General pondering: becoming another person

[anamikanon]

It may be my perception, but sexuals seem to struggle much more with the ace-sexual mismatch than asexuals. Some of it is of course as has been repeatedly pointed out, that for the sexual's preferred intimacy to happen, it needs the cooperation of a disinclined asexual, while the asexual's need, basically being an absence, is not dependent on another person to be fulfilled. Also, because the asexual doesn't tend to think of sex by default, the mismatch and the entire burden of discomfort that comes with it can often slip their minds altogether, unlike a frustrated sexual, who is perpetually reminded by their very frustration.

 

But this still does not fully explain the greater difficulty sexuals have, particularly those - like me - who don't particularly need a specific frequency of sex (though we may like it very much) and are generally not overly distressed by its lack on a sexual level so much as the emotional impact of that lack. It appears that even without requiring "regular sex", there is an emotional aspect that is hard to address.

 

In one of my discussions with my ace, I had an insight. For the hundredth time, we were discussing our differences and thinking of things we could try. At one point, I said "It isn't so much the lack of sex as a change in the whole way I understand intimacy in a relationship. For over two decades, I am this person whose most intimate shutting out the rest of the world and being close to my partner has been sex. Being lost in each other's bodies, sensations, what we do together..." etc. My ace said "Similarly, for me, all my life, loving someone has never had a sexual level. This is how I am. How I always have been."

 

That, I think had a profound point. Not just how we express and understand love - what we do - but also WHO we are. An ace, even a compromising ace remains him/herself. Both the sexual act or the lack of it is of no consequence to their experience of love. A sexual is either frustrated, or in compromise becomes a person who is entirely different on a profoundly intimate level." In either case, there is no going back to the person they were - someone who can effortlessly lose themselves in a loved one. Even when sexually satisfied, there is something fundamentally different in how we are in the relationship. And perhaps the change is forever. Now that the second guessing has entered that inner sanctum of intimacy, I don't know if it can ever be "unlearned". I find it very hard to even think through the possibility of sex with someone else - something that has always been spontaneous and uninhibited now has so many considerations, it feels overwhelming.

 

Just something I am contemplating. Over the last 9 months or so, I have found myself changing into a different person. Someone who does the most trusted relationships and handles the most intimate space in a way that is unfamiliar to me. On some level, I also have to become comfortable with this new me. And like any profound life learning and change, there is no going back. Only forward.

 

Or maybe it is just me thinking circles in my head.

 

Edit: In other words, for us, it is a change  of identity in some ways. Say.... outside this forum, if I were to be discussing my sexuality with someone, would I spontaneously call myself a sexual? I think whether verbalized or not, my mind would say "I'm the partner of an asexual"

[mreid]

2 hours ago, anamikanon said:

My ace said "Similarly, for me, all my life, loving someone has never had a sexual level. This is how I am. How I always have been."

Why don't you ask your ace how that works for him? How is it that he can feel all the intimacy he needs without sex and you don't?

The answers can either be that he doesn't need to feel much intimacy or he experiences intimacy differently.

I'm skeptical about the latter in your husband's case because this implies he feels a kind of fullfilling platonic intimacy with you even though you don't feel it back and that's just not how it works. You kind of have to be "in tune" with the other person on a deeper level for that.

 

If it's the former then I think it's obvious you don't meet each other's needs, whatever his might be.

[ryn2]

2 hours ago, anamikanon said:

At one point, I said "It isn't so much the lack of sex as a change in the whole way I understand intimacy in a relationship. For over two decades, I am this person whose most intimate shutting out the rest of the world and being close to my partner has been sex. Being lost in each other's bodies, sensations, what we do together..." etc. My ace said "Similarly, for me, all my life, loving someone has never had a sexual level. This is how I am. How I always have been."

This is really interesting food for thought.  I won’t elaborate, since this thread is about your experiences and not mine, but it’s still very interesting.

[ryn2]

1 minute ago, Darthleon2 said:

People are definitely capable of feeling connected to someone without the other person reciprocating. "I thought we were really close" really isn't that unusual to hear. Hell, every proposal that gets turned down is an example of 1 person seeing the relationship as marriage worthy and the other disagreeing. Feeling connected to someone else is very often separate from their feelings towards you. 

Very true.  This is especially the case when the object of the feelings isn’t actively fighting against them (e.g., trying to convince the person with the unrequited/semirequited feelings to stop/move on).

[mreid]

@Darthleon2 In those cases it's more a need to believe the other person reciprocates rather than actually feeling that reciprocation or mistakenly thinking they feel that reciprocation.

 

Quote

Feeling connected to someone else is very often separate from their feelings towards you.  

What? In which case the connection isn't really there.

[ryn2]

4 minutes ago, mreid said:

In those cases it's more a need to believe the other person reciprocates rather than actually feeling that reciprocation or mistakenly thinking they feel that reciprocation.

Ultimately all you know of someone else’s feelings is what you can deduce from a combination of what they tell you they’re feeling and how they behave towards you.

[mreid]

@ryn2 Not the case with me... but that's probably because I tend to like people who are like me in many ways. In my case I know when I am into someone, so if this someone is similar to me I can also tell when they are into me. Or maybe I am just good at picking up signs.

[ryn2]

21 minutes ago, mreid said:

@ryn2 Not the case with me... but that's probably because I tend to like people who are like me in many ways. In my case I know when I am into someone, so if this someone is similar to me I can also tell when they are into me. Or maybe I am just good at picking up signs.

That’s what I said - you’re deducing their feelings from their words/actions.  If they’re similar to you, and not willfully misleading you, your success rate may be fairly high.

[ryn2]

1 minute ago, Darthleon2 said:

There are stories of women who end up rejecting proposals from several different men because they were just that good at making others feel connected to them without reciprocating the feelings themselves.

Yes.  This is also very helpful in jobs like customer service and sales.

[anamikanon]

54 minutes ago, ryn2 said:

This is really interesting food for thought.  I won’t elaborate, since this thread is about your experiences and not mine, but it’s still very interesting.

Have at it. I just typed out something that seemed insightful in the moment. Not so much an ongoing/evolving train of thought so far, and if I think further, I can always add to the thread. Discussion will only add dimension.

[anamikanon]

2 hours ago, mreid said:

Why don't you ask your ace how that works for him?...

He feels it differently. No secret. He's ace.

 

My train of thought was different. It was about emotional discomfort, even when a compromise seems to happen, and I think at least in my case it is more about ME having to become a different person in ways that are strange to me. My issue never has been sexual, but mental/emotional. I mean, sexual frustration is there, sure, but it is the emotions being out of the comfort zone that rattles. 

 

For example, if being close is sex, and sex is iffy, it isn't just the closeness I get from him, it is how I act myself in being close that is unfamiliar(?) or out of my natural "recognition" of myself. Where earlier, an embrace would turn into extensive touch and more and more skin contact and sex and emotional overwhelm and satisfaction and being in each others arms in a relaxed and sated mood, the person I am now has almost no spontaneous physical actions left beyond a hug - which I really can give ANYONE I like. Absolutely nothing I automatically do with my partner that I wouldn't do with someone I wasn't intimate with. Everything else is a carefully considered action. And I the person I understand myself to be has no mental template for being sexually unsure/hesitant.

 

I end up acting in ways that make me feel like I am someone else. Or rather a new and awkward me that I have not yet grown into and it doesn't even seem to be a particularly appealing version of me. I feel like I no longer KNOW what to do as a part of sex - the instinctive, automatic actions. What is welcome, what is not. What is pleasurable, what is not. What is "normal" and what is not....

 

It is not about how he perceives intimacy, it is about me not understanding how I enact intimacy anymore.

[ryn2]

2 minutes ago, anamikanon said:

Have at it. I just typed out something that seemed insightful in the moment. Not so much an ongoing/evolving train of thought so far, and if I think further, I can always add to the thread. Discussion will only add dimension.

The impression I got reading your thoughts was that sex (at least prior to the current state of your current relationship) was a relatively easy way for you to communicate with your partners.

 

It hasn’t been for me, excepting my first longterm relationship.  It’s easy to write that off as my having mislabeled my sexuality... but I’m not sure that’s it, as what your partner describes doesn’t ring true for me either.

 

A combination of unfortunate genetics, body dysmorphia, and unkind people left me feeling very unattractive (as in ugly).  When I’ve been in sexual situations, again subsequent to my first LTR,  I’m not relaxing/giving in to my senses/openly communicating; I’m wondering if the lighting is awful and I look (or whatever sense applies) terrible and how I can distract my partner from noticing all of that.

 

Nowadays I’m old and in general less bothered by what people think of me.  I’m not sure - a bit like you mentioned - I can set the clock back to a point where I don’t worry about those things with my current partner, especially given his ED (which he now credits to the aceness I’m not sure I have/am).

[anamikanon]

2 hours ago, mreid said:

If it's the former then I think it's obvious you don't meet each other's needs, whatever his might be.

I have no idea where that came from, if it is in reply to my post.

 

If you read my post, I clearly say, I have changed by being in the relationship. It isn't something I can cancel or hit the "undo" button regardless of whether I am with him. It is more a philosophical thing than "help my partner is ace, give me a templated reply"

[anamikanon]

1 minute ago, Darthleon2 said:

Well this is a rather interesting read. A sexual person who has come to view relationships through an asexual perspective? Fascinating. At the very least, I'm glad you you now have an understanding of what the world looks and feels like for an Ace person. 

lol. That's one way of putting it.

 

Though honestly, I doubt I'd understand it like an ace. But I don't feel the same ease that I used to feel about being sexual either. I'm sort of in a different place and trying to make sense/find ease with it.

 

Think of it like this. Every time you drink a glass of water, something happens. Say.... glass leaks or someone makes a comment about your hair. If this happens consistently every time you have a glass of water, you get into the habit of watching for the leak and adjusting your glass or holding a napkin under it or expecting a drip of water on your clothes or whatever. Or you pat your hair to make sure it isn't sticking out. Once this is a habit, even if the glass doesn't leak when you drink water or no one comments, your habit of drinking water from the glass itself has changed to be wary for what may happen. Even if you throw that glass out, you'll still find yourself checking your glass when you drink or assuming a leak, if a drop of water falls on your clothes or even simply remembering that you had that glass and you kept having to check. Your glass may be problem free, but the way you drink will have changed. There is no guaranteed going back to thoughtlessly tossing back a glass of water, even if you feel stupid and awkward about your new wariness.

[anamikanon]

12 minutes ago, Darthleon2 said:

I hope you eventually manage to appreciate parts of this perspective rather than it just making you uncomfortable. 

There is no perspective. Just a sense of my own actions being awkward and alien and "not me". I am not seeing things like an ace. I'm seeing things like a sexual who is unsure how to be sexual.

[anamikanon]

Just now, Darthleon2 said:

You make it sound really horrible. 

It is. Well, not horrible so much as unnerving and awkward and.... like I can't be "me". Except it is me. It is like you always dressing in a certain way and now have a different dress code and you have no idea how to carry it off.

[ryn2]

5 minutes ago, anamikanon said:

Every time you drink a glass of water, something happens. Say.... glass leaks or someone makes a comment about your hair. If this happens consistently every time you have a glass of water, you get into the habit of watching for the leak and adjusting your glass or holding a napkin under it or expecting a drip of water on your clothes or whatever. Or you pat your hair to make sure it isn't sticking out. Once this is a habit, even if the glass doesn't leak when you drink water or no one comments, your habit of drinking water from the glass itself has changed to be wary for what may happen. Even if you throw that glass out, you'll still find yourself checking your glass when you drink or assuming a leak, if a drop of water falls on your clothes or even simply remembering that you had that glass and you kept having to check. Your glass may be problem free, but the way you drink will have changed. There is no guaranteed going back to thoughtlessly tossing back a glass of water, even if you feel stupid and awkward about your new wariness.

Yes, this, exactly.

[ryn2]

Just now, anamikanon said:

It is. Well, not horrible so much as unnerving and awkward and.... like I can't be "me". Except it is me. It is like you always dressing in a certain way and now have a different dress code and you have no idea how to carry it off.

It’s like you turned into a new you when you weren’t looking.

[anisotrophic]

4 hours ago, anamikanon said:

In other words, for us, it is a change  of identity in some ways. Say.... outside this forum, if I were to be discussing my sexuality with someone, would I spontaneously call myself a sexual? I think whether verbalized or not, my mind would say "I'm the partner of an asexual"

yeah, I feel like this too. I've asked how much he thinks we changed. He thinks I had to change a lot more than he has.

Sometimes I feel like I had to twist myself into a new shape, denying myself things in myself people don't normally do. Like, how I can't imagine being intimate with someone that actually desires me, and I can't imagine someone desiring me... just a blank space, not a sense of being ugly, it's just incomprehensible. Resignation to always feeling desire and not being desired.

Recently the asymmetry and physical condition was enough that I needed his help to be intimate. Maybe my physical condition, but I wanted the intimacy emotionally – couldn't get there physically... then emotions faltering, but... got past it, with TLC from him. And felt so much shame about the irony of it. He's reassuring. It'll pass, I'm sure, usually things do. Sometimes I feel proud about how I've adapted, but sometimes the changes make me feel ... mangled, and I just have to accept it and move on, or at least stop thinking about it.

Sorry. Not feeling great today. He's kind about it.

[anamikanon]

10 minutes ago, Darthleon2 said:

Sounds like having an Ace partner broke you a bit. It's rough for a sexual person to date an Ace as it is; I didn't know we could infect them too. 

yes. Something like that. The person I was sexually is broken and I have no idea who I am now. I wish I could be infected with "aceness" and end the confusion. But that is the thing. I'm not ace. I'm not sexual properly. I'm just awkward.

[anamikanon]

5 minutes ago, anisotropic said:

Sometimes I feel proud about how I've adapted, but sometimes the changes make me feel ... mangled, and I just have to accept it and move on, or at least stop thinking about it.
 

I so resonate with this. I think I'll settle into the new reality, then I'm revolted and asking myself whether this really is what I want to be sexually.

 

(and before someone jumps in with "if you're that traumatized, break off, etc", this is about how I feel about myself - it has changed - even with someone else. There is a wariness about sexual actions even with someone not my ace. There is no "undo" here.)

[anamikanon]

 

17 minutes ago, Darthleon2 said:

Sounds like having an Ace partner broke you a bit. It's rough for a sexual person to date an Ace as it is; I didn't know we could infect them too. 

When I repeatedly deny having an ace perspective or being "infected" by my ace.... nothing against being ace, except I AM SEXUAL. I want sex, I like sex, I enjoy sex, I'd like to have another sexual partner and my ace too is fine with that and now I have no fucking idea how to go about doing sex in a way that feels natural, like it used to, because I'm not certain of anything I do. Me trying to have sex now just feels awkward and stupid and I'm waiting for the other shoe to drop.

[ryn2]

10 minutes ago, anamikanon said:

I so resonate with this. I think I'll settle into the new reality, then I'm revolted and asking myself whether this really is what I want to be sexually.

 

(and before someone jumps in with "if you're that traumatized, break off, etc", this is about how I feel about myself - it has changed - even with someone else. There is a wariness about sexual actions even with someone not my ace. There is no "undo" here.)

It definitely doesn’t magically disappear with a partner change, at least in my experience.  In fairness that was a long time ago for me, though, and I was probably not in the mental spot you are in.

[anamikanon]

2 minutes ago, Darthleon2 said:

Welcome to how sex feels for an asexual person pretty much all the time. That's what I meant by viewing things from an asexual perspective: Sex feels awkward, unnatural, and foreign. 

If sex felt like something they REALLY WANTED to an asexual person all the time.... I wouldn't be on this forum. I'd be busy getting laid.

 

You are missing the key part. That I WANT sex. Asexuals aren't wanting sex and feeling awkward about getting it. They are feeling awkward, because it isn't what they really want. It is the polar opposite other than feeling awkward. Like even in the middle of feeling awkward, the sensations are pleasurable to me. I want them to happen more. Then I'll worry about wanting it too much and turning my partner off. Or maybe I'm not being explicit enough? It is like having conversations ONLY with someone hard of hearing for a year. You have no idea of how to speak so a regular person will hear you. Even if you arrive at an accurate idea, you'll still be second guessing yourself and attributing stray miscommunications to "perhaps I should talk louder/softer/more clearly/more detail/less rambling/whatever...."

[anisotrophic]

1 hour ago, Darthleon2 said:

Sex feels awkward, unnatural, and foreign.

One of the most interesting phases was a period where I forced myself to (attempt) sex, with the newfound understanding that he didn't experience attraction, and well ... neither was I at that point, but I decided to try to push past it. SUPER AWKWARD. But also valuable to experience.
 

59 minutes ago, anamikanon said:

Like even in the middle of feeling awkward, the sensations are pleasurable to me. I want them to happen more. Then I'll worry about wanting it too much and turning my partner off. Or maybe I'm not being explicit enough?

So true!

And... for me I can also feel embarrassed or vulnerable at how I'm experiencing desire and reacting to sex, knowing it's not affecting him in nearly the same way.

But then... in the long run, the act of trust in this stuff makes me feel closer to him. Which is a positive thing I have, special to this partnership. (And remembering this as I write it is making me feel better.)

[Chimeric]

7 hours ago, mreid said:

@ryn2 Not the case with me... but that's probably because I tend to like people who are like me in many ways. In my case I know when I am into someone, so if this someone is similar to me I can also tell when they are into me. Or maybe I am just good at picking up signs.

lol, don't make too many assumptions. You can think you know, but until they tell you so, it's all in your head. 😃

 

10 hours ago, anamikanon said:

It may be my perception, but sexuals seem to struggle much more with the ace-sexual mismatch than asexuals.

I disagree with this on every level. I'm not really sure how you can have been a member of these forums for as long as you have, having seen the distress that ace folks go through, and make this claim. How many ace folks here are concerned that they don't make their partner feel loved? How many tie themselves in knots trying to compromise on something that makes them exceedingly uncomfortable, at the very least? Complicated by the fact that they understand that sex is meant to be an expression of love, but to them it isn't, and so they're compromising a piece of who they are in an effort to make their partner feel loved... when it makes them feel used? And those that can't compromise, that simply cannot have sex - do you believe they don't struggle with the idea that their partner may perceive them as broken, cold, or distant? The physical struggle may be more potent for sexuals, in that there's that nagging feeling of need, but in terms of manifesting and nurturing a loving relationship... how isn't it clear to you yet that this is a deep and abiding concern that ace folks have?

[anisotrophic]

43 minutes ago, Chimeric said:

I'm not really sure how you can have been a member of these forums for as long as you have, having seen the distress that ace folks go through, and make this claim

I suspect the more accurate claim is that the partner showing up here is likely to be struggling more. I think it may be @Telecaster68 that's noted the selection bias.

 

In my case my partner is very indifferent & not feeling very used (minor chore, not major), but I agree that this is seems unusual relative to asexual folks that post -- probably how we went as well as we did, as long as we did.

[mreid]

2 hours ago, Chimeric said:

lol, don't make too many assumptions. You can think you know, but until they tell you so, it's all in your head. 😃

No one is safe from projection and wishful thinking. 😛

[ryn2]

52 minutes ago, anisotropic said:

I suspect the more accurate claim is that the partner showing up here is likely to be struggling more.

Agreed, a good number of the active posters are people trying to sort out their sexuality, or concerned partners (ace or not) in difficult relationship situations.

[ryn2]

56 minutes ago, anisotropic said:

probably how we went as well as we did, as long as we did.

That sounds a little past-tense-y... everything okay?