The 4 Types Of Autistic Masking (97% of People Only Know The 1st Type)

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0:14Dr Carly Jones MBE:Why do you think people with ADHD or autism apologize all the time? Saying sorry is a really good kind of small print in case I messed it up. Even if I don't think I'd messed anything up. That disclaimer to say, I'm not sure I've got this right, so I'm going to apologize anyway. which then is really tricky because people know that you're going to take the blame for anything. When does people pleasing become a survival response rather than just being kind? Something I see a lot in neurodivergent women and men is the fawning, which is beyond kindness. I'm going to pretend everything is fine in order to escape this situation when it's safe to do so.

0:49Dr Carly Jones MBE:But if the autistic person isn't being truly themselves, the version of themselves that's receiving all of that input from the world isn't actually reaching them, Is that a unique experience of loneliness? The masks might be like a guard to protect you, but it's also... Can I have just a second of your time? If this podcast has helped you understand your brain or made you feel less alone, can you do me one favour? Can you hit the follow button? And I'll repay the favour by continuing to book the best and most exclusive conversations on this topic. Please enjoy the episode and always remember, you're not broken, just different, and you have always been enough.

1:28Dr Carly Jones MBE:Carly, so good to have you back. Thank you for having me back. I feel very relaxed, as you can see by my arm up here, and I'm taking my shoes off. They're so comfortable, right? The chairs. Four types of autistic masking. I've been doing this podcast for three years, and I had no idea that there were four types of autistic masking. And we're going to talk about them. And it's the fourth one that I think is the most exhausting, having looked at the research for this episode. I think it's the one that can look like confidence, it's the one that can look like success, but I think it's also the one that can actually be the most damaging in terms of how it can lead to burnout.

2:08Dr Carly Jones MBE:But before we get to the four types of masking, when you hear the term masking, you often think of someone pretending to be someone else, but that's not really what masking is, is it? No, I think if we kind of look historically, perhaps like the scooby-doo character it would always end wouldn't it as the mask would come off and oh look it was actually the villain pretending to be someone else so there's that kind of um myth i think that it's about pretending to be somebody else for for ill intent um and and it's it's it's not masking is a survival technique to hide your vulnerability and to keep you safe it's not done with with malice or um or forgery it's it's purely to to survive um or to feel that that you're fitting in i keep thinking of these the scooby-doo analogy that's brilliant like the villain and he always said right like i and i would have gotten away with it too if it wasn't for those meddling kids yeah i suppose the adhd or autistic masking is like do you think people feel like they're getting away with the masking or do you think they they're aware that some people might be able to see through it i think at first you don't really know you're masking from a younger age and you must just assume that i know i certainly did assume that's what everybody does and everyone goes home exhausted and everyone is struggling with this and no one's actually really looking forward to doing this like you know no one's having to spend days to prepare either mentally or physically or perhaps with clothing and makeup or hair extensions.

3:50As you see, I have arrived unmasked today. I read the questions and I was like, yeah, I'm going to have to leave those hair extensions and eyelashes at home today because I'd feel like a massive hypocrite. And then I'd be sat here, wouldn't I? And you'd be going, Carly, do you think people realise when they're masked? And I'd be like, yeah i'm busted i'm totally busted but i think at first particularly in childhood or in the teenage years you don't realize that's what you're doing because it's going to be on a kind of um a very physical and sensory level that mask when i got my autism diagnosis this and we're talking about masking we're trying to go as far back as we could remember um some funny stories my mother i was at nursery and there was this girl and i really wanted to be friends with her i think she might have had a care bears top or rainbow bright top or something and her name was sophie right and i really wanted to and i can remember this really well i really wanted to be friends with sophie and i asked her her name and she said sophie and i said oh i've got a sofa because i thought she said sofa and then at that point i remember being like three or four and cringing and then every time i went to nursery after that i would hide in a telephone box and pretend to make phone calls every time i'm saying you do you want to play with the other children i was like no i can't do this i can't do this thing that everyone's doing i'll just sit in a telephone box pretending to make phone calls um so i'd kind of realized by then i'd had to i was i was getting it wrong so i'd have to try other other ways yeah i can remember one time uh gosh this is awful and I feel terrible about it I was probably five or six and um once a month we'd have a treat and that was a Chinese takeaway and the really nice Chinese family that ran the Chinese takeaway where we lived when I was growing up and um I noticed that they spoke to us in English and they spoke to each other in Chinese and um I decided that I felt quite sorry that they had to speak in two languages so I tried to speak to them in Chinese obviously I couldn't do that because I do not speak Chinese and getting really told off because they thought that I was kind of taking the mickey or something I wasn't I was just trying to fit in and blend in so like even at those ages I kind of thought right if I'm going to a Chinese restaurant I'm gonna have to learn speak Chinese you know I just always try to adapt to wherever I was that's interesting because we talk

6:22Dr Carly Jones MBE:a lot about children getting corrected and told off for the differences that we associate with autism or ADHD but I mean that is a story of you getting told off for trying to be someone else. Yeah yeah I think and I think as adults as well I can understand why because it must have been really embarrassing for my parents but I so I completely understand why and if you ask them now they'll think it's you know a funny a funny memory but as adults when we see a child doing something like that it's easy for us to put our adult intent or our adult experience of life going oh that must be because they're mocking someone but actually no we're just going well that's what people do here um i i'm gonna copy what i see yes so we have to be quite careful i think um particularly for children if they are doing something i think that's why are they doing that it might not be because there's ill intent behind it it might just be oh that's what they think they need to do in this environment how interesting yeah I remember my first conscious memory of masking I remember it so well I was seven and I've told this part of the story before I was on the playground at school and a boy called Fred he tapped me on the shoulder and he said Alex you could be one of the cool kids if you weren't so weird and I remember thinking why does Fred think I'm weird and it hit me that it's probably because usually in the morning rather than playing football and playing cards on the playground I disappeared to the library and I read the stock market updates this is amazing when I was seven years old you know the early pattern recognition and all of that was there clearly from a young age and I remember looking out of the window and thinking what do I need to do in order to stop feeling weird or at least to stop them thinking I'm weird and I remember looking out of the window peeking out and seeing Fred he seemed to be the cool kid he seemed to be all of the other kids he was the one that they looked up to yeah and they were all playing with these football cards they're all playing some sort of game I didn't really understand it I had no interest in football and and my mum picked me up from school I asked her if we could go to the shop we bought some of the football cards and I spent that evening studying all of the cards learning the players names.

8:34Dr Carly Jones MBE:And I went into school the next morning thinking, right, this is it. This is my day to fit in. And I walked up. I didn't go to the library. I walked up to Fred and the group. I didn't say anything. They were interacting and playing with the football cards. And when they said a player's name, I recognized the name from the football card that I had been studying the night before. And I said, he's great. He's really good. He's a great football player. And they kind of looked at me and smiled. And I walked off and retreated back to the library. And it was a tiny moment that was like the first real memory of me observing behavior and seeing what gets criticized what gets accepted and then copying and I don't think they realized or I realized actually that moment set me off and probably changed the whole path of my life it enabled me to to realize that I stopped asking the question who am I and I started asking the question what do I need to be or who do I need to be in order to be accepted?

9:33Dr Carly Jones MBE:And I suppose my question is, like for me back then, it was clearly a conscious decision. I consciously decided to buy those football cards. I consciously decided to stay up all night and to study and to conduct that social experiment. But do you think it stops becoming a conscious decision over time and starts becoming just an automatic nervous system response to feel safe? I think it becomes so part of our, because thinking about these ages that we're doing this, right, kind of four five six seven those kind of developmental years so that just becomes who you are it's part of your part of your development and you and then now as adults it's hard to go well actually that's just always been the way now and i really hope he went home and he learned on the stock market and came to you in the library that was my first thought thinking i really wish wouldn't it be lovely if he also then went to go do you know what um i want to talk to alex so i to learn more about the stock market but even at that age and that's such a beautiful example it was you doing the homework literally in order to people please and support somebody else's wishes for that social interaction as opposed to it being a kind of a two-way street so you were conforming to somebody else's wants as opposed to them doing it for you or both even at that age yes it felt like people please exactly you know it felt like I was trying to solve the wrong problem I thought the problem was what do I need to do in order to fit in but I didn't realize that the more I was answering that question the less I was understanding who I really was and I think it's that that can cause so much damage with an ADHD an ADHD an autistic child, if they go through life and they have people pleased so much, and then they become an adult and they're making decisions with no awareness of who they really are.

11:37Dr Carly Jones MBE:Because the question they stopped asking themselves was, what do I need to do in order to make me happy? And the question started to become, what do I need to do in order to make other people happy? And that's when you start removing your actions from what you truly need in order to be a fulfilled human being what teaches a child to mask do you think it is one particular moment or do you think it is thousands of little comments like you're too much you're too sensitive why are you so weird it's death by a thousand cuts isn't it and uh it's for some people it might be like something that you really remember and those little examples like oh actually if i really think about it now as adult I can see moments where I was doing that um but it just becomes over time and that trying to fit in and I think it's just lots and lots of those comments of oh don't be a drama queen oh stop being so sensitive or oh that's a bit odd or often people finding things that you do funny um so people just go oh you're so funny and I wasn't trying to tell a joke I I really completely misunderstood something.

12:50I did it recently at work, Alex, and I was on a call in a healthcare environment. I was on a call and we were talking about how well some of our apprentices had done and some of them had gone on to work at kind of Deutsche Bank, JP Morgan, all of this. Really, really cool. And then the next part in the conversation was, oh, do you know what? What we really benefit from is people with bank experience. And I said, well, what about, you know, they've got links to all of these different banks. And they went, no, no, like nurse banking nurses, as in bank staff. And I was like, oh, right. And they were like, you're hilarious.

13:31I'm like, no, I genuinely was really confused because we were just talking about banks. And then we're talking about banking staff. But I just, and then you just laugh about it again. Oh, yeah, great joke. I'm really funny. and I'm like no no I'm really confused right now but I can't make out that I'm confused I mean I probably could they probably just think it's hilarious that I was that confused but um but you kind of get that a lot a lot so then you end up um I don't know we'll come on to this later so I won't preempt it but you become the performer you're the clown because yes if you get it wrong people think it's really funny but actually to us it's like oh my gosh I got it really wrong how embarrassing and um but on the outside just smiling and laughing going ah you know great

14:13Dr Carly Jones MBE:great comedy yeah oh gosh well you observe human behavior you you you're collecting evidence of what is accepted by the world what gets criticized what makes people laugh when to join a conversation when to walk away from a conversation it's like everyone else has this kind of rule book of how to socialize and yet you kind of have to write your own through copying what you observe and the the road to get that can be quite bumpy you know it's sort of trial and error you watch a human interaction you watch something happen and then you decide to reiterate that because you saw that that encounter didn't end up in a criticism when you're going through that trial and error when you're conducting your own evidence, what do you think is happening inside the human brain when they realise that the real version of them isn't accepted?

15:12I think that feels horrible, doesn't it? That kind of feeling of, first of all, having to observe everything and almost going, okay, it's cause and effect, cause and effect. What happens? What happens is, if I do this, what happens? Because we're not often, particularly if autistic and ADHD, going to be aware of what that consequence might look like feel like sound like so it's well I'll just try this and it's almost you know like how comedians do um like oh I'm not sure if this joke's gonna land well so I'm gonna do a really small gig and I'm gonna test my material but that's life you're just walking through the street or you're or you're at an event or you're at a wedding or you're at a party or you're at school um and it's kind of like I need to test my material here um but that it's not meant to be funny it's just talking to other people and seeing what happens and that feeling of, oh, okay, well, I've got it wrong too many times.

16:03Soul destroying. Soul destroying because how come everyone else is getting it right? Did they have a script? Who taught them this before they went into the world? How come other people are getting it right and I'm getting it wrong and I'm having to observe and copy to get it mildly right? Unless, of course, you surround yourself with other autistic or ADHD people, in which case um nine not always but nine times out of ten it's um it either goes well or if it doesn't go well it's not judged as much um I think yeah soul destroying and that effect on people's well-being their mental health the happiness of wondering did I get it right and I try if I can particularly if I know that I've got friends or if it's somebody I'm working with on a project I will always do the email afterwards that was fantastic that was great and if there was a part that was a bit tricky you managed that so well and I always try to make sure that I get that email that thank you letter back or a text if it's a friend or a loved one to say gosh wasn't that fun or um so and so or someone said to me you know oh so and so met you for the first time this weekend and they thought that you're um you know such a such a kind and fun person to be with and i'll always do that because i don't want somebody sat behind the next day kind of going oh gosh did i

17:35Dr Carly Jones MBE:mess it up did i get it right yeah gosh i think it's so heartbreaking because when you're conducting these experiments and you're getting the feedback that a social interaction went well it gets rewarded from the world you often get comments like you know oh alex you're you're really nice or you know we love your personality and in my head i'm thinking well thanks very much i just made that up for you the next person i meet is going to get a different personality and the next person's going to get a different personality and i don't know who i actually am so you're you're you're getting praised and rewarded from the world.

18:11Dr Carly Jones MBE:So that kind of is addictive in itself. So you do more of it. But with each step of getting closer to what the world wants, you end up losing yourself more and more and more. And as we'll get onto in a bit, and really going into the four masks now, you end up not truly understanding who you are. And at the end of this conversation, we're going to talk about how to unmask and how to bridge that gap between the version that the world sees and who you really are, because that is such a big part of the healing process but the first mask carly i think is often invisible even to the person wearing it and the first type of masking it's not pretending it's disappearing what does that actually look like disappearing so thinking about that on perhaps a sensory point of view um might be you know the fact that say um the lighting here is lovely by the way because i'm being very light sensitive let's say you're a light sensitive person and you've got some really flickering lights that haven't been maintained first of all that's incredibly dangerous because that can give people seizures but um it's it's very very dangerous in the sense that that is so painful but okay we're at this work conference and everyone else is sat under it just fine if i react i might be the only person in this room that reacts to it then i'm going to look am i going to look unprofessional um am i going to um disrupt things or are they're going to be delays um and even younger in young years at school that you might not even have the agency to speak up even if you felt you could which you probably don't yes sure and then there's that you kind of the disappearing the drop in your grades the i'm just trying to physically survive this situation and not cause a fuss um and so that will start with i'm in a lot of pain then it will start with oh i can't do my homework tonight because i'm in agony um you know the worst migraine you've had times a thousand for me i'll go non-verbal if if uh there uh if i get sensory overwhelm um and then what happens after that oh well you know grades are dropping blah blah blah not getting into the classes or whatever you should be in do you know what actually i can't bear this anymore i'm not going to go to school i'm going to start bunking off school um so you start missing school then you end up in the wrong crowd right um and then all sorts of manners things can happen so you you completely go invisible not only to yourself because life just becomes survival but then you kind of it's very very hidden in what the massive ripple effect that's going to have all because one blinking light needs fixing and it could be something as small as that now that's just one thing in your day if there's also other things in your day from a sensory point of view that you're masking you're hiding up it's the ripple effects are going to be all over the shop of what's happening to you but nobody can see it it's hidden in plain sight nobody can see what's happening to you and if you do speak up and then it's um not understood you know you might not even know if you're autistic or have adhd or have sensory processing difficulties at that age it's not understood because people don't know or you don't know either or it's then well now i know not to speak up because at the same time that we're doing that trial and error of what works and what doesn't work in in socializing uh we're also then going okay well i've just learned now if i speak up about this it's not liked um and i could get in trouble or um whatever so you'd never do it again and then you've got somebody at a very young age that can't ask for help and that's catastrophic this is heartbreaking as part of learning what's accepted and what's criticized you hide your struggles and therefore you hide your self-advocating to ask for help.

22:09Dr Carly Jones MBE:I remember when I was approaching Fred that morning, I was so terrified to talk about my passions and what I loved to do. I remember as I walked over to that group in the corner of the playground with the football cards in my hand thinking, this is it. This is my moment to fit in. In my head, I was saying, do not talk about the stock market. Do not talk about the stock market. Do not talk about the stock market. That's the devastating thing is because that was my passion that's what I loved to do but I hid it I do you think that is common to many autistic people do their passions disappear oh yeah absolutely and what what a waste that is it's on a on a personal level for the individual how sad because you're really enjoying it it's something that you get you excited it's something that you would jump out of bed to learn about literally straight to the library to learn about it as school and then just to general economic growth of our country we could do with guys that know loads and loads about the stock market right so it's really detrimental to society as a whole because how many people out there have got lost their spark of magic i don't think it ever gets lost but i do think it gets snuffed out you have to try and reignite it again but you know that's it's magic if somebody is really interested has expertise and wants to learn about something which might not be very mainstream but if but then saying that if you're in a school where everybody was really into learning about the stock market and there was only one person that was really interested in talking about football cards then it would it would be the other way around so it's almost um it's almost kind of what made as that young child it's absolutely brilliant you know if i had a son he was like i want to go learn about the stock market i'd like brilliant he's gonna look after me in my old age how exciting but it's kind of what makes you brilliant because it might not be very common makes you odd and just because something isn't common or popular it doesn't mean it's odd it means it's brilliant this actually got me emotional before we move on to the second mask the second type of masking i do a lot of public speaking now and um i go into companies and i talk about adhd and autism and social media sometimes, but I was doing a talk about six months ago and at the end we're doing questions.

24:31Dr Carly Jones MBE:And a hand went up and the mic went to this man and I had told the story on stage about being called weird in the playground. It wasn't Fred, was it? And he said, I'm Fred. No! He said, I'm... Oh my God! So I thought Fred was a fake name. No, he said, I'm Fred. I'm the boy that called you weird. And he said, I'm autistic. he said this is why I'm here today and on reflection he was looking back and he himself was remembering that to pretend to like football cards as well oh that's heartbreaking he apologized personally he apologized now you know we were both we hugged after the talk and for me that was a full circle moment because I was pretending to like football cards to fit in and to be like someone who I thought was kind of the popular kid and the cool person and yet he was doing exactly the same.

25:32Bless his heart.

25:32Dr Carly Jones MBE:And now 25 years later we met and we really spoke about it and he had he has had many many challenges throughout his life. Addictions, not being able to hold down jobs, relationships, have been a car crash for him and he opened up about all of this and actually his path although his interests are different to mine um he's now an engineer he's found his thing like the bumps and the the ups and downs of his journey are very similar to many people in the neurodivergent community how interesting so that moment so when we hear the story from the start and it's you know alex if you weren't so weird i can't remember what it would be so if you weren't so weird you could be cool if you weren't so weird so your seven-year-old brain must have thought oh he's just pointed something out about me and that's quite hurtful particularly if you've got rsd kicking about in your seven-year-old adhd brain now 25 years later what he was really doing was protecting you oh my gosh that's gonna set me off he was protect he was protecting you because he had figured out in his own data social experiments if you play these cards then you'll be cool and it was him he was trying to advise you he wasn't trying to mock you oh gosh yeah i mean i know he listens to the podcast as well you know and he came to the talk because he listens to the podcast and he heard me tell that story on the podcast and straight away it clicked that he was afraid um you gotta start using fake names Alex yeah gosh but yeah we'll move on we'll move on to the second form of masking and people pleasing why do you think people with ADHD or autism apologize all the time I love this question I love this question um I think sorry is is a really handy word to have um and i often find that uh for us saying sorry is a really good kind of small print in case i messed it up even if i don't think i'd messed anything up sorry kind of will cover it um i think that's a good thing not well it's not a good thing it's a good thing for us but it's not a good thing because we apologize stuff we hadn't done and you know what they say you know if you ever get into a prang in your car um never say sorry because admitting guilt yes and i was like well no the first thing i'm going to say is oh my gosh i'm so sorry um i don't drive anymore don't worry everyone's safe but it's for real um yeah i could easily just drive into a park tree you know that that terrible but um it's it's that it's almost kind of like that disclaimer to say uh i'm not sure i've got this right so i'm going to apologize anyway which then is really tricky because people know that you're going to take the blame for anything you're going to go actually it might be my fault because i often get things wrong so i'm just going to say sorry for everything and um i was unaware until maybe five years ago I don't really have meltdowns, I have shutdowns.

28:54So a shutdown for me, I can't talk, very, very overwhelmed. It kind of feels like a silent panic attack. Sometimes even when my vision gets affected and everything, it's horrendous. And I was always trying to figure out how I would know that I was about to go into shutdown. Because for me, I didn't see any triggers whatsoever. and my colleague at work said you keep saying sorry just before when you're really really burnt out from socializing or really really burnt out from work or just life every other word is sorry sorry sorry sorry sorry and I was like oh my gosh it is so maybe it's also a sign of um uh I can't really do this anymore I need to be on my own for a bit um or I need some time out or I'm I'm feeling very overwhelmed I think because sorry is that kind of that word which seems to stick a plaster over whatever's not happening now that might just not be happening for us in our perception of events so top people it might look weird but now when i see other people apologizing a lot i'm like ah okay yeah someone's really burnt out

30:05Dr Carly Jones MBE:yes yeah i never related to that elton john song sorry seems to be the hardest word i mean it's the easiest bloody word so you sort of say too much um it can make you quite vulnerable i think Like it can make you very, you're almost like you've got this like flashing light above your head that's going beep, beep, beep. Like I'm a target. I'm vulnerable. I'm susceptible to being walked over, shall we say. Yeah. And to be taken advantage of. If you ask me for money, I won't say no. When does people pleasing become a survival response rather than just being kind? Oh, brilliant, brilliant question.

30:41and particularly in my work around safeguarding, there is responses, aren't there? You know, fights, flights, freeze. And something I see a lot in neurodivergent women and men is the fawning, the fawning, which is beyond kindness, beyond politeness, beyond people-pleasing, that fawning of I'm going to pretend that everything is fine and it is a survival technique i'm going to pretend everything is fine in order to escape this situation when it's safe to do so and that people pleasing is i think just one degree away from going into full blown form falling and i think we have kind of a duty as as friends colleagues other human beings when we see someone really people pleasing to to perhaps go oh no shouldn't you be doing this for yourself give an example of you know you've got a group of girls and they're all going out to an event one of the girls happens to be really good at hair and makeup so um they're like oh let me help you let me help you let me do this let me do that and everyone's looking really good to go out and there's kind of like 10 minutes to go and they haven't done anything to get themselves ready and then it's a massive panic because it's that kind of being everyone before yourself tenfold that's like a really kind of mild example but in that situation to go hey um this is so kind but actually don't worry because you've also got to get yourself ready um don't don't forget about yourself and i think we kind of have to make sure that other people kind of step in or know that's part of our kind of makeup is to to people please to overgive you can be kind and you can be helpful while still having boundaries and making time for yourself and I think that's really hard to learn when your whole kind of your whole kind of goal is to make other people happy because that means you're getting it right and that's so hard to

32:46Dr Carly Jones MBE:learn yeah gosh I'm thinking of a woman I know she's really really really good at cutting hair like she's phenomenal at cutting hair and she cut her friend's hair her friends asked if she could cut her hair and she did and she did an amazing job and then word got round a particular group of friends that this particular woman was really good at cutting hair and suddenly her phone was beeping all the time they were texting her saying can you please cut my hair and she was like yes of course come over I'll cut your hair and I was becoming aware of what was going on and I was thinking like are they paying you to cut their hair and she was like no no no you know I say oh just send me some money if you want but really no no problem at all none of them were sending her money for for her cutting her hair and i was saying to this person i was well you're saving them so much money because otherwise they would have to go to a salon probably spend a hundred pounds at least getting their hair done and really like do these people text you any other times other than when they want something from you 90 of the time of those people it was a no and i was trying to convince her like ask for money like you are worth being paid for what you're doing and she did see that but again at the same time it was like she didn't have it in her to assert that boundary because she didn't want to face the uncomfortable feeling of having any kind of conversation that wasn't smooth yeah or face any type of combative awkwardness I mean for her it was terrifying asking for money but you know she deserved it and she was doing a huge favor and it's just an example I think so many people like that they've got a skill people sniff it out out.

34:25Dr Carly Jones MBE:People can sense it, they see it a mile off, that person can do something for me that is going to save me money, that person can do something for me that's going to save me time, and I can take advantage of them because I know that they're not going to put a boundary in place that's going to say no. Are people pleasing, when does it stop being kindness, like doing something genuinely nice for a friend or a family member from time to time? When does it stop being kindness? When does it start being self-abandonment i think it starts becoming self-abandonment when um you're having to sacrifice something that you needed to do for yourself you know it could be something small it could be something really important where you notice oh well actually i wanted to to go for a swim tonight but now i'm doing this favor and i can't or let's use the cutting hair example i've decided to do this next night oh no i've done it again and when you start to notice that Actually, I haven't put any time aside for myself or something that I wanted to do because I'm doing this or doing that.

35:25And I think it's really tricky because once somebody, I mean, it feels good to help and it feels nice to do favours and things for friends. But it was that kind of the new spread like wildfire. They're really good at hair and also they won't charge you. That would have been part of the conversation. and i think with that you then it's it's harder to then go back and say actually i'm charging for hair now um than it is if that had been said at the the outset you know what it might be okay i'll do any haircut you want 20 quid yeah if they were happy with that or whatever their price might be it was a massive bargain but that was already there so then the next conversation might be oh oh, I put my rates up rather than I've gone from being this person that's going to give, give, give, give, give to then having to go, actually, I've got a boundary now.

36:19It's harder to put boundaries in place in retrospect than it is to have them to begin with for sure. And I think you start to notice it when somebody is getting really affected and super burnt out or might be too tired to go to school or work the next day, or they might be really affecting their their well-being because this at this one time you feel like you're winning because everyone's nice and everyone likes you and and you're doing something good but at the same time do you feel nice do you like what's happening and and when you kind of realize that you don't it's okay it's gone it's gone way past being kind now this is this is real people pleasing

37:02Dr Carly Jones MBE:yeah oh gosh I mean doing this job being a podcast host ADHD and having this awareness I see it all around me you know I know another example a man it just so happens he's like an amazing mechanic it's a hobby of his he doesn't do it professionally but again word got around his friendship groups all the people were at the pub suddenly realized that I'll make up a name Dave was amazing at fixing engines and suddenly there was like three cars parked on his drive and everyone was like oh I'll buy you a pint, Dave, when I next see you. Thanks very much for fixing my radiator or whatever. I don't know about engines.

37:33But you could see he was like saying yes with a smile

37:37Dr Carly Jones MBE:because he didn't know how to say no. But you could also sense like this sadness behind his eyes and exhaustion. So sorry to interrupt your hyper focus, but I promise it's worth it. Our sponsor is Timo, the best organizational tool for neurodivergent people. Timo wasn't named iPhone app of the year in 2025 by Apple for no reason. It's the ultimate planning partner gently helping you turn the chaos in your head into a day that actually feels doable. A day you might even look forward to. Timo is designed by Neurodivergent Brains for Neurodivergent Brains. And you can tell, it supports the stuff ADHD brains can find hardest.

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38:55Dr Carly Jones MBE:Give it a go and use the link in my bio for 30 % off. Just a note though, the code only works in the web browser, not in the smartphone app. Back to the episode. If we move on to, I think, the third type of autistic masking, and that's really like when you're a chameleon, when you're watching and trying to fit in through drawing on the evidence you've gained from observing human behavior why do you think like autistic people rehearse conversations before a social event they are talking in the talking in the mirror yes do you know what i think a lot of that is to do and for those that do talk in the mirror i know it's not just me i know there's lots of people out there that will kind of practice things and i've tried to do it before you know when you're like the first on teams yes yes oh sorry yeah who are you talking to no one myself yeah busted um trying to get the facial expressions right is is one thing and i find that really tricky particularly on teams because i want to concentrate on what i'm trying to say hoping that it's helpful at work and i'm like i'm gonna have to turn my camera off because i'm just looking at my face going should my eyebrow do that um do I look cross I don't know um but I think rehearsing what you're going to say can be a really good way of kind of ridding part of that anxiety about the event I know some autistic people and it's always it's really interesting particularly in public speaking isn't it some people might have some slides with some pictures and the pictures nudge them that's what I tend to have a picture and then I say oh and it will remind me of something I need to say um other people might literally print out three pages of a3 and read it off the paper it's everyone's everyone has a different way of doing it but that practicing it i think it helps with um the anxiety so it's helpful to get rid of some of the anxiety but it's also bad because if someone else goes off script you're like no i'm sorry that wasn't the reply i practiced in my head i don't have any evidence for this situation i've got to go it's a bit like you know when you say your phone number yes i was about to do it i won't do that you know when you say your phone number and then somebody repeats it back to you but in a different order it's no longer my phone number yes it's like that it's like no that isn't how you were supposed to answer this um and now i've got no idea what we're doing you know i find myself like practicing my smile in the mirror like staring in the mirror just trying different variations of my smile and what i've realized actually is that is my smile is never as big as I think it is in my mind yeah I think I've got a grin on sometimes and then I actually look at it look at myself in the mirror with the exact same facial expression and it's neutral and then I'm thinking oh my god those four people I walked past thinking I was smiling at them actually I was stone cold looking probably quite grumpy do you think like this is where it gets a bit heartbreaking like do you think someone can get so good at rehearsing and reading other people that they simultaneously lose sight of themselves yeah absolutely lose your identity self-erosia um it's it's almost as in you become this frag the identity becomes quite fragmented doesn't it because instead of it being this is my authentic self it's uh well this is a part of so and so and that's a part of so and so and together it all mixes up you feel like you're you know and I and I I think that's I see it quite a lot in teenage girls as well particularly there's a friendship group um like a big friendship group or a clique if you like I kind of say it clique clique um but uh you it becomes really fragmented and that's not good that's not good for you for your well-being to to kind of feel like that and it takes a long a lot of time to kind of figure out who you are again when you realize okay so this is what I was doing in order to to try and fit in or please someone or this is what someone might expect um and just to just to know that you're enough as you are and how to do that if you've got rejection sensitivity.

43:10I mean, because even if you get to that stage, you've still got to question it anyway. And it's really, really horrid, horrid feeling.

43:20Dr Carly Jones MBE:We've talked about three types of masking, Carly, but none of them are the ones that I wanted to talk about the most today, because the fourth one is the one that can actually get confused with confidence. It's the one people get praised for. It's the ones that employers reward. It's the ones that friends can admire. But it's also the one that is most likely to lead to burnout and leave somebody really feeling profoundly lonely if they don't understand it. So let's talk about that one. What is the fourth type of masking? The performer. Push your limits, train with precision, see the results. At Equinox, that's high performance loving.

43:59Everything you need to lock in and unlock your potential at Equinox. Start today at equinox.com. You become, you know, you might have said the wrong thing and people think it's very funny. So then you get this reputation of being funny and then you keep making mistakes instead of going, no, actually I just made a mistake or I didn't understand the word. Um, oh, they've got such a good sense of humor. So then you have to kind of build on that because you think, oh, well that works. That's, that's a likable quality to have um or it could be a case of i'm going to um pretend i'm going to mask and pretend to be very very confident because if i'm confident hey they even kind of recommend this don't they in a lot of um kind of uh those those uh how not to get bullied yes things is walk with confidence yes you know give eye contact no god no why why is it always give give job interviews make sure you give eye contact small talk yeah yeah talk about the weather just look outside the window no one needs to talk about it we all know um and then you suddenly then get into a different position of people going oh okay well they're they're a very very confident person um and then or you might get people going well actually i think they're quite rude or quite arrogant or over confident and then the problem is you're doing you're trying to act confident in order to feel safer in order for people to to like you and not see you as this vulnerable prey that we often can be um and then of course if you appear confident some people not all some people will then you want to knock that confidence out of you but it's not confidence in the first place so you go from kind of minus one to minus 100 in the confidence scale um and i i think i think that's really challenging really challenging because it's not it's not going to help you it's going to make things worse actually if it's not that authentic and it's brilliant to have authentic confidence and i think a lot of the times it's just as human beings alex we there's parts of our our life that we're more confident in than others so maybe someone's really confident at work but at home perhaps not so much or someone's really confident in a small group of people but not in a large group um and and having those moments of confidence but and that's that's fine but when you're kind of masking and faking and becoming that performer becoming more extroverted um than you naturally are really gonna wear you down really the saying you know the world is a

46:43Dr Carly Jones MBE:stage and you are the performer i cast my mind back to the seven-year-old alex going up to fred in the playground. I mean, that was a performance. I was literally rehearsing that performance in my bedroom the night before. And I think that's such a common experience. And you end up getting so good at it that so much energy is actually going not only into the performance, but the preparation. They're looking in the mirror, practicing that smile, practicing how you announce or pronounce a particular word. Is it possible to become so good at the performance that the people you're performing in front of they don't see how exhausted you are absolutely and it's a bit of what you said earlier about someone going oh I really like you and you're like well actually I practiced that performance um and I kind of molded that around what you might like yes so actually what they're really doing they're not getting to like know and like you they're getting to know and like themselves yes which is a really good point actually because if there is that performance element of it if somebody really hates us do they just hate themselves yes yes probably i don't know i don't know um but i i think it's it's it's really risky because if you're putting out there this this version of um extroverted version people might have higher demands of you as well higher demands of your time or higher expectations maybe not even demands just expectations assumptions assumptions over what type of person you might be or what sort of things you might enjoy when actually it's it's not that at all and it's that constant mismatch um constant mismatch yeah it seems to be the type of masking that also gets the most praise you become so proficient at it so good at being the person who the person in front of you wants you to be so you get positive feedback and that's exhausting but also the feedback that you get because it's positive it only reinforces your internal belief that you need to do more of this masking more of this performance and i guess you alluded to earlier the concept or the topic of loneliness and is that why many autistic people do feel profoundly lonely because they could be in a busy room they could be at a party they could be at a work meeting and people are talking to them people are interacting with them people are maybe even emotionally opening up to them but if the autistic person isn't being truly themselves the version of themselves that's receiving all of that input from the world isn't actually reaching them yeah is that a unique experience of loneliness well it's if the masks you know might be like a guard to protect you but it's also uh keeping everyone out it's a barrier to keeping everyone out from from that connection that human connection which is so important isn't it and having to literally put your if you think of the mask as a guard having to know when it's safe to put your guard down and let and let people in a bit um is is really important because otherwise yeah you think to yourself well um they liked me on that day at that event which I prepared for would they like me you know on a on a Sunday afternoon where I'm just sat home talking to the cat um or which is one of my pastimes um or or you know reading up about something I really like or watching this show on repeat because I find it comforting or talking about my favorite film and would would they like would they like me then so you it doesn't you can see that it's worked but you can't feel you can't feel what everyone else might be feeling like oh I've really connected with someone and I I like them and they're going to be such a good friend or all these sort of things because it's then that fear of well this is now now raised an expectation in their mind of of myself and actually that's probably a false advertising and having to take that leap and let somebody in is harder if there's already an expectation or a perception of of what you might be like or they might think you might be like when it's not really very authentic to yourself at all.

50:58Dr Carly Jones MBE:I mean, it sounds like an emotional rollercoaster that is totally overwhelming and absolutely exhausting. And it's no wonder that people crash into burnout through this process. And on this podcast, I always like to cover some strategies to manage what we've been speaking about. So we're going to move on to the topic of unmasking and how to really get to know yourself in a moment. But just a question first. if someone is so good at masking they are performing this incredible character that they're getting the oscar the bafta they're winning all of the awards they're an incredible performer what's a warning sign that the mask is about to crack that kind of seepage that kind of seepage of exhaustion and that from going from that performer be that socially be that at work top performer top salesperson uh top hard worker top this top that top that everyone's like wow their trajectory is going and you have to try and keep that up yet so much falls away for yourself i think the signs might be if it was in a work situation um camera off a lot more on teams in fact actually with my nhs role we have um kind of profiles for us in our team um and it's signs that i'm signs that i'm not coping very well or signs that things are going good for me signs things are going bad for me and we just did that as a team and my top one is my camera will be constantly turned off on teams because i just need to not have to look at facial reactions am i doing this am i doing that what's going you know that kind of it's like it's kind of a masking time um it could be that in a work situation in a personal situation it might be um somebody's got to go to event and then all of a sudden they say no at the last minute or they're having to leave earlier and you're noticing a pattern in that um very very small things but it's it's all those little small things which then build up you know if you think about um if somebody's having a reaction to something in the moment it may well be that something's triggered that in the moment but for a lot of us particularly if it's that maybe a shutdown or or maybe burnout it's not one thing that set off it's it's lots and lots and lots and lots of masking and it's starting to it's starting to give way now because there's nothing left to give because you've exhausted you know they can't what's it you can't pour from your you have to fill your own kettle first or whatever the analogy is i'm rubbish at those yeah something like that you have to pour your own cup yeah and it's kind of empty and it's still on the stove and there's still this expectation that there should be something to give and it's just getting hotter and hotter and hotter and hotter until it's you just need to be some time out the cracks in the mask sometimes i guess they can be so thin at first you don't recognize them i'm thinking of a personal story that of mine that happened recently and i'm out quite a lot i come to london to record the podcast i do a lot of talks i always come home at the end of the day.

54:08Dr Carly Jones MBE:I open the door and my partner says, are you okay? How was your day? And typically it's like, it's almost a knee jerk reaction. Yeah, fine. Thank you very much. It went well. Last week I traveled for a talk. It was a long train journey back. I had a ton of emails to go through. I'm writing my third book, which is putting a lot of pressure on me at the moment. And I got home at the end of the day and she said, Alex, how are you? How was your day? and I opened my mouth I went to say I'm fine and it didn't come out and I burst into tears and it shocked me I didn't see it coming and I don't think you do sometimes the clues aren't always aren't always obvious I completely agree it must have been really and first of all it must be so lovely though to have to have that safe space with your partner because it's something that you would have been holding in and you know what probably was just wasn't just that day perhaps weeks months perhaps a year everything building up and to have that safe space to just cry I think that can definitely happen particularly if we've got issues around our not only our masking but our processing perhaps there's alexithymia going on where we're not processing our emotions timely um for us to it to surprise us and perhaps we don't even realize that we're going for these stages of masking until it kind of gets to that almost a crisis point where you just need some support and the oversharing going from fine i'm great thank you to um it being i need to pretend that i'm fine because i don't want people to know that i'm not fine so i need to kind of like up this get more intro extroverted get be more performer because the bigger i smile and perhaps the more makeup that's on the more hair extensions are in the more fake tan or or whatever that kind of presentational masking no one's gonna know no one's gonna find out and it gets bigger and bigger and bigger until you're so exhausted that instead of it being i'm fine it's it's the tears or it's how how are you and instead of going yeah not bad thanks it's mass trauma dumping because you've bottled this in for so long and what could have just been a hello or could have been you know a little short sentence of a text turns into paragraphs and paragraphs emails which maybe looks like a cry for help maybe is but it's then having to apologize I am so sorry I did not take that as a as a rhetorical or politeness question and even if it was I had to I had to get it out and I think for people to to understand that when it happens that they're a very special person because we've decided that's my safe person that's my special person I can let it all out now um and they're probably really shocked going I just wanted to ask what we wanted for dinner um or you know if we wanted a takeaway tonight or a friend just checking in you know um how well, when do you stop?

57:16When do you stop saying I'm fine? And when do we actually let it all out? So I think oversharing or, I don't want to say it was oversharing, but what could be perceived as, gosh, I didn't expect that response. It's been held in a long time for us, doesn't it, when it happens? Yeah.