Hello from the Other Side?

[SnapbackCat]

What to even say has keep me from joining and posting, despite having been reading and familiarizing myself with the AVEN community for the past month. But I guess I will just jump in instead of staring at this blank space.

Hi! I am 25, a divorcee for almost a year, and unsure if I actually fall inside the asexual spectrum so I am continuing to try and learn more about it even if I am not sure about it.

I have never identified as asexual as I have always been attracted to women, so asexuality never even entered my mind as . I have had 2 sexual relationships with women but it was never really fulfilling for me other than just enjoying that my partner enjoyed it. I just chalked it up to something wrong with me that I didn't get the same thing out of it as they did and didn't think much more into it. It was a hot topic with my now ex-wife, me not wanting sex all the time and getting grumpy if she pushed for it when I wasn't in the right mood for it. The other physical aspects such as cuddling, kissing, holding hands were great and I loved those aspects so, again, can't possibly fall in the asexual spectrum right?

Almost 2 months ago, I made friends with a young woman at a job we worked together. We started hanging out and eventually I came out as gay to her (though I am pretty sure she knew from our first meeting) and she came out as asexual to me. We started talking more and more as I was curious about what asexuality was all about. She talked about her experiences with trying to date, how she came to realize she was asexual, her family's reaction, and what she identifies as. I have learned more and more from her as she talked to me about it, shared videos about it, and introduced me to AVEN. It is still a bit of information overload but I am starting to understand more about it. I talked to her about my relationships and my 'eh' attitude towards sex, even though I am attracted to women. As we talked more and I did more research about asexuality, I started thinking more and more about it but never put it into words because I didn't want to identify myself as something other than lesbian since that is what I have identified as since I was in early high school.

My friend eventually brought up the subject of grey-asexuality and while she never tried to label me or change my mind about my sexuality. She encouraged me to educate myself, she wanted to share an aspect of herself and I found myself fascinated by it. The more I read about it and watched videos by asexuals it started sounding more familiar and found myself thinking 'hey, there are other people who have gone through this'. I still am not fully convinced, but I am here to continue learning about it and expanding my knowledge of sexualities outside of what I grew up knowing about.

[Abbalinax]

Hello SnapBack! Welcome to AVEN!

It's definitely okay that you're not sure if you fall on the ace spectrum or not, you'll always be welcome here no matter what. ^_^ As I'm sure you've already noticed, there are lots of friendly people here very willing to answer any questions you might have. I hope you find that interacting with the AVEN community to be just as helpful as listening has been!

-Abo

[kelico]

Welcome to AVEN! Thank you for sharing your story with us! I'm glad you decided to join. : ) There's a lot to read through and discover, so take all the time you need! You'll find that there are different types of attraction...so you can be asexual (not feel sexual attraction) but have romantic or sensual or aesthetic attraction towards [insert gender(s) here]. See what feels right and go with it. There's a lot of friendly and supportive people here, too. I hope you enjoy being a member! (Also, gotta love the Adele reference in your title! We're actually singing 'Hello' for this episode of AVENites Sing.)