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what did you find out first?


AussieIsAce

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Im trying to see why people say they are ace and in which order they think they fall.

i knew i didnt want to have sex before i found out i wasnt sexually attracted to anyone. 

now the definition of asexual is "not experiencing sexual attraction" 

now yes that definition applies to me just fine but i feel like "i dont want sex therefore im not sexually attracted to anyone" would make more sense for me because thats how i see everything"

 

brad pitt is sexy as hell but i dont have sex so therefore im not sexually attracted to him, he is just a pretty man who i wouldnt sleep with.

see the person doesnt matter because nothing makes me want to have sex meaning im not attracted to them sexually. 

and please dont tell me im sex repulsed cause im not its just there is no way id have sex...its not for me.

aesthetic attraction is something i experience but never sexual.

 

now id love to know which order you found out your aceness through was it:

 

  1. i wasnt experiencing sexual attaction towards anyone
  2. i didnt want to have sex, no desire
  3. other and id love for you to explain why you choose other.

 

Cheers mates. Btw sorry to anyone ive argued with ive turned a new leaf and am trying to be good. 

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25 minutes ago, miettaisace said:
  • i wasnt experiencing sexual attaction towards anyone
  • i didnt want to have sex, no desire
  • other and id love for you to explain why you choose other.

For me it's #2 - I have never wanted to have sex. I was 13 yo when I realized this (during the one and only, not very informative, sex-ed class they gave us at the time c. 1984). When I look back over the years, I realize that #1 has always been there too, but the second option was a full realization early on.

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I noticed Aromanticism before Asexuality.  I didn't want a nonsexual relationship with anyone, just very close friends.  I later would discover a lack of sexual desire as I sheltered myself very well.

 

So, in this order:

1.  Didn't want a romantic relationship.

2.  No sexual desire.

3.  Not sexually attracted to anyone.

 

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Considering I didn't know what sex was until I lived in a college dorm room... is it even possible to desire something  you don't know exists?

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I didn't want to have sex with anyone, though I spent some time trying to convince myself otherwise.

I realised later that I wasn't acutally sexually attracted to anyone. 

And sometime in between I discovered Aven and that was it :)

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I guess I realized #2 first, but it took me a few years to figure out I was ace and not just a "late bloomer." Early in high school, I knew the fact that I wasn't sure I wanted kids was partly due to not wanting to have sex, not just not wanting to give birth, but I never even considered that I could be anything other than straight until I started college.

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I realized 2 first; I kept imagining maybe someday I'd get over my desire not to have sex and kind of decided someday I would just consent to it before realizing it was an option to say I just wanted a relationship without sex; it was so freeing to figure out other people felt like that too. 

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I guess #1 - my friends were all over the latest teen stars/Bros etc but I didn’t get it. One day I just picked one and joined in so I wasn’t left out. my best mate just looked at me and said something like “I was beginning to wonder...”

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2 hours ago, Warsaw said:

I noticed Aromanticism before Asexuality.  I didn't want a nonsexual relationship with anyone, just very close friends.  I later would discover a lack of sexual desire as I sheltered myself very well.

 

So, in this order:

1.  Didn't want a romantic relationship.

2.  No sexual desire.

3.  Not sexually attracted to anyone.

 

Mine's pretty similar to this. Plus, like the OP, I've found many "sexy" people to be good looking, so it took getting into sexual circumstances to realize that was not at all relevant when there's no underlying desire for sex with other people. And getting into sexual circumstances took more effort from the lack of romantic pursuits.

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Before I found out about asexuality, I thought I wanted to have a romantic relationship and sex (because everyone wants that and there is no other option, right?) When I realised that my (nonexistent) desire for romance/sex wasn't affected by gender, I thought I was bi. When I eventually figured out that I don't want romance/sex, I understood how it was all connected and identified as ace/aro. 

 

So, I guess I noticed my lack of sexual attraction first, but I misinterpreted it, thus thinking I was bi. Realising that I absolutely do not want sex came later, and I still struggle with thinking "when I some day will have sex..." because society is shit. 

 

Fun fact: I used to think to myself "I'd rather never have sex than cutting my nails super short" and "I'd rather never have sex than having to wear sexy underwear". I was basically making up excuses as to why I didn't want to have sex, based on what I thought was "mandatory". It took a while before I realised that "I'd rather not have sex, ever, thank you very much."

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I think in this case there's a difference between one's attitude toward having sex, and whether one feels sexual attraction. It's similar to the debate about whether atheism means "not believing in any gods" or "believing there are no gods". With asexuality, it would be "wanting not to have sex" vs. "not wanting to have sex". I was sort of curious about sex, and not repulsed by the idea of having it, but I never felt any actual desire to have sex with anyone. But I'm not sure which of your options fits me, because I'm not really sure what the difference is between sexual desire and sexual attraction.

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1 hour ago, TheAP said:

I think in this case there's a difference between one's attitude toward having sex, and whether one feels sexual attraction. It's similar to the debate about whether atheism means "not believing in any gods" or "believing there are no gods". With asexuality, it would be "wanting not to have sex" vs. "not wanting to have sex". I was sort of curious about sex, and not repulsed by the idea of having it, but I never felt any actual desire to have sex with anyone. But I'm not sure which of your options fits me, because I'm not really sure what the difference is between sexual desire and sexual attraction.

sexual desire is wanting to have sex 

and sexual attraction is want to have sex with that person you are attracted too. 

 

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42 minutes ago, miettaisace said:

sexual desire is wanting to have sex 

That's what I find confusing. By wanting to have sex, does it mean wanting to have sex for sexual pleasure? Because it's possible for aces to want to have sex out of curiosity.

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Galactic Turtle
6 hours ago, miettaisace said:
  • i wasnt experiencing sexual attaction towards anyone
  • i didnt want to have sex, no desire
  • other and id love for you to explain why you choose other.

Hmm... well I kind of had a misunderstanding regarding the sex/romance part of life. I thought sex was only something male bodied people wanted to have and that female bodied people did it to make them happy. So I guess....

 

I didn't want to have sex/had no desire... even though I thought that was normal.

 

From my point of view I thought I'd want to have sex once I liked someone because if I like someone I must want to make them happy, right? The only issue was I never liked anyone and haven't wanted to look for someone to be with because those types of relationships seem kind of unnatural to me especially when I picture myself.

 

However even now I assume that if I like someone that way I'll want to have sex with them (my parents always refer to this as me "blossoming into a woman"). I just remain thoroughly uninterested in that sector of life experiences and haven't had any sort of non-platonic feelings hit me in the face in a way where I'd have to actively deal with it on top of me just I guess... not understanding those types of feelings.

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you could always be a gracer (gray-Asexual). Gray-As (as we were calling our-selves like years ago, I might be out on the lingo) are between asexual and sexual, they'res different types, I've never cared to explore that much cause I found Gray-A works and defining the type gets too into the "how do I make you work?" questions from sexuals, but basically gray-asexuals are anyone who isn't totally asexual but also isn't totally sexual. Some grey-asexuals report feeling sexual attraction with no drive (so, like, they'll think Brad Pitt is sexy, maybe even have sexual thoughts about him, but then the thought pops in and that alone completely satisfies that drive, they never actually want to act on it at all). Others only experience attraction reciprocally (they get turned on by their partner getting turned on), or over time (regardless of bond), can only experience it in the context of a fetish, or can only experience it with an emotional bond (demisexual), or just rarely ever experience it but sometimes do and don't really know how it all works, or some combination, and for most, if not all, Gray-As its not that you WILL experience it in this context, its that you MAYBE MIGHT SOMETIMES, so it can be very confusing and unpredictable if people are putting a lot of pressure on you to define what you are and how it "works".  Or maybe you're something else. Its one of those things, if you need a label to make sense of it than someday someone will just describe something to you and you'll just know that's what it is, if you don't need/want the label yourself and its other people wanting one for you then eventually you'll just learn the only labels you need in life are the ones that matter to you and give up on pleasing other people like the rest of us (i'm not trying to demean your experience in saying that most people eventually give up trying to explain themselves to other people...that's also not just a sexuality thing just in general you stop feeling pressured to explain yourself all the time) 

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I guess #1

I assumed I was just pan at first, because I couldn't tell if I liked guys, girls or something in between. I got my romantic and sexual attraction mixed up as I had thought they were the same, since I felt them in equal amounts of nothing.

 

As soon as I learned that I could in fact be not attracted towards anyone in any way (and that was through a Youtube video lmao), that's when all my feelings made sense. Since then, I've grown up a bit. Although I am still a little unsure of exactly what I feel, the ace umbrella fits very well.

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3 hours ago, TheAP said:

That's what I find confusing. By wanting to have sex, does it mean wanting to have sex for sexual pleasure? Because it's possible for aces to want to have sex out of curiosity.

i have sexual desire, because i want to want to have sex even though i dont want to have sex. 

my sexual desire is through wishing i wasnt ace, very complicated really. 

i look at brad pitt and think im sexually interested and maybe i could have sex with him then i realise there is no way on earth id ever have sex no matter what.

 

so ace people can experience wanting sex through wishing there werent ace, 

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a minor triad
11 hours ago, Amathy said:

Considering I didn't know what sex was until I lived in a college dorm room... is it even possible to desire something  you don't know exists?

I can relate to this. In eighth grade, my best friend explained to me how sex works, and I didn't believe her because I thought sex was supposed to be an appealing thing.

 

For me, I didn't even realize my attitudes towards sex/lack of attraction was unusual until I realized all my peers were a lot more interested in sex than I was. Honestly, it didn't really click that I might be different until I was 16. Before that, I thought that the few people that talked about sex to me were the weird ones. :lol:

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I don't know.  I was just unfortunate to meet a sexual who detailed all the shit he wanted to do to me and I was just there like...he only likes me for my body not that I'd never cheat, that I'm loyal and I was devoted to him. That's how I discovered.

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Guest Deus Ex Infinity
23 hours ago, miettaisace said:
  • i wasnt experiencing sexual attaction in the same way as other people
  • i didnt want to have sex as often as others around me

Yet, I managed to ignore these facts until last year but it finally hit me with the help of some supportive, professional, caring people. I've finally seen the light :D

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Divide By Zero

At the time I realized I was asexual, what made me realize I was asexual was that I had no desire or interest in dating. At the time I didn't know about romantic orientation and that I was aromantic. I thought that sexual interest in others developed as part of having a relationship.

 

Fast forward more than a decade later and I now know that romantic and sexual orientation are two different things and that my lack of interest in dating and relationships is because I am aromantic. I also now know that sexual desire and romantic desire are not linked and that asexuality is a sexual orientation and my lack of desire/interest in sex is because I'm asexual.

 

It's really too bad that sexual orientation and gender identity were not discussed at all in school when I was growing up. I probably would have been less confused and had a better understanding of things sooner.

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2, maybe 1, because I still get confused personally on romantic desire and sexual attraction. I think I may experience both, romantic way more, but any sexual attraction extends only to romantic things? Idk.

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Hermit Advocate

Number 2, which then lead me to the realization that I didn't feel any sexual attraction to anyone. It was my aromanticism that really got me thinking about sexual attraction in the first place. 

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I believe I would be no. 2, I never had the desire to have sex. I recall distinctly thinking at the start my junior year of high school: "Do I have to get a boyfriend this year? Do we have to mash our naughty bits together? Why is that expected of me?"

 

It took me quite a bit longer to recognize no. 1. I didn't even realize there was a difference between aesthetic attraction and sexual attraction. I think it was around the time I finally accepted being ace.

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Alejandrogynous

Hmm. Well, I realized that I didn't want sex before I figured out the reason (asexuality), but that's just the order in which I came to understand myself. I don't think it necessarily means that's the actual order of operations, more that I simply observed the effects before recognizing the cause.


For me, I think, "I don't innately desire partnered sex, thus I don't want to have sex," makes more sense than, "I don't want to have sex, thus I don't innately desire it." (I altered the phrasing slightly because I don't like defining anything via sexual attraction, my answer should still shake out the same regardless.)
 

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