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Exploring your limits?


DoomDodo

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Hello,

 

I am in the very early dating stages with a guy and we are both getting along very well. It pains me think about to tell him I'm asexual. The thought of kissing him is not bad (it nauseated me with others) and I think I can compromise on some level but I don't have the experience to really gauge how far I can compromise without diminishing the joy of a relationship. The dating relationship is very casual and slow right now but I can tell we're both getting pretty attached. I don't know if and when I should bring this up, and whether I should set clear boundaries or let him know about the gray area I'm in. I don't want to get his hopes up that a relationship with me will be normal, I don't want to lead him on. This may be internalized stigma but I feel wrong even attempting to start a relationship with a presumably straight person.

 

Getting to the point, I'd like to know what your experiences with compromise have been like and how exploring your (a)sexuality in a relationship went. I appreciate anyone willing to share. Thanks :)

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AcornCarvings

I'd try to communicate this stuff  sooner rather than later. Definitely talk about this before you are doing too much physical, so that he doesn't just assume you are up for things when you really aren't. Saying that you are asexual is probably a good idea, or at least saying that you aren't in to a lot of physical things that lots of people are into. 

 

It's totally ok to explore your boundaries, just try your best to make sure you are being consensual with yourself, and make sure you are communicating a lot with your boyfriend while you are trying things out.

 

I actually kind of have a framework for testing out my boundaries. It works ok for me, but of course you and I probably do things very differently so if you wanna look at it sure, but if not thats cool too. It's pretty much all about communication. (it looks like a super long list of stuff but when your actually talking I find it goes pretty smoothly.)

 

    First I ask myself why I want to try this thing out. do I really want to or am I just feeding off of norms or pressure or something? If I do want to, I make sure I'm in a place at the moment where I want to test this stuff out. (I can leave if I need to, I trust the person Im with, I am not feeling overwhelmed or stressed, I am not being pressured)

    If so, I say something like "hey I don't know how I feel about ____, but I think I'd like to try it out. would that be ok with you?" and if they want to, I set terms on how its going to go, and tell the other person that it might actually feel really bad for me, and I might have to stop. I say what some of signals might be ("I might push you off if I am panicking" or "hey, if It feels like I'm not really reciprocating or I'm not really into it, stop" or "if I am going still or seem spaced out, stop") and I tell the other person to check in throughout the thing and ask questions like "how is this?" or "whenever you want to stop"

   If I'm still up for trying the thing out I check in if the other person still wants to do it. also do a quick check in with myself, see how I feel about how they are reacting to all this so far. Then I try the thing out! I go slow, and check in with myself. If something feels off, then I stop. 

    Afterwards, I take some time to process how I'm feeling before talking about it too much with the other person. Then once I've sorted through my thoughts for a bit, I talk over how it went with that person (things like "ehh, I'm glad I tried it, but I don't think its for me." or "I liked the part when we were doing ___, but not the part where ___ was happening" or "huh, I actually really loved that!" or "thanks for trying it out with me but i don't ever want to do that again.")

 

Whenever I'm doing stuff and something happens that triggers me, or if I'm not ok, or I need space, I stop and say something like "hey give me a little time to think" or "give me some space" or "hey, please get up for a bit, I need space right now." This happens every now and then when doing things for me, even things that I've done before or that I usually like.

I take some time to calm down or get things sorted out in my head, then communicate with my partner some about what just happened. (like "hey, thanks for stopping there. I'm a little shook up right now, so thanks for the space. Just a bit ago, ___ was a really big NO for me, and it freaked me out pretty bad. I don't want to do that ever again.") Usually when this happens my partner is pretty freaked out too, so I sort of check in with them and see where they are at.

 

so yeah, I don't know how much of that would apply to you, but that's how I navigate exploring my own boundaries and communicating things with people.

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Anthracite_Impreza

You need to tell him, it's not fair to hide such important information. You should really tell people before you agree to date them.

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everywhere and nowhere

@AcornCarvings - thanks for sharing, it's an important read that could be useful to anyone, not just aexuals. Some people just blindly assume that all allosexual people are impatient to try sex, never anxious, that sex is The Allgreatest Pleasure and so no one except asexuals may feel uncomfortable with that... And that's not true. "Not feeling ready" is an absolutely common thing (and I hate the assumption that everyone will feel ready someday) and requires caution.

I have never been in a relationship, so I have never had any opportunity to explore my limits. But I'm afraid that they lie painfully close. I'm OK with hugging, I feel that I could be OK with kissing... but anything involving nudity feels IMPOSSIBLE TO EVEN TRY. Way too frightening and distressing.

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12 hours ago, Anthracite_Impreza said:

You need to tell him, it's not fair to hide such important information. You should really tell people before you agree to date them.

I agree, I would have liked to make it clear before anyone started getting attached. It's been a very smooth transition though. Dating or romantic things weren't explicitly mentioned, we just sort of started having lunches and dinners together. I'm trying to figure out if I can bring it up without disturbing the flow (in fact I'm not 100% sure we are dating 😅).

 

@AcornCarvings thanks for the detailed post! Seems like a good way to go about it when we get there.

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