Autistic Masking and Burnout: The Hidden Cost of Appearing “Normal”
As a Licensed Educational Psychologist who conducts autism evaluations throughout the South Bay—including Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach, Torrance, El Segundo, and Palos Verdes Peninsula—I increasingly see children, teens, and adults who have spent years exhausting themselves trying to appear neurotypical. This phenomenon, called “autistic masking” or “camouflaging,” comes at a significant cost to mental health and wellbeing. Understanding masking is essential for recognizing autism that might otherwise be missed.
🎭 What is Autistic Masking?
Masking (also called camouflaging) is when an autistic person consciously or unconsciously suppresses their natural behaviors, mimics neurotypical social cues, and hides their autistic traits to fit in or avoid negative reactions from others.
It’s not pretending to be someone you’re not for fun—it’s a survival strategy developed in response to a world that often punishes autistic ways of being. Masking is especially common in autism in women and girls.
What Does Autistic Masking Look Like?
🎯 Common Autistic Masking Behaviors Include:
- Scripting conversations: Memorizing phrases, questions, and responses for social situations
- Forcing eye contact: Making yourself look at people’s faces even when it’s uncomfortable
- Suppressing stimming: Stopping natural self-soothing behaviors like hand-flapping, rocking, or fidgeting
- Mimicking others: Copying facial expressions, tone of voice, gestures from peers, TV shows, or movies
- Hiding special interests: Downplaying or not mentioning intense interests to seem “normal”
- Performing emotions: Consciously producing facial expressions that match expected emotional responses
- Tolerating sensory overload: Enduring painful sensory experiences without showing distress
- Monitoring constantly: Analyzing every social interaction to ensure you’re responding “correctly”
“I feel like I’m running a simulation of a normal person all day. By the time I get home, I have nothing left.”
— Common sentiment from individuals with autistic masking
Why Do Autistic People Mask?
Autistic masking typically develops as a response to:
- Social rejection: Being bullied, excluded, or criticized for natural autistic behaviors
- Pressure to fit in: Messages from family, school, or society that being different is wrong
- Safety concerns: Fear of negative consequences for appearing “weird”
- Professional necessity: Needing to mask to keep a job or succeed in school
- Relationship preservation: Wanting to maintain friendships and romantic relationships
- Internalized ableism: Believing that autistic traits are inherently bad
Many autistic people, especially women and girls, begin masking so young that they don’t even realize they’re doing it. This is why autism in women is often missed until adulthood.
The Cost: Autistic Burnout
🔥 What is Autistic Burnout?
Autistic burnout is a state of physical, mental, and emotional exhaustion caused by the cumulative effect of masking and navigating a neurotypical world. It’s different from typical burnout—it’s deeper, lasts longer, and involves a regression or loss of skills.
Signs of Autistic Burnout:
😫 Exhaustion
- Profound fatigue that sleep doesn’t fix
- Physical illness or increased health issues
- Inability to complete basic daily tasks
- Needing much more alone time than usual
📉 Skill Regression
- Losing abilities that were previously easy
- Increased difficulty with executive function
- Speech becoming harder or reduced
- Struggling with tasks that used to be automatic
😰 Reduced Tolerance
- Sensory sensitivities becoming overwhelming
- Lower threshold for meltdowns or shutdowns
- Inability to mask even when you want to
- Social situations becoming unbearable
💔 Mental Health Impact
- Depression, anxiety, or both
- Loss of identity or sense of self
- Feelings of hopelessness
- Suicidal thoughts (seek help immediately)
⚠️ Autistic Burnout Can Be Misdiagnosed
Autistic burnout is often mistaken for depression, anxiety disorders, chronic fatigue syndrome, or laziness. Without understanding that autism is the underlying factor, treatment may be ineffective or even harmful. This is why accurate autism diagnosis through proper autism evaluation is so important—it changes everything about how burnout should be addressed.
Who Masks the Most? Why Autism is Missed
Research shows that autistic masking is more common in:
- Women and girls: Social expectations lead to more intensive masking, which is why autism in women is underdiagnosed
- Those diagnosed later in life: Years of not knowing why you’re different leads to compensatory masking
- People with higher cognitive abilities: More capacity to analyze and mimic social behavior
- Those in demanding social environments: Jobs, schools, or families requiring constant interaction
- LGBTQ+ autistic individuals: Managing multiple marginalized identities increases masking burden
This is one reason autism is significantly underdiagnosed in women and girls—they mask so effectively that their autism isn’t recognized, even by professionals.
Recovery from Autistic Burnout
💚 Healing from Autistic Burnout Requires:
- Reduced demands: Temporarily (or permanently) decreasing expectations and responsibilities
- Permission to unmask: Safe spaces where you can be authentically autistic
- Sensory accommodations: Creating environments that don’t drain your energy
- Understanding and acceptance: From yourself and others
- Time: Recovery from burnout often takes months or years, not days
- Professional support: From providers who understand autism and masking
For Parents of Children Who May Be Masking Autism:
- Recognize that “holding it together” at school may mean falling apart at home—this is masking
- Create safe spaces where your child doesn’t need to perform
- Don’t punish meltdowns that happen after school—they’re often decompression from masking all day
- Validate their autistic traits rather than encouraging suppression
- Advocate for accommodations so they don’t have to mask as much
- Seek autism evaluation if you suspect your child is masking autism
Why Autism Diagnosis Matters for Those Who Mask
Getting an accurate autism diagnosis through comprehensive autism evaluation can be life-changing for people who have been masking. It provides:
- Self-understanding: Finally having an explanation for lifelong differences
- Permission to accommodate: Knowing that accommodations aren’t “cheating”
- Community: Connection with others who share similar experiences
- Better treatment: Mental health support that addresses the actual issue
- Self-compassion: Understanding that struggles aren’t personal failures
- Burnout prevention: Learning to reduce masking before burnout occurs
“Getting diagnosed at 35 was the best thing that ever happened to me. I finally understood why everything was so hard, and I could stop blaming myself.”
Wondering If You or Your Child Might Be Masking Autism?
If this article resonates with you—if you or your child seems to “hold it together” in public but fall apart in private, if social situations are exhausting, if you’ve always felt different but couldn’t explain why—comprehensive autism evaluation can provide answers.
As a Licensed Educational Psychologist serving Manhattan Beach, Hermosa Beach, Redondo Beach, Torrance, El Segundo, Palos Verdes Peninsula, and all South Bay communities, I provide neurodiversity-affirming autism evaluations that recognize masking presentations often missed by other providers.
Understanding is the first step toward support. Contact me today for autism evaluation.