Werewolf Masquerade

Werewolf Masquerade is a lyric game/activity poem on masking. In particular, it's about high masking autistic people.

My whole life, I want to be friendly and nice to everyone, but there's always a feeling that I have to be very careful in what I say and how I say it.

I used to assume that everyone has to put effort into socialising to not be misunderstood, until I learnt about masking and autism. The theory of double empathy problem explains why I have to put in more effort to socialise than most people.

Watching videos online on autistic people sharing similar experiences makes me feel seen. In "Why are autistic people always misunderstood?" by Morgan Foley, her explanations of the double empathy problem, non-verbal communication, and communication trauma perfectly encapsulates my experience. Like her, I grew up learning to be the quiet kid so my words don't get misconstrued against me, and when I do speak, I pick my words carefully to sound articulate. Even though I am friendly and have good intentions, I have to adopt a mask for people to see that. My mask also involves being hyper-vigilant on social cues and being proactive in finding faults in how I present myself, so it's draining to keep it on. In addition, some people might become my acquaintance only due to my quiet and articulate persona, while others who would have enjoyed the company of my unfiltered self might find my masked self too distant.

In Are you just an introvert or are you actually Autistic? by The Thought Spot, Irene talked about how a lot of autistic people adopt a more introverted persona as a coping mechanism, as we were taught to suppress ourselves in order to accommodate others. While social interactions are intuitive to allistic people, they are like logic puzzles to a lot of autistic people. We try to recognise patterns and come up with folders and instructions for different social situations, which form our masks for them. We can get confused if new variables are introduced in existing social situations, or when none of our masks work for a new social situation. The video explained that many autistic people are not necessarily introverted nor shy by nature, but they feel overstimulated in social situations. Some of us crave connections and experience chronicle loneliness, but putting on a mask is tiring and it's scary and confusing when we screw up socially despite our best intentions.

Autism is a spectrum, and some people are afraid to talk about it because of how it has been pathologised. Autistic people struggle with understanding surface level social nuance, but we are capable of empathy as much as anyone else, and some of us are more empathetic due to a lifetime of being misunderstood. As part of my journey in understanding neurodiversity, I don't like pitting neurodivergent people against neurotypical people, as I see a lot of internalised stigma in people with neurodivergent traits. Very often, people I see who most zealously police neurodivergent traits are the ones who have them because (a) they worked hard their entire life to suppress their neurodivergent behaviours so others have to too and/or (b) rigid social rules is part of their coping mechanism. When I am at neurodiverse spaces, I can count on people saying what they mean and I can relax without a heavy mask. However, in neurotypical spaces, I have to be hyper-vigilant in reading non-verbal social cues, and sometimes I can't be sure if I am sensing negative social cues from a neurotypical person or if they are just another neurodivergent person who doesn't mask. Occasionally, a group of high masking neurodivergent people can tire themselves out at the masquerade until they realise that they are all wearing masks.

Perhaps if there is more awareness to neurodiversity, it'd help everyone to be more kind and empathise with each other.

Artwork: The Wolf And The Crane (1857) by Charles H. Bennett