Hiding myself

 I am not the person people see. Every word I share with people is not scripted but the feeling or the emotion behind those words are.

I want to show people a good version of me. One they will approve of or even like. Whenever it’s my perception someone doesn’t think well of me I try to change their mind.

How nice it must be to actually not care what people think of you. What’s that even like? Presenting an agreeable person has been a goal of mine since I was in 6th grade. Long time ago but the intent was very , well , intentional .

The previous year I had  been invited to attend a school for advanced or gifted children because of how well I always scored on the standardized tests. Full disclosure , in the second grade I was put in the trailer outside the school with the kids that rode the short bus because of my poor reading comprehension.

The year spent at the advanced school was one of the worst of my childhood. Most of the other children were advanced in social aspects as well as intellectually. While academically I was as advanced as the other students , socially I was very far behind them. I was still learning lessons such as keep your hands to yourself and  “do onto others”. I was a bully and the other children didn’t like me. Which I totally understand now. Even then I knew they didn’t like me, it didn’t feel good at all but it felt like my only recourse was to behave even worse.

I made it through the year. Too many fights to count. One that comes to memory was with an 8th grader (I don’t back down, still) . The older kid decided he didn’t like me and we were going to go to the woods after we got off the bus and fight. 

Go into the woods and fight we did. He wore me out. I was throwing useless jabs at what was probably the air. If he missed a punch he threw I would be surprised. Suddenly he stopped and said he had to get home. I was very upset and overwhelmed so I was glad for it to be over.

The next morning when I got on the bus the 8th grader was already seated. He was wearing a cast on his arm. Apparently he had broken it over my head. 

I’m getting away from my point .

The next school year I decided I wanted to go back to regular school and my mother agreed because of all the trouble I had gotten in at the advanced school. I decided I wanted to start new and try to have good relationships with people.

That’s the 1st time I can remember consciously masking. I began crafting what I would show the world. I wouldn’t show the knee jerk reactions I have to everything that has any emotion attached to it. This is what always lead me to become overwhelmed and act out or fight.

I started measuring my reactions and thinking how I could react in a way that may make a person like me.

Imagine that. Each time you interact with all but the handful of people that are very close to you, you have to measure everything you share. It is so exhausting. In the beginning ,  more times than not, this attempt would fail. As a result I must have looked  like some weird kid that said things or acted in a manner that seemed odd.

Over the years I’ve gotten much better at masking , or presenting as I think of it. There are still so many mistakes and it’s not uncommon that I feel like that weird little kid again but for the most part I think I come across as a well adjusted (likable) person. 

I’m experienced enough now to know that you can’t please (or fool) all the people all the time. Honest Abe  had it right . I still try to change their minds though, can’t get that out of me.

I am older now. After all these years of masking I have become the person that I have always tried to portray. I think of others feelings when interacting , Im considerate in my responses and genuinely wish everyone well. 

Just like the lessons I learned in 6th grade I’ve learned so many other lessons to help me become a more regulated person that can interact with the people around me in a typical way.

Just as when I was a boy it’s taken me longer to learn these lessons than typical folks but I have learned them.

The thing is , I still hide , mask and  present . This is because I still struggle to regulate my emotions. There’s just not enough mental bandwidth in my mind for emotion and reason.Its typically one or the other. 

When emotional I can’t reason. Masking my emotions or hiding them helps me participate in the world. Those emotions are still there, just as strong as when I was a child, but hiding them seems to keep them from exploding . Through masking I’ve developed a type of control over my emotions. 

It’s not perfect. The emotions don’t just go away. I have to self regulate. I regulate these emotions by letting them out with people I’m comfortable with (my wife and children) or through isolation and not participating once I’ve reached my safe place (home).

And this is the irony. Only those that love me the most see my true self. I can fake it when out in the world but when at home I drop the mask. I’m not violent but my emotional reactions can cause my family distress. As a result, in recent years, after recognizing the burden this puts on my wife and children I have begun to mask with them as well. 

I think this must be true empathy or my best simulation of that. Another lesson that’s taken me longer than most people  to learn.

The overwhelming feeling of needing to express an emotion in a negative manner can feel like a thing that I must do, hard to define but it’s like I need to satisfy some part of myself by showing someone the emotion I feel .

In truth I get no satisfaction from being like that in front of anyone . I get only shame and self loathing from having treated someone in that manner or from them having witnessed such a display.

So I mask this part of me. It doesn’t go away. It has always felt the same.

While I think I have become the  person that I present  , there’s this whole glob of emotional dis regulation that exists between that me and the outside world that I hide.

Autism isn’t me, it’s just what’s between me and the world.