotypical people. Masking makes Autistic people easier to “deal” with. It renders us compliant and quiet. It also traps us. Once you’ve proven yourself capable of suffering in silence, neurotypical people tend to expect you’ll be able to do it forever, no matter the cost. Being a well-behaved Autistic person puts us in a real double bind and forces many of us to keep masking for far longer (and far more pervasively) than we want to.
I hope anyone reading this knows there's people out there who accept you and are willing to make space for you. Thanks OP for fostering this space for discussion. It's hard and very sobering, but it feels like a puzzle piece clicking into the right place instead of just jamming pieces into the wrong puzzle.
