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Advantages and disadvantages of being asexual


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Nothing is hard about it. It requires me only to be as I have always been since birth: single and a virgin, and I can live with that just fine. These things aren't really a side effect of being ace. They'd be the case, even if I were sexual, so why fight what suits me so well?

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I think the most difficult thing for me is feeling in the dark when sexual people make innuendos and double entendres. Also when I make faux pas or other social errors because I say something that may be a double entendres or other sexually related comment. Things that should be obvious to sexuals aren't always obvious to me, so I put myself in awkward situations that aren't always enjoyable in social or professional situations.

I guess it's annoying to me that other people seem to have an innate ability to sense these things, but for me, it's a learned behavior, with a rather painful trial and error learning experience.

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Scarlett-Raine

Finding someone who actually wants to be with me for who I am, not just someone who gets to know me in the hopes that they can have sex with me. I find that it tends to make me very suspicious of people's motives when I am first getting acquainted with them.

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People's reactions and attempts to "find the cause" and "fix it" or try to diagnose you with random crap that you don't have (e.g. childhood trauma). I love being asexual though :).

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.........................
Also when I make faux pas or other social errors because I say something that may be a double entendres or other sexually related comment.

I have this problem too. And the way people can't stop laughing when you do that really annoys me. I can't understand what's so funny about it.

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I don't find anything hard with being asexual to be honest. There have been times I've declined to go to strip clubs with my friends, but those are few and far in between. I wouldn't go for moral reasons anyway.

At worse, I act a bit in social situations but that's mostly for my own amusement. I personally like making double entendres, they're even more funny because I know the truth.

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Speaking of which, do you get morning wood (when you are a true asexual who doesn't masturbate)?

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Speaking of which, do you get morning wood (when you are a true asexual who doesn't masturbate)?

Yes. Males are programmed to have erections when they sleep.

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scottimus prime

I would say that loneliness could potentially be one of the more difficult aspects of asexuality. I'm used to being single and I can function just fine on my own. I'm accustomed to being by myself. However, I have noticed that there are times when I feel lonely. I wish for some sort of companionship. I'm not terribly needy - I wouldn't want to be smothered by another person. I like having my own space and alone time. However, as I get older, I do think that it would be nice to have some sort of long-term partner.

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MrBigglesworth

1. Loneliness and being alone.

Some times they mean different things but in this context they're the same thing. It's a two-pronged issue to struggle with. One one hand there's the real time loneliness which can strike at any time. I think everyone gets that but I feel it's more acute as it ties in to being alone - that feeling that it could be a long time before you find some one - if ever.

You get struck with loneliness and then end up thinking "wow this is never going to end is it?"

2. Romantic attraction

There's nothing worse than an itch you can't scratch. I sometimes envy the amoebas amongst us. Romantic attraction is often or always unrequited. What right (poor choice of word I know) do I have to ask a sexual person to participate in a romantic relationship?

Why can't I have a friendship with intimacy? My experience is that this is very difficult to make happen. Those who find it a truly lucky.

This is getting easier for me though. Time seems to be taking some of the sting out of it.

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I've actually stopped getting morning wood on a daily basis nowadays. I might get it 1 in 5 mornings, but I've been actively trying to kill whatever sex drive (chemical or whatnot) I have left for the past 10 years so I'd like to think it's working.

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Purnkin Spurce

Whenever me and my friends hangout and we all notice an attractive guy or girl, they are joking and saying how cute they are and what they want to do with them. I sit there and play along so they won't think I'm weird

I am like this. I started doing that right after my friends started to notice i didn't ever like anyone, so I use to lie and say someone random was pretty even if i didn't really care at all.

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Hm. Since I'm open to (and fully expect) sex in a relationship, it's not really a hardship. Since sex is never something I would engage in for its own sake, and will always be only a means to an end--intimacy, shared experience, fun, etc. with a partner--I'm absolutely horrified of someone treating me, a human being, (and presumably their partner) as merely a means to the end of physical pleasure. That's the point at which sex ceases to be part of a meaningful connection, and becomes humiliating, repugnant, and degrading in my eyes. Possibly an asexuality-related issue, but I think it's a fear plenty of sexual people share with me.

I second this - totally agree!!!

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The hardest part of being asexual is managing the sexual needs and desires of your partner should you be in a mixed relationship. Part of this is getting them to understand that it isn't personal. You aren't rejecting THEM sexually, your rejecting everyone sexually and then finding a compromise or agreement to which their needs can be fulfilled yet the asexual is comfortable with whatever that compromise is. The hardest part of this complex dilemma is getting them to understand that sex and romance are not the same for you and making that work in a mixed relationship.

Exactly how I feel.

What's hardest to me?

  • Hurting my partner who takes my lack of interest personally, and thinks there must be something wrong with "his manhood" if he’s not able to arouse and satisfy me.
  • Feeling constantly guilty because I can’t give my partner what he really needs. Even when I compromise (as I sometimes do) it’s him that does all the “work” while I feel completely numb, just wondering what the heck it’s all about and waiting for it to end
  • Fear of being alone.
  • People trying to fix me, sending me to doctors or asking me about my “first time” assuming there must have been something wrong there. I’m also fed up with listening about hormones.
  • People who don’t believe someone might not like sex.

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Loneliness is probably the biggest. I have a few very good friends, and that helps a lot. But, sometimes I still just want to be *special* to someone. Also, having someone that I do care about and *would* consider a relationship with if I wasn't relatively sure they were sexual...and not wanting to risk that friendship. Still, it would be nice for them to know, even if nothing changed...and sometimes that creates a kind of loneliness itself.

Otherwise, people consistently not understanding where you're coming from, even when they know you're asexual. Assuming that their values are your values, and not being able to process that something that is important to them is not important to you.

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Vyanni Krace

Pressure from our sexualised modern society and not being understood.

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The Great WTF

<.< To be brutally honest, the community. I love AVEN most of the time, but it's also more alienating than almost any other community I'm involved in. Being sexually active, in a mixed relationship, and sex positive tends to give me a serious case of odd man out when compared to most of the people around here. There's also a sort of... ignorance (I hesitate to use the word, but no better one is being provided by my mind) to much of the community that I find infuriating, a refusal to see the other side. Not that sexuals aren't guilty of it as well, but I still find it frustrating to see so much of it from my own community.

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I love AVEN most of the time, but it's also more alienating than almost any other community I'm involved in.

I feel the same with alienation, I relate to none of the difficulties and I relate to almost none of you. Actually, I am an alien from outer space as I don't even understand my own parents (I don't actually believe I am an alien, but you get how I feel). Humans are just so difficult to understand.

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Whenever me and my friends hangout and we all notice an attractive guy or girl, they are joking and saying how cute they are and what they want to do with them. I sit there and play along so they won't think I'm weird

I am like this. I started doing that right after my friends started to notice i didn't ever like anyone, so I use to lie and say someone random was pretty even if i didn't really care at all.

I rarely bother to pretend, to act like I was conforming.

I feel that practically no one has ever truly understood what I think. I feel that I've always been alone and will always be because there is no one who I can relate with on the same level. Even if there are, they are so rare that I've yet to come across one.

At best, I've felt that a handful of people have understood my thoughts but only to an extent. When I've tried to express more, bewilderment has taken over them. I also think that I'm very well suited for a life of mental solitude, because at core I don't care what anyone else thinks. My view of myself is not dependent on the sentiments of others.

I am left free to observe and study the psyche of others as a true outsider that can blend in rather seamlessly. It is fascinating, after all, to study the animals in their natural environment - and if I don't alarm them with pestering questions, they will ignore me and go about their business. Perfect!

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Grumpy Alien

Right now, just feeling different from the sexual society and not having anyone in my life that feels the same way. I'm sure I'll encounter harder things when I eventually have a relationship.

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highcakedrive

Needing to explain it to people and wanting to date other asexuals so you aren't expected to have sex.

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highcakedrive

Plus, when people think you're gay when you have no interest.

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Plus, when people think you're gay when you have no interest.

Heh, I gave up worrying about that one a long time ago. These days it just amuses me. It can be fun watching struggle to figure you out :twisted:

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One of the hardest things for me is not being trusted by other members of the LGBT+ community, which I've tried really hard to be a part of despite generally not being a "community" person. I actually saw someone on Tumblr get offended by the A in LGBTQPIA because they thought it stood for "allies," not "asexuals." I've even seen people claim that asexuality is "just like being straight, unless you're homo/bi/panromantic," in which case it's okay. I hate it when all the other marginalized groups fail to understand that we are even more marginalized than they are (not to create an oppression hierarchy, but hey, you'll never meet anyone who denies the existence of homosexuality).

As an aromantic I'm not bothered by the idea of "being alone" in the sense of being single, but I do find it depressing that most of my best friends will probably get married and start families, thus reducing me to a name in a dusty address book. (That might sound a little dramatic, but my parents have had practically no friends since they married, and they only contact their few remaining ones about once every two months -- I don't know if this is the norm or not.)

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Not so much a difficulty as an annoyance is the reaction I get from others when I either turn them down or walk away. I've had some people actually get offended that I'm not interested. I feel like stopping and asking "what did I ever do to you"?

Some of the comments I don't even know what to say to. One time I heard "come on, I only wanted sex". Not to mention some of the hurtful comments.

I'm a really nice guy and love to sit down with anyone and talk. I just don't understand why it has to treated as a personal attack when I get up and walk away.

I have to echo Paradox's concern with friends marrying and moving on. I sometimes wonder "what about me". I try hard to stay relevant in my friends lives as those friendships mean a lot to me. But some day it may only be me and my hobbies.

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1. Feeling left out when your friends talk about their relationships or crushes, etc. I always feel so awkward, like I have nothing to say or add. I wish I could tell them to change the subject sometimes because half the time it's all they talk about so I'm completely left out!

2. Every one instantly thinking you're gay because you've never had a BF. I've even had family members ask my parents "what's wrong with her?" *sigh*

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Personally, I find the hardest is that my closest friends who love me to bits and I love them don't quite understand what I mean, they think I just haven't been sexually awakened yet or that I haven't met the right person. It makes me sad because they all mean the world to me but they're all sexual people and they struggle to understand how someone can not be a sexual person. I'm also not eloquent enough to explain it properly try as I might.

On top of that for the longest time I thought I was just weird because I couldn't find the words to describe how I feel, now with more tell of it out there I can say "I'm asexual" I'm not weird, it's just my sexual orientation, natural as breathing, I'm just sad it took me so long to find out I'm not alone in my feelings.

best feeling in the world though, realising sex is never going to distract you from the really important things.

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