Does anyone else feel... ?

[Four Eyed Lemon]

I'm sure I'm not the only one who feels like, once you have one thing sort of figured out, another confusing thing rears its ugly head, possibly (probably in my case, aha) because you're now less focused on trying to figure out the other thing. And misrepresentation/lack of representation just continued to make it worse.

So, when I was younger, I had it kind of hard coded into me that I was 'normal'. So I was kind of repressed for awhile; my family was never really up for discussion about that sort of thing (especially not my dad, whose views on homosexuality [debatably the most accepted LGBTQ+ identity] are really ignorant; my mom is better as far as being socially progressive, but the way she acts and treats me discourages me from opening up to her about anything). So I was kind of pushed into these restrictions like, I had to be straight, cis, etc. A pretty strong desire to fit in definitely didn't help, considering my shitty social skills. So for the longest time, I kind of refused to acknowledge any indication I might have to not being straight/not being 100% girl. I was also told early on in me learning about different sexualities/gender identities that asexual wasn't a thing, so that didn't help. Cause thinking back, I've always kind of felt a disconnect between me and my sexuality (I'm fairly sure now that I'm ace with autochorissexual tendencies).

But anyway, that kind of affected me for awhile. Especially since I started dating this guy. And even after figuring out asexual was indeed a thing, I figured I couldn't be ace, because we did sexual stuff all the time and I really wasn't made uncomfortable by it much (meanwhile I worked out later that he was guilt tripping me into it half the time). It actually wasn't until over a year into another relationship that I figured out I wasn't actually sexually attracted to either guy I had dated. It's also important to note that I was identifying as bisexual at the time (I've had more crushes on girls than I have guys, but I've only ever dated guys). This was actually only last September, and I identified as biromantic asexual for awhile.

It actually took me going through the process of losing my grandmother in December to figure out exactly how distant my relationship at the time was (it didn't really help that I didn't have a healthy relationship to compare it to). At first I thought it was just the grieving process taking a toll on me (which it was and still is; it just wasn't the source of everything like I wanted it to be), but I kind of had this mini identity crisis at work at one point where I realized I really didn't want to be in the relationship I was in and that I hadn't been into it romantically for awhile, and made myself confront it after that. And after some looking into it, I ended up determining I was lith/akoiromantic (whichever term; they mean the same thing as far as I'm aware). I've also since ended the relationship (that and this whole identity crisis was two weeks ago).

Okay, so I feel fairly confident in this identity and think I have things generally figured out (like anyone ever does completely but I'm satisfied for now??). And it's actually kind of a relief to have this romantic relationship off the plate. But now that I'm kind of satisfied with my identity that way, I seemed to start actively questioning my gender (granted, I had been considering binding my chest just to see how I looked/how I felt about it for awhile before that; I had actually been rather uneducated on non-binary identities until maybe the middle of high school but I had always leaned in a sort of androgynous direction socially and appearance wise but it isn't like extreme dysphoria).

So does anyone else feel like, once you're satisfied with an answer to one hard question, another one always seems to just rear its ugly head?

Sorry this is kind of a vent, aha...

[SlugFart]

You are totally not alone on that-- I have felt like that for EVER.

I have dated countless guys, thinking that eventually my sexuality would 'click' or that I'd actually enjoy dating these people. I have been dating the same man for 11 months now, and after we started to get sexually active I realized that this was NOT for me.

I came out to my parents and my boyfriend, and they all took it at different levels of 'this is redonk and you're faking,' but I'm slowly working on fixing it.

So yes, you're not alone. And this is easily the best place to vent about this stuff, so it's no big deal.

-Morris

[Star Bit]

Lith has another title; Aporomantic/sexual, and it's not left up to a metaphor like the previous two. And it covers all the types of Lith too; indifference, loss of interest, and repulsion. So i prefer it. Though it's creator inaccurately named it Apromantic/sexual; the prefix Ap is used before vowels and R and S are not; so it's other term Apo or Aph would be accurate.

[Baskervillain]

I love another challenge appearing when I've got a handle on one it keeps things interesting