Masking is a sensible survival strategy when you have no other tools at your disposal. But the more you deviate from what society values, the more elaborate your masking must be. Hiding your Autism, your cultural Blackness, and your queerness or womanhood can be too much. Sometimes the only viable alternative is to shut down and become deeply inhibited. You can’t offend anyone if you simply melt into the wallpaper.
So this is what i always feel like i want to do at work when i got told i was too honest or too - whatever it was at the time. But then I literally couldn't stop being myself for long. And then I'd feel like a failure and hate myself when i did the same thing again.
