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At what age does romantic orientation become apparent?


Galactic Turtle

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Galactic Turtle

Hello humans!

The question is basically in the title of the thread but... basically...

I've heard in life that you pretty much always become aware of your sexual orientation during your teenage years and it's supposed to be pretty obvious to figure out... unless it doesn't happen... in which case you might just find yourself on AVEN.

It seems like romantic orientation, to a lot of people, is a lot more ambiguous to the extent that a lot of people seem to say that it's not a real thing. I was just wondering what the age range usually is for realizing your romantic orientation or if there isn't one, really...?

Yeah...

Personally, my first "YO THAT BOY BE CUTE" moment was when I was fourteen... but it never escalated past that. Because of this, I assumed I was heterosexual. However, eight years have passed since then and the urge to jump into bed with someone hasn't hit me like it has with the rest of my friends (a few of whom are already engaged) so I've been giving this thing called "romantic orientation" a closer look.

Because I find many boys to be attractive in theory, I assumed I was heteroromantic just like I assumed I was heterosexual but I still seem to lack the ups and downs in my life of pining over crushes from afar except perhaps on one unique occasion. When nothing came of that particular non-relationship, I wasn't sad about it at all. It was more like I was confused that it happened at all in the first place.

So... eheh... yep. That's all I've got to say.

(This was the cause of my "yo that boy be cute" moment :P )

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hecatonicosachoron

I figured out my romantic orientation when I was fourteen, when I had my first proper crush (it didn't go anywhere, she was straight...), but at the time I labelled myself as bisexual. I only realised I was actually ace two years later.

I think romantic orientation, for me, wasn't that hard to work out. I had an absolutely massive crush on a girl, but I could imagine myself dating/living with anyone in the future.

A friend of mine who is ace also figured out her romantic orientation at about 14 years old. I don't know if this applies to everyone though, it probably doesn't.

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I think most people experience attraction (romantic and/or sexual) around ages 11 - 15? but i also think it can change and evolve as a person grows.

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Kids have been known to express their orientations as young as 9 or 10. So you can sometimes tell if someone is gay, bi, etc from a young age, but not always as it doesn't always become apparent until during puberty or even later or never at all. I think this is because they express their romantic orientations at a young age since that seems a little young to be thinking about sex.

For me, I was interested in boys slightly when I was in elementary school. I remember having a couples crushes (now I think they were squishes instead) when I was that young and they were always boys. I also remember that I was essentially straight at that time since sex was still off the table for everyone I knew. I asked my bi friend and she remembers being interested in boys and girls in elementary school as well, but repressed her interest in girls since even then she knew a girl liking other girls wasn't accepted in society.

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Unlike sexual desire, romantic attraction/romantic desire does not have a set age range. It can happen anywhere from 5 years old to 18.

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just an owl

Pretty much everyone I know had crushes in primary school (up to age 11) so... I think quite a young age? (Although a lot of them may not have been all that romantic and I'm sure others made up crushes...)

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It started for me around the age of 8.

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I can't tell you about age because I don't experience regular romantic attraction.

But from what I read, you're still having this strong celebrity crush, right ? It's possible that as long as you have it, it doesn't let any room for other crushes to develop. Especially if it's very intense and long term.

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Galactic Turtle

I can't tell you about age because I don't experience regular romantic attraction.

But from what I read, you're still having this strong celebrity crush, right ? It's possible that as long as you have it, it doesn't let any room for other crushes to develop. Especially if it's very intense and long term.

It's strange though because with Changmin (the person I like) I acknowledge that I'm infatuated with the idea of him which is really all you can get with a celebrity because you don't know what they're actually like. I like the fact that there's no physical component between us and imagine that if we really were together I'd just really want to eat waffles with him. Compared to the one crush I think I actually did have, my feelings for Changmin can best be described as "unlimited praise"... I think... though he is quite handsome. ^_^ I admire him quite a bit!

for me at 8 but everybody is different.

You like NU'EST? Cool! ^_^ I feel so old liking TVXQ. All the guys in NCT are younger than me. XD

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I had my first crush when I was twelve or thirteen, on a girl. I don't think I realized I could crush on people who weren't girls until I was in college, though. It's not like for most bi- or pansomething people, who know from an early-ish age, and suppress the non-hetero feelings for a while. I just didn't know they were there, honestly.

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starry-night-sky

That's actually a hard question. I had "crushes" in primary school but they were probably made up crushes. I think I probably got interested in the whole love topic and saw stuff about love on TV, heard people talking and so I acted like I had a crush. Even now ​I can't tell if I have a crush or if I just think it's interesting to have a crush and it's not about the actual person. So umm.. if I had to give an age I'd probably say 13 but as I said before I don't really know.

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I never had a crush until I was 17, so I guess I was just a late bloomer in that regard. Even then, I only feel attraction to someone I'm already friends with (except for one weird time when I was only just starting to get to know someone- we weren't quite friends yet but she definitely wasn't a complete stranger), and crushes are rare for me, so I identify as demiromantic. Obviously for my peers their orientation became apparent much earlier than mine did; I'd say as early as 9 or 10 in some cases. So I'd say there's a wide range of time when it could happen.

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I had my first crush when I was around 9 or 10 (actually, I had my first "boyfriend" when I was 6, but I don't remember feeling any romantic attraction to him). It took me until I was 14 to realise I was biromantic, but looking back there were signs that I was attracted to girls years before that.

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CunhaMarchi

Hullo people, newby here. Also, brazilian here, so forgive my poor english skills.

This thread really interest me, because it was basically last year, at 21, that I realized "Wait a second, shouldn't I have had some kind of crush yet?". I even talked to my parents, to ask them if maybe they remembered something from my 12~16 years that I forgot.

As far as I know, I have never been interested in anyone. Never felt that kind of "want" to be close to another person, or any kind of giddiness, nervousness or repeated thinking about someone.

Some people, my mom included, insist that I simply have not found the right person yet. A part of me hope they are right. The rest of me thinks that, at the age of 22 and almost a decade after most human beings start feeling attraction, I was simply shipped without the necessary software.

Also worth mentioning that I have never felt physical, or sensual, or sexual, attraction for another person either.

I have been lurking in these forums for a couple of months now, but finally decided to start posting. Nice to meet you all.

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Oh yah, forgot to post my info. I'm pretty sure my crushes in kindergarten (which i only remember one of but am informed otherwise) were done out of hetero expectation and was basically mistaking squishes for crushes. So my first crush was when i was 18.

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WhenSummersGone

I was 9 when I got my first crush on a guy so I knew I was into guys. I've never had a crush on girl yet but I can really like some.

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I always knew I was asexual and I assumed I was aromantic until I was 18 years old. At that time, I realized I was romantic but I'm nonbinary (neutrois/genderless/agender) so I don't know what to put in front of the word. I present myself on the masculine end of the androgyny spectrum and some days I do feel masculine, so I sometimes call myself as heteroromantic due to my romantic attraction to females, but due to mostly feeling genderless I don't use that term that often. I guess I'm gyneromantic, or romantically attracted to female.

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The beginnings go back to kindergarten age for me (around 5). I still fondly think back of my "sandbox crush" I. occasionally, and wonder what she's up to nowadays (havent' heard from her in like, 30 years).

It's been clear for me since then that I had some feelings for girls that I simply never - or close to never, there was one exception - had for boys. Just took another decade or so before I identified these feelings with the word "romance".

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I only had a few crushes in my life and all of them were never serious. I took me quite a while to found out about it so I guess it was around the age of 17.

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For me, I don't know. I'm just going with the flow. :P

#RhymingFTW

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