compounded aromanticisiom

[jimerman]

this is not really a topic but i just wanted to share this again after i posted this on another topic.

i am still fighting with definitions, i don't really know if i am aromatic or if i am Philophobic (the fear of love). i have never really wanted to be in a relationship my entire life, but when i was in college i decided to find out "what i had been missing" so i dated one girl for around a year and she was really abusive and [trigger warning] one night she even handcuffed me to the bead when i was sleeping and raped me. [end trigger warning] i think that my experience with her expanded my aromanticism to the point where i don't even want to give "love" a chance. i have even wrote up contracts with mycelf that stated that if i ever feel a desire for more than a friendship i would sever all contact with that person. its depressing i know and it may stand in the way of my happiness, but i just remember how unhappy i was in the relationship not only in the abusive parts but just the regular lovey dovy bullshit that relationships bring.

[Bezzy-Loo]

Sounds like that experience really left a horrible impression on you. :( It may be good to seek out professional help to work through that. You'll just need to be clear about what parts you actually feel need to be worked on and which you accept as being part of who you are.

You mention that you still didn't like the "love dovy" parts. What do you mean by that? Was it any particular forms of affectionate display that bothered you? And in what way were you unhappy - did it bore you, did it tire you, did you just plain not like it...?

It's possible that you're both aromantic and philophobic, though I imagine the latter comes more from that bad experience. If you developed philophobia when you were already aromantic, being aromantic wouldn't have gone away, and you sound like your main interest in the relationship was just as an experiment. If you have had to act on those contracts of yours, though, then it may be more a philophobia thing.

[Miav-desu]

I'm sorry this happent it sound really awful.

I get your point. I had some bad experience before which made me doubt whenever I was philiphobia or simple aro.

From what I read out of the defenition of philiphobia its that you are afraid to fall in love. Personally I am not afraid to fall in love and at some point I wish it would happent, but I can't stand people having romantic feeling toward me. I think this would be the same even if I liked people romantically so in that caise it would unfurtunatly not work out.