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When did you know you were Asexual?


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MintIceCream

When did you know? I started noticing when I was fourteen, but I didn't have a name for it. And I met my brothers friend who was Asexual and we just had a lot in common which was kind of creepy! So I looked it up a few months ago and now I just found AVEN like a week ago. I've just been trying to learn now.

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The first time I remember feeling different from my peers (at least sexuality-wise) was in middle school. I knew on some level that sex wasn't something I wanted, and didn't understand why all my classmates suddenly cared about it. By my freshmen year in high school, I was considering becoming a nun just so I would have an excuse not to start a family or have sex. If I knew asexuality was a possibility at the time, I would have definitely identified with it.

My feelings were finally solidified when I was 19. I had just gotten out of a romantic relationship that felt completely wrong to me, and I knew I wasn't straight like I originally assumed. Soon after I stumbled across the asexual spectrum, and after a bit of research, immediately knew I belonged there.

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MintIceCream

I remember being fourteen and noticing that I tell myself I love that boy or whatever, but then I realized I actually hated him. I only had feelings for one boy, but in the end I really just wished he was my brother. We had so much in common and I think that was it. So it's strange to talk and accept that I might never be interested in sex. And the strangest part of that is I think I actually am fine with it.

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Well, I only really came to the conclusion a few months ago. I had never thought about sex beforehand and had an honest "conversation" with myself when finding out about Asexuality and found that I was Asexual. I'm also pretty certain I am Aromantic but...haven't figured that one out yet.

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Tyger Songbird

Looking back, I should have known when I was 17. I was basically in high school and everyone was talking about things like oral sex, masturbation, and condoms, and I just was so focused on school and academics. Sex was more like a biological function to me for germination. It was something that I hadNow, while I was looking at porn, I think it was more of a dopamine rush to deal with depression because I was solo. I always was a peculiar kid, I guess. I liked being by myself, though there were times I would get lonely. I just was not really into dating. Matter of fact, I used to say that I wasn't interested in anything. I just wanted to focus on my career. People just thought that I hadn't met anyone yet, and I held that possibility as well. So I used to say that I hadn't met anyone who would change my mind. I felt really insecure about saying that I didn't want to have anybody. I felt like that would be called weird by most people. So, I did whatever to fit in for the longest time. If I had heard about AVEN back then, I would have been overjoyed. I didn't find out about this until college, but then I dismissed it for a while until now just a few weeks ago because I still thought that I just was weird and I was still aesthetically attracted to girls. If I had known what I know now, then it would have been much easier.

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I started questioning my sexuality at 16, until then I simply hadn't cared. I then went through phases of wondering if I was a repressed lesbian (who knows why I would be repressed, but nvm), or if I had been sexually abused as a child and didn't remember (discarded that idea very quickly), before settling on thinking of myself as "non-sexual" when I was 17. Found the term asexual at 24.

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DragonflytotheMoon

I'm a pan-demi rom grace. Most of my life (I'm 47), I considered myself to be bi rom. Pan I recognized fit better in the past year. Demi & grace was something I came to understand, just a month ago. After that, I looked for a forum where there were people I could relate to & found AVEN. Looking back, what I experienced & the way I responded to things, now makes a lot of sense.

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Coffee Bean

In high school, I went out with the first boy who ever asked me (pathetic, I know), because I thought I was supposed to say yes, even though I had no romantic interest in him. We ended up doing some sexual stuff, but when he wanted to take it to actual sex, I felt very uncomfortable with the idea, but was going to go through with it, because once again- I thought I was obligated to, or that it was just something people my age did. Thankfully, his parents made him break up with me (probably had gotten word of what he was planning), and I was soooo relieved that I literally danced in the hallway! I had also gone out with a girl for some time afterwards, but fudged that relationship up by trying to make it sexual for the sake of "normalcy" with somebody who didn't like being touched (I believe she was also asexual). I ended up having sex with the man who is currently my husband, but it still feels odd. I thought that there was something wrong for years, until I learned about the asexual spectrum through tumblr. The more posts I read, the more I found I could identify with it.

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I have never been that interested in sex. I did rarely get what other guys at school was talking about when sex/girls came up, sure i could find her cute but nothing more then that. And this followd me for years why i didn't function like everybody else when it comes to things like that. So around half a year ago i started search for some info dident really find anything that answer any of my questions, did some tests and eventually found this site and got so many of my questions answered.

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  • 1 month later...
dragon_cake

I never knew what asexuality was until I discovered it online as a young adult but I definitely knew I was one at age 10 where almost everyone seems sexually interested, mention innuendos or words that adults would try to hide from children because I was not sure what their slangs and vocabulary around sex meant and I never felt like doing anything with a celebrity and thought they were joking when they talk about how they would lick, touch or whatever they meant.

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I can't remember exactly but I know I joined AVEN pretty much as soon as I figured it out so must have been about 25. I'd know I was different since the age of about 16 though.

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I only figured it out maybe this year? I knew that there was no difference in how I felt towards men and women so I assumed for years that I was bisexual. But I started learning more about asexuality and then I learnt that you could be aromantic too, and I realised I'd never actually had romantic/sexual feelings before. It was a long process of 'maybe I have but I brushed it off because of anxiety'. I tried internet dating and spoke to really interesting people but as soon as they were interested in taking it further and actually meeting I realised I didn't really feel anything for them and needed to abort the situation. I spoke to friends and reached out to other people and eventually settled on aro/ace as the best category for me to fit in to.

It was never really straight forward and even now I have moments where I question if I really am asexual or if I'm just full of anxieties.

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I'm asexual since I was born. When I was in Middle School, Everybody had interest in getting girlfriends, or boyfriends. I just didn't care about this, I just wanted a life just for me, because relationships are boring for me. When I finally was in High School, things got a little "extreme", now they are talking about sex, and sexual positions and how they want to lose virginity. I was just like like I always was. sometimes I get in some chats like:

(Somebody): "Hey man, You still don't have a girlfriend."

(Me): "I don't want a girl."

(Somebody): "LOL WHAT A FAGGG XDD"

(Me): "I don't want a boy too."

(Somebody): "You have to choose one!"

(Me): *sigh*

In the last month, I made a test to see if I'm really asexual, after some tests, yeah... I'm aromantic.

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One Winged Angel

I have always known, but did not know of the word, nor the wider community, until I found AVEN.

To look back on my teenage years is to see someone who would have loved to know the word "Asexual" sooner. I have often wished that the sex education at school included this orientation, for it would have jumped up at me and shouted "this is you" so loud I could not ignore it. Instead I had many years of looking for something that wasn't there, out of a subconscious belief that there must be 'something' out there that worked for me sexually.

But even as a young child, when someone would say "in the future, when you have a girlfriend", I just knew somehow that I was not interested in ever having a girlfriend or sexual relationship. I found the thought repellent, it did not appeal to me, and woe betide anybody who tried to convince me otherwise. I have not changed, and this is all still very true today.

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_Need_Advice765

The first time I remember feeling different from my peers (at least sexuality-wise) was in middle school. I knew on some level that sex wasn't something I wanted, and didn't understand why all my classmates suddenly cared about it. By my freshmen year in high school, I was considering becoming a nun just so I would have an excuse not to start a family or have sex. If I knew asexuality was a possibility at the time, I would have definitely identified with it.

My feelings were finally solidified when I was 19. I had just gotten out of a romantic relationship that felt completely wrong to me, and I knew I wasn't straight like I originally assumed. Soon after I stumbled across the asexual spectrum, and after a bit of research, immediately knew I belonged there.

I was considering becoming a nun as well at the same time, it seemed so much easier to have that excuse for not to have sex or a romantisk relationship... And I agree if i´d only had known about asexuality then, it had been so much easier.

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I first realized something was different about my sexuality when I was sixteen, but I didn't have the words for it until I was nineteen, and I came out shortly after that.

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My friends all started acting weird and giggly about *sex* stuff right about early teens and I knew then that there was something different about me because I was, like, just completely not into this. I tried *making out* but it just felt like slobber in my mouth. My best friend explained to me years later, in college, that other people were experience a, like, addictive, tingly feeling associated with all this stuff so I guess that was sort of my, light-bulb moment so to speak.

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When I was around 7 years old I had a fascination of Lucky Luke. I did think 'Do I want to be his lover?' but it didn't seem right in my head. I noticed that I actually really wanted to be his best friend.

Also, when I was around 9-10 everyone got crushes and fell in love, but I didn't experience that at all. Though, there was one time where I thought I had a crush but I thought veeery long and hard about wanting to be this guy's lover... and I honestly didn't care if someone else liked him, they could take him if they wanted to lol

I found (from this girl forum-thing) the word asexual when I was 14 years old. so yea

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When I was 19 (I think), a friend who likes making up words planned to joke that I was a term he made up, asexual. However he decided to prove he made up the term, and found it it was already a term used. He asked me if I was asexual anyway because whem we would go to clubbing, he thought I would be interested in pulling women, but wasn't. After he helped explain the term, I realised it fitted me.

He said it helped him know that when we go to clubs since then, pulling women wouldn't be a priority and knows it'll be a more relaxed night with me.

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Oh, boy... It was a long process of slow realization, honestly. I started feeling "different" from the people around me when I was thirteen or fourteen. Later in high school, my classmates began talking more and more about who was "sexier"; who they wanted to "bang", and I honestly felt like a fish out of water, because I'd never thought of people like that before; all my attraction was based in aesthetics. I had to fake my way through all those interactions. I hated going to school dances because they always had a sexual undertone. I felt like a prude because I didn't try and sexualize my school uniform (eg. hiking my skirt way above the knees, which most of the other girls were doing) to catch the attention of boys. This whole feeling of disconnection got worse and worse, especially because nobody else really seemed to reciprocate what I was feeling. When I was eighteen, I met my first boyfriend, and I was horribly uncomfortable with any form of sexual contact. After a while, I found myself making every possible excuse to avoid it. On the off-chance that we did try something out, I immediately became bored and didn't care for it. He moved away after a year, but the whole thing stayed on my mind, and when I was around nineteen, I finally started doing some google searches. That brought me to Aven, and the remaining few pieces of the puzzle fell into place.

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  • 2 weeks later...
cavalier080854

I was told I was asexual when I was 16 (45 years ago), though I suspected something earlier when I was 15.

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I am fairly young still, and so I am one of the lucky few that knew about the terms 'asexual' and 'aromantic' before my classmates and I hit puberty (say what you will about tumblr, but I can't thank it enough for that).

When I first found out what sex was, a was around ten years old, and it sounded disgusting to me. The more fluids involved, the more disgusting it became. I thought at the time, because I was so young and because I knew people my age didn't have sex, that it was something that would grow on me. I kept that mentality until I was fourteen, in the eighth grade.

The first reality check for me was when some of my friends started to date each other. I knew people my age were dating, of course, but these were my close friends, people I more closely associate with myself--so when they started their (fruitless) romances, I wondered why I could never see myself wanting that, and considered that I may be aromantic; and, for that matter, asexual, because I wasn't interested in sex either.

The second reality check was when rumors were spread around the school that two of my classmates (not my friends) had... 'gotten busy' together after school. That told me that some people my age actually wanted sex, and that I was rather behind the curve in that respect; it solidified my already growing suspicion that the 'It'll grow on me' rhetoric had worn out it's welcome, and I started more seriously considering my sexuality.

Finally, it had been eating away at me for long enough, and I stumbled across AVEN. When I read other people's experiences that were so similar to my own, I knew that there was, like, a ninety-nine percent chance that I was ace.

Three days later, I came out to my parents, and the rest is history.

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I didn't find out about asexuality until I was 24, and I don't think I would of, for a lack of a better word, had the maturity to understand it before then. Which I think for me, that was a good thing, although I was never in a position before or since then to "properly" find out. As soon as I did find out, it took about a week of what ifs before showing up here, and then everything slowly started making sense, as well as it being a lot more relaxing.

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Well I joined AVEN when I was 16, but I knew before then that I wasn't sexual. I remember a friend once asking if I was "asexual" (I thought it was an unofficial/made up term at the time) when I was 14/15, and I responded yes, so I guess sometime around then.

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I would never know someone else like myself existed if not for internet. Growing up, the concept of sexuality was never open for question in my community. We didn't even learn it in school save for a paragraph in Biology that compares sex and asexual reproduction. "Hot" was never in my vocab to describe anyone and while kids my age got through the sexual phase, I was left standing at the side wondering how the heck do they magically know who they find attractive. Where do they learn to be attracted or not? This goes on for the most of my teens and young adulthood. I tried faking it or pretended I am straight but it only caused my so much stress and discomfort. I then find it easier if I tell people that I am just "has very high standard and/or materialistic".

After internet, I learned a lot about the world outside Asia and see the variety of sexual and gender indentities. I am now 30 years old and can positively identify myself as aromantic ace finally.

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Hermit Advocate

I always knew that I wasn't maturing in terms of sexual desire/attraction alongside my peers, but I always just kind of figured that I was a late bloomer and then never gave it another thought. It was really only when I forced myself to start dating this past year that I sat myself down and told myself that I am not a late bloomer, I am simply asexual.

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DragonflytotheMoon

Three months ago I had an epiphany. I was having a relationship with a woman. We're both married & poly. It hadn't gotten sexual & I really didn't want to go there. Though, I enjoyed the friendship, romance & some sensuality. A month or so after we started our relationship she began one with another woman. I knew about it & in fact was the one that said about us being open to seeing other people. Then, she decided she was having a better connection with the other woman, wanted to end it with me & even take a break from the friendship. I'm not going to detail what's occurred since. It did make me realize a lot of things. Including that I'm a demi romantic grace. Everything that I had experienced & felt up to that point now made sense. I don't like how she treated me, but, I do like the better understanding I have of myself.

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EnterCreativeName

I never noticed a difference, honestly. I thought everyone was just like me, as my friends never talked about crushes or getting into relationships at all. It was in 8th grade at the end of the year when I heard about asexuality through a GSA assembly with a slide show. It was on the very last slide, and was listed with pan and another sexuality I can't remember. When I was walking back to class, my friends had said jokingly that I was "clearly either lesbian or asexual". Again, I didn't think much of it. It was only until summer came around, when I had more time to myself, that I actually thought about asexuality and decided to look it up. I didn't ever feel different, I still don't really, and I never had some great realization moment. I just found the right label and nodded, coming out whenever it felt right and to whoever I wanted to.

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I guess it really hit me when I was at University. It was a few months in and I was involved with this girl but nothing sexual had happened yet. We would just go out on dates, hangout together and things were going quite well. There were no expectations of anything and we hadn't really discussed being in a relationship so we were taking things slow and casual.

One night we were out drinking and afterwards I walked her back to her place, she invited me in to watch a movie and I declined. The next morning I was considering things and it dawned on me that I was making excuses/ avoiding situations where we could sleep together. This caused me to consider my previous relationships when I was a teenager and the more I thought about things being asexual just fit. When I was younger I was making excuses to myself that I wasn't emotionally ready for sex but looking back on it as a more mature person it was clear to me that I had no sexual attraction to them.

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