Jump to content

At what age did you perceive your (A)sexual difference?


Recommended Posts

Walkablesun

As stated in the topic title, at what age or time in your life did you discover your (A)sexual difference?

As for me, it was around my 15th, I then lost my first love in an accident, and in the relationships after that i noticed how passive I was when it come to having sex with them!

I'm curious to know how and why this awareness came upon others...? :)

Link to post
Share on other sites

Aged 15, it was pointed out to me that I wasn't yet acknowledging sexual attractiveness in other people that my peers were quite definitely aware of.

Aged 16, I started identifying as bi, after having realised I made no differentiation between the genders.

Aged 20, I discover articles on asexuality and everything makes sense.

^ Any one of those would do, I suppose.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Vyanni Krace

I think I've always known on a subconscious level.

But I only really figured it out consciously about a year ago, just a bit before my 15th birthday. I discovered the concept of asexuality about a year before that, and I had that moment of 'this is me!', but I didn't want to just leap into the label, I didn't want to rule out everything yet. So basically I lied to myself for about a year or so as I looked into my sexuality, and the details of orientations a bit more. I joined AVEN two months after I finally accepted my asexuality.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Earth Sprite

I have been this kind since my teens, more or less. But I didn´t know the term 'A-sexual' earlier. That´s why I was trying to imitate the "one and only way to fulfill my sexuality". Earlier I hadn´t any knowledge of, that you can be just like you want - or just like you don´t want :)

Yeah! The last ca. five years have been the Era of Freedom! :D

Link to post
Share on other sites
That asexual guy

I was never interested in being with anyone as far back as high school. I didn't know why, but I thought I seemed different than anyone else. Of course, back then no one knew what asexual was and I don't think the word was even used by then to describe people. They were only just starting to fully understand homosexuality.

Link to post
Share on other sites

TMI

I didn't know until I actually got myself into a sexual situation. I was 16 and I had always been good work girls and my girlfriend at the time wanted to try stuff out. I had heard through jokes that it was something awesome and quick and both of those things were a lie. I tried as often as possible but I could never reach climax.

I now know that there is a difference between attraction and physical reactions but with no one to talk to it just lead to self doubt and I finally got the last piece of the puzzle now when I am 23.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Grumpy Alien

I realized something was different in high school. I could tell I was just not as interested in sex as other kids. But I honestly thought it was because I went through puberty early and was more mature than them. :rolleyes:

I found out about asexuality around age 18/19. It was when I heard the term grey-asexual that I was like OH! That's me. I was 19.

Link to post
Share on other sites
pegasusoftraken

It was only in my first relationship at 18 that I figured my interest in sex wasn't the same as my girlfriend's (or any of my friends). It's also taken until very recently for me to figure out that I have a low libido - only just realised how often most people desire sex or masturbate.

But I never really understood sexual attraction or desire, when I was a teen. So it took me a long time to realise that I experience sexuality differently to most people.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Looking back, the signs were always there, I just didn't have it brought to the forefront of my mind until my hand was forced last year.

Link to post
Share on other sites

I realized something was different in high school. I could tell I was just not as interested in sex as other kids. But I honestly thought it was because I went through puberty early and was more mature than them. :rolleyes:

You know what? I thought that too :blink: I wonder if it's a common theme amongst aces unaware of asexuality?

Link to post
Share on other sites

I always thought that it was because I was sheltered, or that I was just 'different' from all of the other kids as long as I could remember. Everyone would be making these jokes and comments that I simply didn't get and I would just laugh along as though I did.

Eventually when I started picking up on things, and I would get all of the dirty jokes, I would just sort of laugh along with them still, being like 'it really isn't that funny but whatever.'

It didn't change anything though. I realized that I was different. In elementary school people would be talking in hushed voices and using childish euphamisms for this cool adult thing called sex. Middle school a few kids were trying it out and a some got pregnant. Everyone was dating dating dating. A new boyfriend/girlfriend every other week. What was I doing? Playing pokemon and reading books about childish things like dragons and other universes. I didn't even know when people were hitting on me. I was oblivious. It didn't matter. I thought it would be some magic thing that would happen when I finally 'bloomed'. I would suddenly get all of this.

In high school, I still didn't. It was a frank thing by then that everyone was jaded about. Everyone had been there done that. The jokes were explicit as they came. Because my mom was worried about my not being straight, I picked up a boyfriend. [i had to be straight, because I had no interest in girls. It was the default.] And... I felt nothing. To me, it was like having a friend, only we were expected to hold hands and be cute around each other. We were expected to kiss, and spend weekends at the movies. I would have rather been with my other friends. Kissing was weird. I felt nothing. There was no magic like they showed in the movies. What was supposed to be there? What was the magic 'factor' everyone else had always had?

I couldn't give him what he wanted, so I had to let him go.

That wasn't very long ago.

Since then, I've found out about asexuality.

After a few months of questioning, and mulling it over, I joined the site, and have since then been able to make a little more sense out of my life. Though I'm not sure whether or not I need to 'come out' to anyone.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Scratch-Tie

Yup, I always thought I was more mature as well, seen what every one else was going threw as crazy, shallow and immature.

Now I realize it actualy matters to them and it's not crazy shallow or immature, just different.

First time I noticed a difference hmm, honestly I'm not sure but I think it was probly the time I noticed somthing odd in reguards to, my nephew (same age as me) and I was watching some show, he comented that one of the charectors was hot, and asked me what I thought I looked at her for a bit I could tell she matched what other people considered to be pretty so I casualy replied, "yup..." He looked at me realy weird after that laughed and said "do you realy think so?" I said "sure why not?" He simply replied "wow" and continued to watch.

I think we were 13 or 14 at the time, im not sure. But as time went on it became more and more aparent,

I only recently with in the past couple of years realized I fit in the asexual spectrum, it's kind of funny realy, I hear about alot of people in the asexual spectrum who thought somthing was wrong with them, I never did that I thought somthing was wrong with every one else haha.

Link to post
Share on other sites

It's something I never really gave much thought. I just never had romantic or sexual feelings, and that's how life was for me-- I didn't know any differently. It didn't even exactly occur to me that most people do have those feelings-- I always knew they do, but again, I just didn't think about it. I never thought I was strange, just outside of the majority; I only realised just how strange people consider these things after I discovered the term asexuality and was able to give a more precise explanation for my feelings.

So basically, I always knew, and as soon as I came across the term I knew it was for me, I just don't remember exactly when I came across it (estimating aged 16).

Link to post
Share on other sites
Janus the Fox
I never perceived sexuality until much older, pretty much just after around my 24'th birthday. Along with any social perception, it still alludes me to some extent. It did make sense retrospectively, so did my autistic differences, quite humbling actually... :huh:
Link to post
Share on other sites
WittyUsername

I noticed that I was less interested in romantic relationships (not asexuality, I know) around middle school. I also was genuinely surprised when I heard that some of the kids at my school were already having sex; it just didn't make sense to me. Why do it then, couldn't they just wait? I just figured that I was more mature than them.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Back to the forums after a long absence ...

At first, I thought that everyone was pretty much like me (I think we all start out a little bit like that, really). I don't think it was until I was in my 40s that I realized the full scope of just how different I was, and how much of the rest of the world's behavior was down to their desire to get laid. I kept perceiving sex as this thing that would ultimately seem like a good idea for me at some point, but it never did. And I kept thinking that it must be a good idea for me at some point, because everyone else clearly felt that it was a good idea as well.

It was like being hit in the head with a brick when it finally became obvious to me that no, other people didn't engage in sex because they had arrived at the realization that it was a good idea, but because their body urges were simply driving them forward to do it. Like eating when you're hungry -- you don't sit down to a meal when you're hungry and say to yourself, "How wonderful that I'm about to ingest proteins, fats, fiber, and other materials that will continue to keep me around for another day or so!" You look at the plate and just start eating, anticipating a much more visceral satisfaction and a pleasant sensual experience. Sure, maybe on some level you prefer to satisfy that urge in a constructive way with healthful food. Maybe you are also fortunate to naturally find healthful food tasty. I'm like that. Yes, I had a bowl of brussels sprouts for dinner last night. But I wasn't thinking of how healthful they were while shoveling them in. I was just shoveling, thinking to myself, "NOMNOMNOMNOM oh man these are so good I need more pepper where'd I leave the lemon juice NOMNOMNOMNOM ... "

It took me a very, very, very long time to realize that I was not feeling that about sex, and everyone else was. That the reason everyone else was engaging in it was not because they thought it was a good idea, but because they were just driven to do so -- and without that drive in me, I was never going to arrive at the point where it was a good idea for its own sake.

So I'll tell you that I have been asexual (or at the very least hyposexual) for most of my life, but I hadn't realized what that meant until I was in my early 40s. I recall remarking off the cuff to a friend once about a decade and a half ago, "I'm probably bisexual in that I'm equally disinterested in both genders." It was a far more prescient statement than I knew at the time, and I had no idea at all the magnitude of the abyss it placed between me and the entire rest of my species.

There's a really good science fiction novel called "Beggars in Spain" that is about society's reaction to the development of a sub-race of people who do not need to sleep. It's worth a read, just because it examines the three-legged stool that is most animal motivation -- food, sleep, sex -- and just how vast a difference it makes between "races" when one entire leg of that stool is missing. For us, the sex leg is missing -- one-third of what is assumed to be the common, basic animal drives is not present for us. I am constantly surprised and often greatly depressed over just how completely alien it makes me to lack that one leg. I feel like I was supposed to be born on a planet where the dominant lifeform is corals or something, and instead I somehow got here by mistake. On the Planet of the Groping Apes. :-(

I don't want that third leg, though. I just wish I knew more two-legged stools. I would like to have more close relationships, but for the entire rest of my species, that only way they can do that is via that one leg of the stool. What they require for intimacy is something I do not want to give or receive, and what I require for intimacy is something they do not value. It's very irritating.

Anyhow, nice to be back for a bit.

Link to post
Share on other sites

At 14 or 15, I had my 'oh, that sounds about right' moment. At 19, in a serious relationship, I had a much more distressing moment of 'that is definitely right, and I can't pretend to be anything else anymore.'

Link to post
Share on other sites
AmeliaEdwards11

I knew since I was around 3 my mum became pregnant with my sister, and I decided then that I wanted to adopt kids.

From the time I learned that sex was I would joke about it like other kids, but knew I didn't really want it, and thought other people were the same way. I have a lot of sexual jokes fly over my head, and it can be really awkward having to have people explain them to you. And it was alway awkward for me when people would say that they wanted it, because I didn't understand how you could have that desire.

In January I found the label asexual, and knew it fit me right away. I was just about to turn 15 at that point.

So I'm going to say that I've known forever, but really discovered it and put a label on it just before I turned 15.

Link to post
Share on other sites

20 or 21 probably. Starting at around 14 I noticed that I wasn't as interested in having sex as some people, but lots of other people didn't want sex at the time, so I didn't think much of it. I've had a libido for as long as I can remember, and I just figured it was a matter of time before the desire to have sex another person kicked in. It wasn't until 20 or 21 that I started thinking that my lack of interest was life-lasting.

Link to post
Share on other sites

Knowing that I'd never want sex... around age 5 when I first heard of the concept. Not all that uncommon a reaction for a kid getting "the talk", or so I've heard... but unlike most, it just never changed in my case. :P

Starting to realize that (was one of the things which) kinda make(s) me pretty different to most folks... around age 17.

Starting to actually call myself asexual... age 38, when stumbling onto AVEN. Didn't realize before this point that masturbation doesn't invalidate asexuality.

Link to post
Share on other sites
SpaceLizard

In high school I thought I was just afraid of sex, but identified as bisexual/pansexual because I was romantically interested in multiple genders. So around when I was 15/16.

It was only later that I realized I wasn't afraid of sex (and wasn't even sex-repulsed anymore), I just wasn't sexually attracted to people. This was when I tried to do research into asexuality not too long ago - so maybe 22? That was when I started identifying as asexual.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Squirrel Combat

I think I've known for over 10 years but it wasn't until last March that I actually put a word to it.

Link to post
Share on other sites

I was never interested in being with anyone as far back as high school. I didn't know why, but I thought I seemed different than anyone else. Of course, back then no one knew what asexual was and I don't think the word was even used by then to describe people. They were only just starting to fully understand homosexuality.

This was my experience as well. I came to accept my asexuality with time, never realizing until very recently that there are many of us.

Link to post
Share on other sites

I didn't know asexuality was a thing until I joined Tumblr when I was about 18-19? I'm like a lot of people posting here in that I always suspected I was different but then I had this word for it and I was all OH, THAT IS ME! Before that I think I just identified as hetero but oh, silly past me, you're so adorable when you don't know anything about yourself.

Link to post
Share on other sites

My timeline is as follows, more or less...

Age 13: "People keep talking about sex. I bet they just want to pretend they're adults by having these boring talks and they aren't really interested in it."

Age 14: "Wow, some people say they've had sex already. I bet they just want to brag and it's not really true."

Age 15: "More and more people are into this sex thing apparently... geez, how long must this farce go on?"

Age 16: "So it seems like those who are in a relationship find it difficult to wait until marriage to have sex. I wonder why."

Age 17: "Oh look, my hormone raging phase is supposed to be nearly over by now (wait, when did it happen?) and I have almost come of age. Maybe I am the odd one out, after all..."

Age 18: "Wait. What's this thing called AVEN?"

Link to post
Share on other sites

Didn't really know about or identify specifically as ace until 33, but the signs were there by the pre-teen years. When my friends were going ga-ga over cute boys, I could never understand what the fuss was about. Still can't... I don't even seem to register somebody's looks unless I have a connection with them through other means (and then it still isn't "sexual" attraction).

Link to post
Share on other sites
Truth and Lies

Hmm. I think I started finding differences between me and others around me during fourth or fifth grade, when everyone started on the whole "do you like-like so-and-so?" It was blatantly apparent in middle school, where the people around me were getting in to relationships and having to overhear all the drama surrounding them. So, ever since then, I suppose.

Link to post
Share on other sites
katelynntheresa

I got my first boyfriend at 15 and had no desire to do anything with him, no kisses, nothing. I figured I was just a late bloomer and continued to think this until I was about 17 and I started thinking something was a bit off but thought maybe it was just due to lack of experience. Finally got my first real kiss at 18, was really bored throughout the entire think and well kind of disgusted. i thought the boredom could be that I didn't really like the guy, and disgust because the guy tasted like cigarettes. Had a few more situations with guys I actually did like and realized I didn't want to do anything with them aside from receive hugs and cuddles. Around a month ago I found asexuality and everything just kind of clicked into place.

Link to post
Share on other sites
1/100 of me

I began using the term asexual to describe myself when I was eighteen but I have journal entries from when I was seven years old that were about how I didn't think I'd ever have normal romantic relationships like evryone else.

Link to post
Share on other sites
Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.
×
×
  • Create New...