Suicide Prevention Awareness Month: Putting On The Mask
(!) Trigger warning: This post discusses self-harm and suicide. If you are struggling, you're not alone. If you are in immediate danger, please contact your local emergency services.
If you are in the United States, you can call or text 988 for the Suicide & Crisis Lifeline. If you are outside the U.S., please contact your local health services or search for crisis lines in your country.
masking (n)
the act of preventing something from being seen or noticed:
the act of hiding signs of neurodiversity -- the fact of having a type of brain that is often considered to be different from what is usual, for example that of someone who has autism) in your behavior:
also called camouflaging or compensating, is when individuals repress or hide signs of a mental health condition to blend in or adapt to the neurotypical world.
I woke up this morning and went about my regular routine... which may or may not include scrolling my Twitter feed like it's the morning newspaper.
While I can feel you judging me right now for that, my point here is that I stumbled something very interesting upon doing so:
“I have AuDHD, which is a newer diagnosis where you have partial ADHD and autism. So I have a lot of autistic tendencies, and I’m level one... I may not look like I need support, but I have earphones to block out sounds because I, too, have audio processing differences. Everything comes at me all at once...
A lot of autistic people have… they used to call them obsessions or fixations, but we call them special interests now. And my special interest was always acting and music... I feel like I know myself so much better... Growing up in Newark, you couldn’t be different. Back in the day when I grew up, you couldn’t stand out like that." — actress and singer Tisha Campbell, 57
Tisha Campbell, she of Martin and My Wife and Kids fame, revealed her AuDHD diagnosis at the age of 57 on Way Up with Angela Yee on NY's Power 105.1 FM.
Tisha Campbell made a major name for herself through her work as Gina on 'Martin' (1992-1997) and as Jay on 'My Wife and Kids' (2001-2005).
In describing why she pursued this diagnosis -- a diagnosis that she herself says brought her a lot of peace and clarity -- she explained that she felt that she couldn't "be different" growing up in the environment she grew up in: the mean streets of Newark, New Jersey. Campbell said she spent years hiding her stimming.
The act of camouflaging neurodivergent traits (such as someone with Autism or ADHD hiding their stimming) to better fit into environments catered more toward neurotypicals is a common approach practiced by "neurodivergents."
This can look like neurodivergents forcing eye contact or mirroring social cues.
This behavior, called masking, is much more widely known and recognized today than it was during the time in which, say, Tisha Campbell grew up. Mental health understanding and discourse has never been at a higher level than it is presently.
At the same time, that doesn't mean that this is now such an easy world for neurodivergents to navigate. Being perceived as "weird" (or "different" as Tisha Campbell put it) still opens up neurodivergents to bullying, judgment, or other forms of scrutiny.
This is especially true in the formative years of childhood and the developmental years of adolescence (ages 11-19). These are the stages in life where much of our behaviors practiced in adulthood were originally adopted and learned.
If one's neurodivergent traits were made fun of and ridiculed in childhood, it then becomes extremely likely that that child will develop masking tendencies to prevent that same ridicule from happening again. When you consider that adolescence (compared to childhood and adulthood) is the life stage where peer pressure and fitting-in is the most important to us, you can begin to understand how masking becomes so engrained in many.
Through this, masking becomes a way of life and a means for survival for so many, all the way into adulthood -- a necessary strategy to eat, drink, work, and exist in neurotypical spaces.
But just how exhausting is this strategy? How much mental and physical energy does this exhaust? And as we continue to recognize September as Suicide Prevention Awareness Month, how costly can this behavior be long-term?
The Danger of the Mask
A while back here on mentality, I wrote about cognitive dissonance -- the psychological conflict of contradictory behavior and thoughts. To summarize, when our thoughts, attitudes, and beliefs don't match up with our actions on a consistent basis, it can carry serious mental consequences.
Also some time ago on The Recess Bell, I developed the People-Pleasing Project, outlining how people-pleasing behavior, through cognitive dissonance, can produce feelings of shame and low self-esteem. The logo for the People-Pleasing Project was the comedy and tragedy masks.
The choice for this logo was centered around how we can put on a brave, confident, and generous face to brace the world, covering up a bunch of pain lying underneath.
Part of this pain can come from the cognitive dissonance that many masking neurodivergent people experience: concealing their "real" selves and tendencies to better conform with society.
In short-term situations, this balance that neurodivergents can force themselves to find can be manageable enough. People with autism mask their stimming in job interviews and social gatherings every day, for example.
But as the saying goes: too much of anything is never good. And as always, that's certainly true when it comes to mental health.
There's a wealth of evidence that proves this is especially the case when it comes to neurodivergent masking. Multiple studies show that -- unfortunately -- the ties between long-term masking and heightened risk of self-harm and suicide are strong.
A 2019 study conducted by the National Library of Medicine found that masking autistic traits increases risk of a low sense of belonging and high feelings of being a burden to others, which then increases risk of lifetime feelings of suicidality. [1]
There's a term for this: neurodivergent burnout, which outlines the great amount of energy it takes to mask neurodivergent symptoms, which can lead to crisis through diminished "performing" skills, extreme mental AND physical exhaustion, and increases in depression and anxiety.
2024 research found that the risk of autistic people dying by suicide is nearly 3 times higher than the remainder of the population. [2]
Additionally, in a wicked twist of fate, those that are better and more skillful at masking are at higher danger of suicide and self-harm. If one is so "good" at masking that medical professionals underestimate their level of neurodivergence and true feelings of agony, then less support than what may be required could be given. [3] [4]
"But I've Been Wearing This Thing My Whole Life!"
To relate back to the case of Tisha Campbell, she said that she learned how to mask out of necessity while growing up in an environment that wasn't very tolerant of neurodivergence.
The things we learn and habits that we pick up in childhood and adolescence have a way of sticking with us into adulthood -- for some, deep into adulthood. As you've read, this is very true with masking as well.
In the world of mental health, I always find myself coming back to this saying: "the trauma that we suffer is not our fault, but how we handle and process that trauma ultimately becomes our responsibility." It's not fair, no. But it is a fact of life.
The saying mainly refers to the "hurt people hurt people" trope. But it also applies to the tragic matters of suicide and self-harm.
I hope you can see why neurodivergent people decide to mask, and mask, and mask some more as they trek through life. As human beings, we're engineered to want to fit in and coexist with the rest of society. That's just a fact.
But it's also apparent how much of a toll this long-term masking can take on neurodivergents. In a world that consistently parrots sayings like "just be yourself!" and "take pride in who you are," the cognitive dissonance and inner conflict that comes about can tear things apart for neurodivergents within.
So as we seek to raise awareness for suicide prevention throughout the month of September, it's important to remember what we discussed in the last post -- providing support doesn't just look like giving someone money or other material things. For many struggling under the mountain of suicidal ideation, support can be as simple as being heard and listened to.
Re-iterating one final time: neurodivergents mask because they don't feel safe being their true and unfiltered selves around others. So think about the world of difference that can be made for a neurodivergent person if they're able to feel understood even for just a moment.
If we're able to gravitate more toward that within our support systems and throughout society, the evidence shows that it wouldn't just be a kind and noble thing to do for a neighbor.
You might just save a life in doing so.
