MoraDollie Posted January 16, 2019 Share Posted January 16, 2019 I also published this on my Medium account: https://medium.com/@Vi163/trauma-and-sexual-orientation-650545a0bd3d I first really became aware of my sexual orientation and began to take notice of other people in that regard when I was in a teenager. Unfortunately around that time, I was also involved in a sexually abusive relationship. I was sexually abused the entire relationship (from age sixteen to nineteen). The sexual coercion took its toll on my mind and to this day, I have great anxiety about the topic of “sexual attraction” and what it exactly means. When you ask a random person on the street, they’d likely be able to easily tell you who they are (or are not) sexually attracte to. While they might not be able to give you a professional or “formal” definition, they can describe what goes into the idea of “sexual attraction”. For me, this has always been a giant question mark. Over the last almost decade of my life, I have hopped around from one sexual orientation term to the next, trying to find where I “fit in”. It is frustrating and upsetting. It does not help that the home I grew up in was very homophobic which resulted in some internalized homophobia for a good chunk of my life as well. Being the logic oriented person I am, I attempted to look up a formal definition for “sexual attraction”. Every professional and/or academic website I went to had a different definition. Whenever I looked at the problem from a sexologist point of view, no one could agree on a definition there either (and those were the experts!). Google was no help in this regard either, stating “someone who you find sexually attractive”. The Complete Dictionary of Sexology equates “sexual attraction” with “sex appeal”, to which it defines “sex appeal” as: having the capacity to arouse sexual interest and desire. This is an extremely broad statement. Extremely. By this definition, anyone who watches porn, ever, would suddenly have sexual attraction (which is not the case because of the asexual community). Human sexuality is incredibly complex. Due to the trauma I suffered from as a teenager, I will likely never have a complete grasp of what exactly “sexual attraction” is to me, and thus, be “homeless” in regards to my identity when it comes to sexual attraction. The closest identity I can relate to is “not straight”. Link to post Share on other sites
LeChat Posted January 16, 2019 Share Posted January 16, 2019 Hi. I'm sorry to hear that you went through that as a teenager, and I relate to feeling confused about what my sexual orientation was, what "sexual attraction" was supposed to mean, etc. Have you tried reading various LGBT+ and heterosexual peoples' stories about their sexual orientation (i.e. I don't mean only on AVEN, but all over different sites on the internet: how they discovered it, their feelings, attractions and desires in relationships, etc.) or watching their vlogs about it on social media platforms, like YouTube? Things like that helped me figure myself out a bit more. Link to post Share on other sites
Evren Posted January 16, 2019 Share Posted January 16, 2019 If it helps you feel any better, I just gave up on defining my sexuality. It was stressful to try and name it so I just stopped trying. You don't have to have a label. Link to post Share on other sites
Sally Posted January 16, 2019 Share Posted January 16, 2019 Perhaps if you switched from pondering the "sexual attraction" frame and thought instead about whether you have any desire to have actual sex with any other person, it might become more clear. I'm certain i've been asexual all my life, and determined that (after I'd read about asexuality) after I realized that although I'd had sex for decades, I'd never even once wanted sex for itself. Link to post Share on other sites
Guest Posted January 16, 2019 Share Posted January 16, 2019 1 hour ago, Sally said: Perhaps if you switched from pondering the "sexual attraction" frame and thought instead about whether you have any desire to have actual sex with any other person, it might become more clear. I'm certain i've been asexual all my life, and determined that (after I'd read about asexuality) after I realized that although I'd had sex for decades, I'd never even once wanted sex for itself. this x100 Link to post Share on other sites
everywhere and nowhere Posted January 16, 2019 Share Posted January 16, 2019 3 hours ago, Sally said: Perhaps if you switched from pondering the "sexual attraction" frame and thought instead about whether you have any desire to have actual sex with any other person, it might become more clear. I agree. I may feel some form of sexual-ish attraction, but I never desire sex. I feel completely unable to want to have sex (and wouldn't want to want sex). Link to post Share on other sites
012 Posted January 20, 2019 Share Posted January 20, 2019 On 1/16/2019 at 1:28 AM, Sally said: Perhaps if you switched from pondering the "sexual attraction" frame and thought instead about whether you have any desire to have actual sex with any other person, it might become more clear. Agree, sexual attraction is too vague and difficult to define. Desire for intercourse, on the other hand, is quite clearly understood. Link to post Share on other sites
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