When Friendships Devolve Into Relationships

[TellerCam]

In many ways, I am exactly the same! :) I understand myself and my motivation, it is good, kind and generously given. I state my boundaries then don't think about it....simply because I do not see things the way that sexual people do...especially when I was younger, I was so often confused when others would end up some where I couldn't understand and totally in my bubble making me feel odd and uncomfortable! And at 51? I still have no clear answers...I have just gotten much better at hitting the brakes and identifying that "NO" is a complete sentence, thought and message. That I no longer feel compelled to explain or qualify. Try it on a stranger....just say no....and bite your tongue....see how it feels and if it might be a communication option for you! :) It actually becomes much easier with time...and works fairly well overall! :) It is very nice to meet you and good luck! But I have to state...it is awesome that you are kind...everything else is simply details to be worked out!

Happy Holidays!

Thank you! It's nice to meet you too. :D Happy New Year, as well! Thankfully, my problems have simplified, because I started spending way less time with that one friend, and it was really nice to take a break. He's in another part of the state on holiday, visiting his ex-girlfriend, and I've been convincing him to get back together with her since they both want the relationship but broke up because of long-distance issues alone. If they can be together, that would make my life so much easier. Yeah, I recently hung out with my sister's friends, and they're all about two years younger than me, and I'm astonished by how they can turn every sentence one speaks into a sex joke. I usually don't laugh, and while I get the obvious ones which are usually slang terms, there are others that baffle me. One of my New Year's resolutions has been to politely say "No" more often, and I put it into practice in late December, and so far it's been going great!

I agree with wowmom and Skullery Maid. Also, there's really nothing you can do to stop someone from developing those kinds of feelings for you short of being a total asshole or something. All you can do is tell them that you're not interested. You may not know you are doing anything that you identify as showing interest, but there is clearly something you're doing with these people that DOES express that interest whether you want it to or not.

Personally, if someone took a large interest in my life and likes and wanted to hang out with me one on one quite often, I would most likely take that as romantic interest, especially if I don't know about the issue with hanging out in larger groups. I prefer getting to know the people I crush on as friends first, and if the feeling is strong enough I probably can't just be friends with them when they don't have the same feeling. It's not really a bad or good thing, I think, but to keep in that relationship after being rejected would basically be like drinking poison just because it tastes good... I'd at least need time to get over it before we could have an actual friendship again.

Yeah, I've noticed that unless I'm a total jerk, someone somewhere will become interested in me and it's very annoying. I try to respect them and their feelings, but I really despise it when they try to cross my boundaries. Thankfully, nobody's truly succeeded in doing that, other than the few brief panic attacks I had from being over-touched by a different friend. (She was way too touchy in public, and I had a panic attack and freaked out.) I feel really bad for rejecting someone, because they think it only feels bad for them, when in reality it feels bad for me too. I don't like knowing that I broke someone's heart. I don't like it when friends shut me out of their lives and cut off communication because of how badly I hurt them for saying "no". I don't like losing all my friends over it. I know it's probably because there's a maturity gap (I tend to handle rejection of anything way better than most friends I've had). I also don't pursue people if I crush on them, because they tend to not understand that I'm attracted to their personalities and will get disgusted if they try to make sexual advances. It's so complicated, I've avoided all possible relationships for my entire life. I've never dated. Never tried, and I may never will, because it could go so wrong so quickly.

I should've said this in my first reply: I think the answer is to only be serious friends with other asexuals. That's the conclusion I've come to in my own life, and I don't even have the problem you have, OP. Asexuals make better friends, period. We value friendship in ways sexual people don't, and we will never end up wanting sex from our friends. Even if we fall for a friend romantically, we're more likely to continue being friends with them after romantic rejection simply because we do value friendship for its own sake. And many of us generally don't treat friends like shit the minute a romantic partner comes along, so there's another huge benefit.

I know that meeting other asexuals you like is easier said than done, whether you're looking for friends or a partner, but it's possible. So I would start to set your sights on that possibility.

I really agree with this. Asexuals make amazing friends, because all that energy that could be put into a sexual relationship is instead intensified and channeled towards forming life-long bonds with people. I've noticed that in myself. I've had lots of people walk out of my life because I was aromantic and uninterested. However, I never, ever, ever left them. I was the one who stayed and stood the test of time. And yeah, I've experienced some of my friends suddenly become really distant because their romantic partner was more important -- in fact, I've received that from my sister. It's horrible, because it's like playing favorites, and shutting out whoever isn't giving out free intimacy. I've only known one friend to be as resilient as me -- we almost got together very early in our friendship, but it fell apart because of long distance and because she wanted to date seriously and I was afraid. However, after dating for quite some time, she's chosen to remain single and maintain our awesome friendship. It's been incredible. Even when she was dating, she was still a really good friend and it was as if she was single, because of how much time we spent. I really appreciated that, and this May, we will have been friends for five years. (I'm still young, so there's no way I have friendships that last longer than that yet.) I wish that would happen each time I have friends. I really value that friendship, and sometimes I wish I had more than one like that, because it's so mind-blowing and awesome. We stayed best friends even after we broke up. In fact, that friendship intensified afterwards! (Probably because we didn't know each other so well at first when considering a serious relationship, so we fell apart, but then we maintained that friendship, and now we're so close that there's a possibility that we'll get together in the future. She's accepted my asexuality too, so I totally trust her.)

All throughout reading these replies I was thinking "I am so glad I only have asexual friends". Seriously, if you seek friends within the asexual community, you will have none of the problems associated with the sexual attraction that your current friends feel. Nobody will go on a crusade to 'cure' you. You can still have relationships without the sex, if you so choose.

I do think many of us asexuals attach a different value to friendship than sexuals. For sexual people, they may see friendship as a means to a (sexual) end, whereas we are able to have friends just to have friends. Honestly, the rest of the world confuses me; the interplay between friendship, romance, and sex all seems very mushy and unpredictable. At the same time, I imagine that there is a terrible amount of strategy going on, with people wondering if they will get to have sex with this friend or that, or how they can sabotage the relationship among their friends for their own (sexual) profit. Perhaps I am just paranoid.

Honestly, I was homeschooled for the majority of my childhood, so the only information I knew of sexuals (until I entered high school) was from movies and dramas. I thought those were over-hyped. However, when I finally entered a religious high-school, I was surprised that all the hormones and insanity existed even in a God-believing teenage population. OH MY GOSH. I thought it was all a myth because I was sheltered from it my whole life, so when I finally saw others in action, I was completely mind-blown and horrified. I'm so socially "behind" that now that I finally have a friend (who happens to be sexual), I'm really surprised with how much sexuality is intwined into some people. It's so much a part of them that they can't even separate it if they tried. (I'm not saying this applies to everyone, obviously, but I am saying that I've noticed this in my friend. Sexuality cannot be separated at all.) I guess a lot like how I am -- so far removed from sexuality that it cannot be integrated no matter how hard it was enforced, because it was never there to begin with. For me, sexuality is foreign. I don't understand it.

This is a little off-topic, but this is a relevant example of how shocked I was by how intertwined sexuality is in my friend. What happened was that my friend and I were watching a TV show that talked a lot about adult relationships, which varied from how much of the covers they share to how frequently they have intercourse, and if they're keeping that relationship interesting with various sex positions. Afterwards, my friend decided to talk about it. When he was describing it, I stared at him blankly. When he realized I didn't understand him, he decided to try to describe crazy sex positions, and why people have sex. Even AFTER he described it, I said, "... I don't get it." He got frustrated and asked me what I didn't get. I replied, "I don't get why people want to smash their genitals together." After that, he decided to show me 18+ youtube videos that had loads of sex jokes, and I didn't laugh once. (In fact, it actually disturbed me a little bit, and made me feel sick.) He said, "Okay, time to go back to the sex positions and explaining how it's physically possible." To that, I replied, "You can explain all you want, and I still won't understand why people WANT to do it."

Back on topic, I realized that I get really distant with my sexual friends. There's a huge gap in our personalities, because sex means so much to them, and sex is something I can easily avoid for the rest of my life and happily miss out on without a single regret. It's totally unnecessary. I'm just so happy to communicate with people, help them out, offer my advice, and spend genuine time together. I do have normal hormone levels, and technically I should have a sex drive due to high amounts of testosterone (the sex-drive hormone in males and females), but I still don't feel the need to do it at all. It's just not there even though the hormones are there. It's very interesting. I do have one amazing friend who accepted my asexuality and is interested in a potential non-sexual relationship with me. It makes me so happy. She's the only friend I know who's like that, but it would be amazing to have multiple friends like that, just for the sake of options, meeting new people, and figuring out who I'm compatible with. That would be awesome. Usually it's hard to make friends, because a lot of people get weirded out (to the point they won't talk to me anymore) when they find out that I'm biologically intersex and anatomically different from them. It's really rare to find somone who's open-minded about that, and asexual, AND totally open to being non-sexual friends as well.

I am in love with my asexual best friend. I've been in love with her before she find out her sexuality. I always dreamt of us being a couple but it was nothing but a dream. I knew she never was into me like that and I knew I would never move on from my love for her. All I ever wanted was her to be happy, I dont want our friendship to change because of my feelings. I am afraid of losing her and our friendship is enough for me.

The friends you made were people who can not respect you, they were lonely people who tried to change someone and that means they truly didnt love you. They wanted to boost their ego and pride for changing someone who never wanted a romantic relationship. Its hard finding true friends it takes time and patients to find the right people you want in your life.

It really does take a lot of patience, and sometimes it feels like they'll never come. I've been really blessed to have a best friend similar to yours. I'm not certain if she's asexual, but she is religious, so she believes in sex-after-marriage. Due to that, I've never figured out her sexuality, because she never talks about sex. However, after we've been friends for four-and-a-half years, she's been really open-minded about my asexuality, and even said, "Even if we were to get married, I'd be totally fine with that. We can adopt." We've never officially dated, because we live three states apart, but we're best friends and I'm really privileged to know her. It's always amazing to know someone like that. However, it's always nice to have a variety of friends, because it's really hard to know if you're the most compatible with a different person, or something along those lines.

I prefer to hang out one-on-one as well. And I have the same problem. It's funny because if I voice this problem to other people in my life, then they don't see it as a problem at all. I guess "Oh no, everyone I talk to falls in love with me" doesn't sound that bad to a lot of people. My friend gives me the same advice, to not hang out alone, and instead do casual, public group meetings. I don't like that. I feel awkward in groups, and I like the comfort of hanging out somewhere private. I also like talking to my friends a really lot, and apparently you can't do that either. At this point I don't know what to do, but I will certainly not change anything for now. I like the closeness of my friendships, but I wish we could have that without a romantic component on their end. It's even worse if the romantic component is on my end too though, and if I know I can't/shouldn't date them! I hope that doesn't happen to you. Even if you say you're not interested in romance or sex, they still can't help it. It's usually innocent; they like you a lot and they can't help that it's romantic. It's not innocent when they stop talking to you eventually because of it. That means that although the only reason they were talking to you wasn't for romance, it was still a key factor, and enough to end the friendship. To me a really good friendship would still be fine if one person had romantic feelings. If one shares their thoughts about having romantic feelings, then it can even strengthen the friendship because of the comfort of sharing things with one another.

Bold, because that's a really good point. I used to get flattered when people were romantically attracted to me, but then it started becoming annoying and offensive because the friendship would be totally ruined by THEIR feelings, and THEY would bail out of it because they wouldn't get any more from me. From my point of view, it was completely selfish on their part, and a waste of two or three years of my time. However, as time healed those wounds, I tried seeing it from their viewpoint and tried imagining, "What if I really, really wanted to be with this person, but their apathy made me feel like they wouldn't care if I lived or died?" <--- That's how they told me that they feeled. I wasn't actually apathetic, but my lack of romantic reciprocation made some of them feel suicidal. I feel bad and all that, but I can't really make myself suddenly feel something some day. I just can't. Just like I can't change my eye color whenever I feel like it, or lengthen my fingernails by several inches overnight. It's awful that it ruins those kinds of friendships, and it's taught me to avoid the vast majority of sexual people. It hurts me too. I don't want to be constantly verbally attacked and referred to as a heartbreaker because I feel nothing. It's been different with this recent friend, probably because unlike my previous experiences, he's male instead of female. (Less dramatic, too, by 300 times.) It's much more open this time around, and what frustrates me is that I've been told that I looked really interested, but I've constantly explained that when I look "interested", I get intrigued with a person's backstory, their personality, their thoughts, etc. I wanna be their best friend. That doesn't make me sexually attracted to them at all, but it constantly gets confused for that all the time. Apparently staring with wide eyes and looking away when the person looks back = I am deeply and whole-heartedly attracted to your body. WHAT? To me, that makes no sense. Staring = Creepy. Staring with wide eyes = Trying to figure something out. Looking away when the person looks back = Being polite because it's rude to stare. I don't know, brains are wired differently, and interpretations are always going to vary. I just wish that everything was simple, and that all my friends were asexual, but unfortunately, that's never going to happen in my case. (I've had friends say they were asexual... and guess what, they're sexual and they said that just to get closer to fixing me. Wow. Low blow.)

It might seem like these two thoughts contradict one another, but really, they don't. Only when you feel being yourself is enough can you loose the chains of attachment that bind and often prevent enduring friendships to form while keeping them from 'devolving' as this thread laments. Ask most long time lovers, and they'll tell you... when the passion cools, it's the sweetness of friendship that remains. Those friendships don't last because of romance, but in spite of it.

That's really true. I really like those quotes. I've found that in the best marriages, it's because the involved people were best friends first, and lovers later. When the passion died, they were still best friends no matter what. I think that's beautiful. It's something I hope would happen to me, that I'd be capable of remaining a true friend to someone no matter what. Obviously, I'm not going to be the one who would tear myself away due to personal sexual feelings. Nope. If anything, it's the other person. It ends up hurting me the most, but I guess that's just what's going to happen no matter what.

Dang, this was long. I'm so sorry. It's hard to simplify and summarize when there's so much to say.

[The Great WTF]

I'm going to take a moment to remind everyone that sweeping generalizations and blanket statements about sexuals (or any group) is highly discouraged. Please be mindful of varied life experiences and sexualities of the members of AVEN and that no one's experiences are entirely universal.

The Great WTF

Asexual Relationships Moderator

[TellerCam]

I'm going to take a moment to remind everyone that sweeping generalizations and blanket statements about sexuals (or any group) is highly discouraged. Please be mindful of varied life experiences and sexualities of the members of AVEN and that no one's experiences are entirely universal.

The Great WTF

Asexual Relationships Moderator

If my post came off that way, I didn't mean for it to. I was describing my personal experiences. I made a few edits to be more clear that I was talking about the actions and attitudes of my friends, not every single human being on the planet. I'm sorry. :(

[The Great WTF]

It wasn't directed solely at you Teller, don't worry.

[Annie1]

Hey,

I believe that he only way to have a meaningful friendship is to be honest (but at the same time tactful).

I mean, friendships are voluntary relationships which are supposed to make both parties feel good. So if there is a constant "oh my god, what will I do now, I can't tell him/her that, oh my god what is he she thinking/oh my god this situation is weird" etc, then the friendship might need a little "fixing".

You can be like that for exaple around colleagues and classmates, because they are people that you are forced to be together with and have to try get along with by not always saying how you feel and ignoring/not saying many things in order to keep a normal relationship, but if it happens in friendly and/or romantic relationships it shows that there may be a lack of understanding and trust.

Finding the right level of intimacy is difficult for me too. The fact that I am asexual does not mean that I need less emotional intimacy and connection. I am able to be as intimate as possible without getting any sexual feelings, but it seems that it is different for sexuals, because in the "sexual world" such behaviour implies romantic/sexual interest. Since we (most) asexuals can not live entirely without an emotional connection we still create it and it would be OK if all people were asexual BUT the thing is that we are surrounded by so many sexuals for whom all of this line of acting, chatting, hanging out is in a complitely different context. It's as if one person is talking Chinese and the other one French :P

I know some people think that you should not be too friendly and keep some kind of a distance and it is definitely not bad advice but if I were to do that then it would change the whole friendship for me too. In a friendship I would like to say how I feel and think without being proved "wrong" or having someone get angry/resentful towards me JUST because of their own romantic feelings that they have developed. I kind of see that the whole relationship would turn really artificial if you constantly have to choose what to say and how to say it because otherwise you will be guilty of "making" the person fall in love with you. . I do not mean blabbing about every random thing, I hope you understand what I mean. The other thing is that I/we just lack the skills of drawing the line into the right place in a sense of knowing what what and how often is it OK to talk about to keep an image of a sexually/romantically noninterested friend.

What is the solution? I would see only honest communication as a solution. You can explain that you feel as if the other party is trying to get really close to you and you do not mind it to some extent but would like to bring out (once again) that you are and will not be romantically/sexually interested. Also you can explain how the asexuality makes it difficult to understand sexuals sometimes and thats why you may sond too flirty or something. Finally it would be good if the sexual could then explain their side of the story and say how do they see this relationship continuing, what is OK for them and what can you change in your behaviour. I do not see why a grown-up, reasonable person should not understand this kind of an explanation. I think if you do it really nicely then most people will actually be OK and continue their friendship.

Then again it seems that sexuals sometimes have "this thing", where they feel that they are in love or something and they might be all polite with you and everything but later will still pull away because for them it was a rejection and after losing hope of forming a relationship they will just "hide" - it is a self defense mechanism. It happens between sexuals too all the time.

You will probably not be able to keep all the relationships, but definitely some of them :)

[belovedless]

TellerCam, your predicament is the story of my life, and I admire you for being so strong. The old me would have ended up in those relationships, or at least sexually compromising (which is horrible considering I am sex-averse), in the attempt of keeping the friend. In my personal experience, I've had two life trajectories with friendships with sexuals:

1) We are beautiful, wonderful, amazing friends and then... they ask me out or make a sexual advance.

2) Our friendship falls to the wasteland for their romantic/sexual relationship.

Recently, as the result of a lot of emotional turmoil from losing friends to my shutting down their romantic advances or my giving in and enduring nearly yearlong relationships in which I was the friend-pretending-to-be-a-lover, I've employed a new strategy (for sexual friends; with other asexuals I don't do this stuff). The first, most important thing, is to come out as asexual and disinterested, which you've said you already do. Next, I've tried to shut off any flirting, which to me can range from touch to simply giggling too much when that person makes a joke to intense eye contact. Then, if the person still asks me out, I say no and tell them that I am dedicated to our friendship and that the ultimate reason why I'm saying no is for their benefit, as well as mine. If you say that they won't be happy with you, they might not believe you; so it's important to say both that they won't be happy and you won't be happy. Then, they will continue to make advances on you, and you have to stay firm and pleasant. This might go on for a month or two in a strong way, then it will die down so long as the person sees that you are really intending to be their friend, that you will never break in your will to stay just friends, and that you really care about them. This person will still be hurt and possibly pine for a while, but if you maintain your will, it should die down. Then, their acts of physical love will dwindle to only when they are drunk (haha). If you can handle that, then your friendship is saved! However, beware that this person will probably enter into a romantic/sexual relationship at one point or another, and that might drastically affect your friendship in the long-run. I have managed to keep many sexual friends by doing this, including my best friend from college.

As a caveat, if this person is cruel to you at any time during this process, making serious fun of you, and verbally abusing you, then stop the process immediately. Their feelings might be too crushed to maintain a true friendship with you.

That scenario and guidebook is totally based off my own experience and won't work with every person in the world, but it's better than sitting around wondering what the heck you should do!

[ethereal_energy]

I just wish that everything was simple, and that all my friends were asexual, but unfortunately, that's never going to happen in my case. (I've had friends say they were asexual... and guess what, they're sexual and they said that just to get closer to fixing me. Wow. Low blow.)

Sorry for the late reply! That's really messed up. I'm sorry about that. I've never had anyone tell me they were asexual. I understand how that would make you get closer to them. I sometimes wish that one of my friends or acquaintances would tell me that.

And sorry for the weird format. I meant to only quote TellerCam, and when I submitted it things changed.

[Ziggy_G]

the word devolve is the reason I clicked on this thread. I was glad to be not the only one who saw the path from friends to them fancying me as a devolving relationship. It ruins what was a perfectly lovely friendship.

I love friendships with guys but so few of them are happy keeping it at that. Its so much easier to be really really close to them too, I wish I was a guy sometimes so that it would be easier for them to just stay friends. :/

[HiddenDemons]

So, I can kind of relate to this except I'm the person falling for the friend. It sucks since all of my crushes have been good friends of mine however, only one ruined our friendship (we're fixing it though and it was for other reasons as well). I fell for a friend back in grade 9 who was bisexual (though she liked this guy at the time) and when I told her that I liked her (or my friends did cause I was too nervous) she was fine with it actually and when I asked her out a couple weeks later she politely said no and our friendship continued (it turned out really well for my first crush actually).

After that, I crushed (and am still crushing) on this girl at my school (straight) who somehow ended up finding out that I liked her (still don't know how that happened) and when we talked about it she said though she was flattered, she was straight and then for other reasons, our friendship fell apart. I think as previously stated, they can't help if they're interested in someone and its true. I can't help that I still like her (though I am getting over her), it just how I feel and I can't control it. However, I do respect them, I know that they don't like me and I respect that and everything. I would rather remain good friends because for me, the friendship comes first.

And actually, me and my best friend have made a bit of a promise that no matter what, we'll never date each other since we don't want to ruin our friendship.

[Xavy]

This happened to me a lot before I understood I was asexual and therefore I was completely missing signs that the expectations of "friends" with whom I was spending lots of time was changing.

[noparlpf]

That's happened to me a few times. In tenth grade a girl had a very obvious crush on me and it got so awkward that the friendship fell apart. In twelfth grade another friend asked me out and I turned her down. A month or so later I stupidly went skinny-dipping with her and two other friends, and she got drunk and came on to me really hard. That was pretty awkward. She was embarrassed and pretended not to remember anything the next day. That didn't directly ruin that friendship; we had several ups and downs for various other reasons, and we still hung out until I moved away after graduation. We started talking again last year but then drifted apart again when she moved to Texas with her boyfriend. Hmm, what else. Another friend had a huge crush on me freshman year, but when I turned her down she handled it well and we stayed friends, although we've drifted apart a bit because last year she basically went completely MIA and even her mother had trouble getting in contact with her; she's back now but we haven't hung out all that much since.

I think that falling for a friend is less likely to ruin the friendship as you get older and people are (hopefully) more mature.