Unmasking Autism: The Power of Embracing Our Hidden Neurodiversity

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I wasn’t entirely satisfied with the way the medical and social models of disability were presented, the explanation felt a bit overgeneralized to me and I didn’t feel like the medical model was described or critiqued entirely accurately.

Unmasking Autism, The Power of Embracing Our Hidden Unmasking Autism, The Power of Embracing Our Hidden

Uses control to manage stress: follows intense self-imposed rules, despite having an otherwise unconventional personality. Give yourself permission to actually offend someone," Price says. "Obviously, you don't want to go around saying offensive, hurtful things, but accept that you're not in control of other people's emotional reactions to you." I wish the author had engaged more with disability justice as a framework/movement. it’s pretty clear that DJ is not the /basis/ of Dr. Price’s understanding of disability or autism, but it definitely feels as if the book aligns with DJ in a LOT of ways, and I feel like it deserves more than a couple passing mentions!! I feel similarly about other more radical ideas, like abolition — it was mentioned, but I wish more time had been afforded to it, and I think this book could’ve been a good venue to get more people interested in DJ and abolition, and I wish they’d taken advantage of that! Because autistic people often spend their whole lives trying to fit into a specific societal mold, it can be easy to lose touch with who you really are or what is really important to you. Price suggests trying the Values-Based Integration process, an exercise from autistic life coach Heather R. Morgan. While masking is employed by many autistic people, people in marginalized groups, including women, people of color and LGBTQ+ people might feel even more compelled to camouflage their disability.

This is where compensation comes in. Price does this, for example, through scheduling ghost meetings on his calendar to give himself time to recharge. This is an incredible book and resource. I can't recommend this enough to anyone on their self discovery journey with Autism enough, but especially to Trans folks, BIPOC, and women, this book focuses on these groups in examples and stories and does a great job of explaining how these groups have historically been left out of Autism research and diagnosis until more recently and highlights ways Autism presents for them.

Unmasking Autism: The Power of Embracing Our Hidden Unmasking Autism: The Power of Embracing Our Hidden

I also would’ve liked more high-support-needs voices to have been interviewed/included. I understand that the book focuses on autistic people who mask which is often those with lower support needs, but especially as Dr. Price emphasizes that unmasking can be a political goal that furthers acceptance of all autistic people, not just those who mask, I think it would’ve benefited the book overall to invite more people with high support needs into the discussion. I think I expected (or perhaps just wanted) something slightly more academically-focused on the phenomenon of masking that I could throw in the face of everyone in my academic psych department, but the format instead is more like "you're probably reading this because you think you might be a masked neurodivergent person, or you love someone who is, so here are a few citations of evidence about this chapte This was such an incredible book! Written by an autistic trans social psychologist, this focused on high masking autistic experiences. He begins by talking about who is more likely to mask/less likely to be diagnosed as a child, what traits get overlooked, issues with how autism is "treated". Then, he goes into what masking can look like, how we might decide to unmask, and ending with what we need to do as a society to make it a safe place for people to live unmasked. I really loved that he talks so much about the social - not just ableism and stigma, but also aspects of racism, impact of poverty, and transphobia, among other things.

Dr. Devon Price is a social psychologist, writer, activist, and professor at Chicago's Loyola University who, with "Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity," has crafted an informative, insightful, and engaging deep dive into the Autism experience and, more specifically, the phenomenon known as "masking," a coping skill in which Autistic people with identifiable traits hide those traits in an effort to better blend in to a society that often rejects these traits as "odd" or "needy." Epically awful book by a nonclinical psychologist who use personal experience to make broad claims about a complex condition; Falsely attributes symptoms of comorbid conditions as symptoms of autism; and fails to point the reader to any solid empirical research. In Unmasking Autism , Dr. Devon Price shares his personal experience with masking and blends history, social science research, prescriptions, and personal profiles to tell a story of neurodivergence that has thus far been dominated by those on the outside looking in. For Dr. Price and many others, Autism is a deep source of uniqueness and beauty. Unfortunately, living in a neurotypical world means it can also be a source of incredible alienation and pain. Most masked Autistic individuals struggle for decades before discovering who they truly are. They are also more likely to be marginalized in terms of race, gender, sexual orientation, class, and other factors, which contributes to their suffering and invisibility. Dr. Price lays the groundwork for unmasking and offers exercises that encourage self-expression, Unmasking Autism" will, of course, deeply resonate with those who are Autistic or who identify as someone who does "mask" or at least someone who can relate to "masking." However, "Unmasking Autism" is also a valuable resource for those who work in the field of Autism, those support or simply love someone with Autism, or even someone, myself included, who has always felt neurodiverse yet never officially been "diagnosed."

Unmasking autism – unlearn shame and nurture a more - NPR

Again, it’s not like the author is wrong in pointing out the preference people who look like me have been given. But I’m still here, too, still in pain, and still trying to figure all this out. Do I not count anymore? Ughhh. I wanted to like this book SO bad. The disappointment is particularly painful because I had such high hopes. The thing that really upset me was when he said being autistic is “an eerily similar experience” to being a closeted gay person. In what way is being closeted equivalent to being disabled?? He goes on to talk about how in both cases people are so oppressed and can’t ever truly be themselves. I honestly find this really offensive. Being closeted doesn’t make it so you have to drop out of college because you’re in so much pain all the time you can’t keep up. Being closeted doesn’t make it so you can’t leave your bedroom for months at a time because the entire world is too stimulating. Being closeted doesn’t make it so you go fully nonverbal for days and physically can’t ask for help. Being closeted doesn’t make it so you can never live alone because you can’t manage basic tasks like bathing or cooking without help. Being closeted doesn’t make it so you can’t drive due to spacial awareness issues, or make it so you’re fully dependent on AAC to communicate. Saying that being closeted is equivalent to having a disability is extremely disrespectful, not only to disabled people but also to closeted people. They aren’t remotely similar. In Unmasking Autism , Dr. Devon Price shares his personal experience with masking and blends history, social science research, prescriptions, and personal profiles to tell a story of neurodivergence that has thus far been dominated by those on the outside looking in. For Dr. Price and many others, Autism is a deep source of uniqueness and beauty. Unfortunately, living in a neurotypical world means it can also be a source of incredible alienation and pain. Most masked Autistic individuals struggle for decades before discovering who they truly are. They are also more likely to be marginalized in terms of race, gender, sexual orientation, class, and other factors, which contributes to their suffering and invisibility. Dr. Price lays the groundwork for unmasking and offers exercises that encourage self-expression, including: lots of validating stuff but I was annoyed by his generalizations. this concept of unmasking is only available to very specific types of people, mostly white, documented, middle class, low needs individuals. he mentions the risks associated for more marginalized people at a few different points but something just didn’t sit right with me.he’s a middle class academic who’s anti-work, but I don’t think he’s held a labor or even retail job in his life? he shills his “laziness is a lie” book all over social media but has a high paying cushy job in academia and no student loan debt like…okay dude. I’d rather hear about anti-work strategies from people organizing from “the bottom” of the class hierarchy than some funded phd pipelined professor. he did a reddit AMA and when people asked him more critical questions his answer was “maybe you should read my book”! In this book, I made 97 highlights which is a record. So where do I even begin with a review?! (especially when it's going to take weeks to process everything I learned)

Unmasking Autism’, and the author - Reddit I am reading ‘Unmasking Autism’, and the author - Reddit

There is more nuance and issues with self diagnosis that Price does not touch on. The possibility that self diagnosis could be wrong, that self diagnosis does not grant needed accommodations, having time and access to diagnostic tools in a non-medical setting, self diagnostic tools are very much centred on low-support needs white boys, etc. Devon Price is a social psychologist and the author of Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity. Those who embrace a more ABA approach to Autism may be most likely to struggle with "Unmasking Autism" as it's clear Dr. Price sees ABA as part of the enforced masking journey. If there's a weakness in the book, perhaps, it's that Dr. Price never really delves into this issue more fully and it's an area that deserves deeper exploration. it started out good, but especially in te second half of the book I really felt this was written for a specific type of autistic person. Even tough the author supports that every autistic person is unique (which is, especially in research quite hard to deal with), the only type of autism that was represented was the "autistic nerd" that has a special interest, some talent and a hyperfocus. The constant use of "we" to represent a bunch of people that are vastly different was getting annoying.If you're a girl, if you're a person of color, if you're gender nonconforming," Price says, "you're more likely to be seen as a problem to be contained." I’m near the end of the second chapter and I’ve decided to abandon this book. It’s too infuriating for me to continue on. This is not what I expected and definitely not what I needed. Upon reflection I think the author made it clear what the book was about but I wanted to believe it was about something else, that is, masking/unmasking. Autistic people perceive all the individual trees, and stumps, and rotting animal carcasses. The thousands of small features don’t effortlessly combine into something larger for us, so we have to process all of it separately." Reading "Unmasking Autism" was a watershed moment that helped me full-throatedly self-diagnose: I'm autistic! This book has been an essential tool on my unmasking journey; I've re-read my copy at least three times, and I refer to it for comfort on challenging days of unmasking and autistic trauma processing. I also appreciate Dr. Price's healthy distrust of psychiatry and the tone of mental health liberation throughout the book; the real experts on autism are autistic people. Social psychologist Devon Price explains that masking is any attempt or strategy "to hide your disability." Price's new book, Unmasking Autism: Discovering the New Faces of Neurodiversity, explores masking, and how to "unmask" and live more freely.