BionicBadgermole Posted December 1, 2017 Share Posted December 1, 2017 Nice to meet y'all. Officially, I mean. I've been coming here for a quite a while already since I decided to take responsibility for myself and work out my baggage. This includes identifying what actually needs to change and what doesn't. I've had a hunch that I was somewhere over the asexual rainbow for years and that the stream happened to cross with aromanticism as well. And I admit the way I handled this realization has been... not good. It hasn't been good for me or my partners. I've hurt quite a few people on the road to self-acceptance. I'm not too sure what identifications would fit me, but I feel in my gut, sometimes literally, that I keep being drawn back here for a reason. So here's my story. I was one of those kids who was a bit too smart for my own good. I picked up a clinical understanding of sex and the human body from my dad's college textbooks. And of course, I lacked any experience that would have made that knowledge meaningful. I noticed something was really different about me when it was about time for those volatile teenage hormones to call in and mine kept getting dropped. I didn't really get girls. I didn't understand why my friends' conversations suddenly became about who they liked. Rather, the idea of liking someone but more than just liking them seemed like nonsense to me. I mean, there were girls I liked but it wasn't much different from the way I liked books or video games. Honestly, it got to the point where my friends kept asking me so much that I just started making up crushes to be left alone. On some level, I liked those girls, but clearly not in the same way my friends liked their crushes. Hell, my initial thought about it was "Why would I want to be crushed? Why would I want to crush anyone else?" In fact, it was one of those words I kept saying until it lost all meaning. Crush. Crush. Crush. Croooosh. Key-rush. Finally, my dad asked me if I was gay. And that brought it to my attention that I didn't more than just like other boys either. And I thought about that for about five minutes before just kind of brushing it off. So my utter lack of interest in these heady, heightened emotions that most other people seemed to be thrilled about experiencing just kind of faded into the background. Whenever the topic switched to that, I would start listening to the elevator music in my head until we reached a familiar floor. I realized at some point that I was completely unaware of any of the relationships, sexual or romantic, that my friends were pursuing at the time. I thought I just didn't care to ask, but it was that I didn't even assume it would be a priority in their lives. And then around senior year, I met a really awesome girl who is still one of my best friends. And we got really close and I liked being around her. And then I found out a few years later that she initially wanted to date, but I picked up on absolutely nothing in that direction. Even when she flat out told me she liked me, I was like "Aww, I like you too. :3" It's funny because we were saying the same thing, but our meaning was completely different. A few years later, during college, I awakened to my desire and it was like getting a new toy. I mean, I had a libido since puberty and could identify it as such, but I literally never considered it was something I could share with anyone. I just kind of regarded it as an annoyance to handle so I could get things done. Realizing that I might actually want to share it and that it could even be enjoyable was something of a revelation for me. Even then, I understood that what my partners got out of our relationships was very different from what I got out of them. For one, I have never had an offline relationship. And honestly, I've never really considered having one. That is, it seems that the concept of sex is more intriguing to me than making it a tangible part of my life. It seems that the idea of romance is more fascinating to me than the work and commitment it takes to maintain a romantic partnership. Sex always felt like nothing more than a hobby or obligation and romance always felt like a burden or a struggle. And I never quite understood that it wasn't like that for everyone. Then I started reading about asexuality and aromanticism, and my personal history started clicking into place. Not that I didn't fight it like hell or try to deny it by overcompensating my feelings. I'm not proud to say it, but I've been in relationships where I claimed to fall in love because I sensed that was the expectation. I've been in relationships where I pretended to be more interested in sex than I actually am. I've floated along in situations simply because I couldn't find any fault in them. Not because they were actually what I wanted or needed. I don't seek pity or sympathy. I'm merely owning my tendency to get carried away by my partner's energy and forget my own. The energy of those heady, heightened emotions is very intoxicating and passion can be addictive. However, the surest sign that sex and romance are gray areas for me is that I talk about them analytically and philosophically but I feel no personal attachment or relation to them. I find it exceedingly difficult to identify those feelings in myself. The form they do take is defined by maddening ambivalence. And when it comes to love, I don't really categorize between love for a friend and love for a partner. For me, it's the same feeling from the same place; the dynamic might change is all. The cultural veneration of romantic love and sexual desire just never made sense to me. When I try to consider them in the context that my friends and partners have expressed them, I come up with nothing but static. Anyway, sorry for the long post. And thank you for having me. 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Lichley Posted December 1, 2017 Share Posted December 1, 2017 Welcome! First of all, the asexual rainbow sounds amazing, mind if I use that from now on? Second of all, have you looked up Aromantic Asexual, as it sounds quite fitting from what you've described. Link to post Share on other sites
ver Posted December 1, 2017 Share Posted December 1, 2017 It's great to read about your journey and that you're taking steps to deal with things that seem to have been weighing you down. I haven't been here long at all, but there's a lot of great people around and the sense of community is really strong (as I'm sure you know if you've been visiting for a while!) I'm glad you've made the decision (like me) to get more active. Welcome to the fold, I wish you all the best, and have some cake Link to post Share on other sites
arekathevampyre Posted December 1, 2017 Share Posted December 1, 2017 hello . Welcome to Cake land !! Just kidding . Welcome to AVEN and I hope you enjoy it here . And now , have some cake !! Link to post Share on other sites
Lia Posted December 1, 2017 Share Posted December 1, 2017 Hello there, and welcome to AVEN! As part of my welcome to you, I'd like to point out some important threads that might be helpful in your first few days here. The Terms of Service is here. We recommend you read it over, and if you have any questions please don't hesitate to send either myself or any other administrator or moderator (the "admod" team, as we're called) a message. Also, there's a handy forum called Site Info, which has some useful information including a thread outlining who moderates which forum. If you ever need something done in or have questions about a specific forum, please message the mod of that forum. And if you have problems with the site in general, or any single member, please message any admod. The following are also nifty links to take a look at: Welcome Lounge Mini Manual | Welcoming 101 | Quick Guide to the Forums | Asexuality FAQ's Again, welcome to AVEN and I hope your stay is everything you hoped! Link to post Share on other sites
BionicBadgermole Posted December 2, 2017 Author Share Posted December 2, 2017 19 hours ago, Lichley said: Welcome! First of all, the asexual rainbow sounds amazing, mind if I use that from now on? Second of all, have you looked up Aromantic Asexual, as it sounds quite fitting from what you've described. Thank you for the welcome! And of course you can use it, I don't own language. Aro ace is what I originally considered, but then the serendipitous emergence of my desire to share my libido with my partner complicated things. I know behavior doesn't define asexuality, and my understanding of attraction itself became wooly. So the ace part took on a shade of gray for me, personally. At the same time, I am far more excited about the sensual. I like to flirt because it makes both people feel good and produces a warm, slightly electric energy. I tend to oscillate between being okay with sex and kind of dissociating from it. I'm sex-positive, but it's just not on the level of a brilliantly expressed piece of prose or a delicious meal. And I've noticed a lot of distress in my partners when it became clear that sexual activity wasn't bonding me to them the same way it bonded them to me. My relationships had a theme of being kind of platonic most of the time. I suggested dialing down the sexual element a lot because I was never quite sure how much I really enjoyed it and I started feeling uncomfortable. I forget I'm a virgin a lot. Romance has a similar effect on me. I don't begrudge others because I see it can be a beautiful experience when the right people connect. At the same time, I don't see it as really having a place in my life. And I absorbed such grandiose messages about romance that it became its own source of anxiety. I mean, I suck at it. Like a Dyson vac. Link to post Share on other sites
BionicBadgermole Posted December 2, 2017 Author Share Posted December 2, 2017 16 hours ago, arekathevampyre said: hello . Welcome to Cake land !! Just kidding . Welcome to AVEN and I hope you enjoy it here . And now , have some cake !! Thank you, thank you! Aww, Cake Land sounds amazing. I'm picturing a land where everything is made of cake. Even the cakes. :3 Link to post Share on other sites
BionicBadgermole Posted December 2, 2017 Author Share Posted December 2, 2017 17 hours ago, ver said: It's great to read about your journey and that you're taking steps to deal with things that seem to have been weighing you down. I haven't been here long at all, but there's a lot of great people around and the sense of community is really strong (as I'm sure you know if you've been visiting for a while!) I'm glad you've made the decision (like me) to get more active. Welcome to the fold, I wish you all the best, and have some cake 1 Thank you very much. I'm beginning a journey of self-discovery and I'm really excited about it. I admit I used my relationships partly to distract from the work I knew I needed to do on myself to be whole again. Facing your demons is always difficult, and mine are benign enough that I don't really need to exorcise them. Just get along with them. It's still hard and messy work nonetheless, but life removed my masks so violently that it's impossible to put them back on again. So I'm learning to be and love myself. Whatever that turns out to mean. I don't really have another choice. All the best to you, too. And was it okay to eat all the cake? Link to post Share on other sites
arekathevampyre Posted December 2, 2017 Share Posted December 2, 2017 1 hour ago, BionicBadgermole said: Thank you, thank you! Aww, Cake Land sounds amazing. I'm picturing a land where everything is made of cake. Even the cakes. :3 you are most welcome !! haha sounds like something out of 'Willy Wonka and the chocolate factory' Link to post Share on other sites
LeChat Posted December 2, 2017 Share Posted December 2, 2017 On 11/30/2017 at 11:48 PM, BionicBadgermole said: ...I've had a hunch that I was somewhere over the asexual rainbow for years... Hi. You called...? Link to post Share on other sites
Lichley Posted December 2, 2017 Share Posted December 2, 2017 4 hours ago, BionicBadgermole said: All the best to you, too. And was it okay to eat all the cake? Of course! It's welcome cake, after all nothing welcomes someone better than a cake made especially for them Here, have some more. Link to post Share on other sites
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