Autistic Masking saved my life

One of the earliest articles I shared here after the founding of this site was called "Neurodivergence." In that article, I talk about how I rely on my synesthesia to help me understand people and embody their emotions. I also briefly touched on my masking strategy. However, it ended on kind of a sour note and I want to right that wrong. So that's why I'm writing this piece! I am neurodivergent. At 18, I was diagnosed with Pragmatic Language Disorder. At the time, it was not a common diagnosis in the US and I was given a secondary diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder by the same clinician. The definition of PLD has changed a few time in the intervening 20-or-so years. It's now called something else entirely. But I definitely checked the DSM criteria then and still do today. Delayed language development (my sister, ~18 months my junior, was speaking before I was) Language disorders including word search pauses, jargoning, word order errors, word category errors, and verb tense errors…