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My romantic orientation is just all over the place


arobot

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I'm 100% asexual; I came to terms with that.

 

However, I am confused about my romantic orientation.

 

1) I've recently got out of a 2years+ long relationship. Towards the end, I was just feeling sad all the time--my partner was amazing and supportive all the time, but not only that I wasn't sure if I "loved" them, but I was sad in the relationship somehow. When we broke up I started feeling relieved, happy, and free, and for some reason my sex drive went down by a lot. Recently, they called me and I was excited to hear from them; I was happy and cheerful, making jokes on the phone and having fun. However, when they mentioned they want us to get back together, that sadness came back to me. I started feeling gloomy and being unresponsive. They told me to forget about it, and I said ok.

 

So in this relationship, I was happy to see my partner, I loved cuddling them, touching them, and kissing them (without tongue), and I was under the impression that this *is* romantic attraction. Even the AVEN forums define romantic attraction as " It involves, just to name some examples, feeling better when this person(s) is around, wanting to spend lots of time with them, the desire to take care of them and make sure they are okay and the desire to have a closer relationship with them."--I believe I felt all of these for my partner, yet I was sad being in a relationship with them.

 

2) Now, the other confusing part is that at some point I was talking to someone online. We kept talking and although I was sort of fancying them, I never had very strong feelings towards them. However, at some point, I started to suddenly feel "love" (?). I was so attracted to them, I wanted to do everything for them; I would stay awake all night just to be with them, I would honestly move in with them and dedicate my life to making their life better. I was feeling an urge to say "I love you" and even "I love you so much." It was very, very different than anything else I remember experiencing. Very different than the previous experience I detailed as well, even if I never dated this person. After a month or so, this whole attraction was gone. Right now, I have unread messages from them and I can't bring myself to respond. I don't feel anything anymore, and I'm only talking to them out of inertia and because I'd feel bad to ghost them or let them know I no longer "love" them.

 

So, in the first relationship I detailed, I never really felt the urge to "do everything" for my partner. I would be lazy or avoid responsibilities, but I would most definitely enjoy their presence and love spending time with them (we were living together). However, it was also making me sad. In the second "relationship," it was all online and we never dated. It was very intense but only lasted a month or a bit more, and ended for no external reason at all--my feelings simply vanished.

 

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If I was to try to label these things myself, I would say that maybe my first relationship was aromantic, and the second was "burstromantic"--a term I've seen used & hated here. However, the first relationship seems to fit a definition of "romantic relationship" as defined here (https://www.asexuality.org/en/topic/76092-romantic-and-aromantic-lexicon-and-faq/), and the latter was just bizarre.

 

What do you make out of this? What in the world is going on with my romantic orientation?

 

Edit: Forgot to mention--perhaps important--, I, by no means, wanted to date the person in (2). They had a partner, they had a sex addiction, and I would've definitely declined dating them even if they wanted to. I just wanted to be part of their life and be helpful but not date.

 

Edit 2: I-I think I solved it. I'm aromantic in the sense that I do not want traditional relationships and dislike being part of one. However, I experience love/romance in a submissive/kink kind of way. Kink has been a major part of my life, and I can totally see myself being with (1) in a D/s relationship, but not in a normal relationship. Similarly, in (2), the love was becase we had a bit of a D/s online relationship. I think everything makes sense and remains consistent in this kink-led framework.

 

Edit 3: Further, my "love" for (2) died around the time my sex drive went down, so I believe the kink-led attraction is dependent on sex drive. However, I've been "seeing" someone who I am very attracted to but only in a platonic (and aesthetic) way: she has a partner, and I enjoy talking to her and visiting her and just being with her generally. My interaction with her makes me happy, but I didn't have this with (2)--we didn't hit it off talking, so once the sex drive went down, the kink-led attraction died and there was nothing else there. Further, I believe I am turned off when someone likes me in a traditional relationship/dating kind of way--my partner in (1) was mono for the most part and saw me as a partner, while (2) and my current platonic partner were/are both in a serious relationship. So, in a way, for a relationship to work for me in the long-term, I may need:

- the relationship to be D/s rather than traditional (only helps when I have a sex drive)

- the relationship should ideally be poly (but I don't need/want to be with others; I merely want a reassurance that the other doesn't see me as a traditional partner or some other reason

- we need to have a strong platonic connection (helps when the sex drive is not there)

- aesthetic attraction

- maybe even more ingredients that I don't know.

Wow this is inhuman.

 

Edit 4: In summary, my new understanding is that I desire aesthetic/sensual/platonic attraction, but romantic/sexual attraction (?) is only triggered by kink and thus I would be grey-romantic and grey-asexual, if my variation of romantic/sexual need can be cataloged as an attraction in the traditional sense. Otherwise, I would be sort of a kinky aro/ace.

 

Anyway, sorry for the monolog--typing things up apparently provides further clarity to my orientations. If anyone has any thoughts/experiences that are kind enough to share, that'd be highly appreciated.

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TeamYellowUmbrella

Hello arobot!

 

For relationship one, it depends on where the sadness came from. Maybe you felt pressures that you didn't want to do in the relationship. Maybe you didn't want a relationship at first, but knew they liked you and you tried anyway because you loved the friendship you had. Maybe it was completely something else. I'm not sure where it came from, but figuring out where the sadness is coming from can help.

 

For the second relationship, I have had a similar experience. I met someone and he and I fell for each other. I was excited that he liked me back and texted a decent amount. It seemed great, but a part of me knew it didn't feel right. Some reasons were somewhat shallow I'll admit, but my biggest reason was knowing how he was sexual and I went by asexual. I had shame in that at the time, and I was afraid that I could never give him the full relationship he would want. Shortly after, I had to break off the potential relationship, and the feelings were just gone. For a while, I thought I was lithromantic (only liked someone until they liked back and then the attraction dies for the lithro). Since then, I have been in a relationship with someone else and I fell in love. The difference was that that relationship happened fairly quickly, and we lived on the same floor, so the relationship happened quickly enough that I never lost attraction and hope for the possible relationship.

 

I hope my stories and insights were helpful!(:

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