Masking is a common survival strategy for both neurodivergent and LGBTQIA+ people, often required to maintain safety, belonging, or credibility in workplaces and services. For individuals who hold both identities, masking frequently occurs simultaneously and continuously, a phenomenon this presentation describes as “double marking.”

This presentation explores how double masking operates across professional, clinical, and community environments, and why it carries a unique psychological and emotional cost. While much existing discourse focuses on autistic masking or LGBTQIA+ concealment separately, less attention has been given to how these demands compound when neurodivergence and queerness intersect.

Drawing on clinical psychology, supervision of frontline mental health staff, teaching experience, and lived insight as an autistic gay man, this session examines how expectations around professionalism, communication style, emotional expression, and identity disclosure are often shaped by neurotypical and heteronormative norms. Even in spaces described as “inclusive,” subtle pressures to conform can leave neurodivergent queer people feeling unsafe, exhausted, or unseen.

Rather than framing masking as an individual coping issue, this session reframes it as a predictable response to environments that unintentionally punish difference. The presentation concludes with practical strategies for leaders, clinicians, and organisations to reduce masking demands by adjusting environments, expectations, and power dynamics — without requiring disclosure, visibility, or emotional labour from neurodivergent LGBTQIA+ people.