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Influenced by what I read?


Purple_Panda

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Purple_Panda

I’m not sure if I’m going to explain this properly, but I need to know I’m not the only one. 

 

Okay, so I love reading fanfiction and I use it to know that I’m not weird/alone in my gender/sexuality a lot. I have a ton of ones that I saved and go back to read all the time. Anyway, there’s one that has a poly relationship that I love. The problem is that whenever I read these stories I get influenced and think I might like to try this or that or whatever in regards to my sexuality at least. I know I’m on the ace spectrum but right now I’m reading the poly fanfiction I love and I love it so much and seeing the relationship/relationships in it has me questioning if I’m poly romantic. Stuff like this happens to me all the time and it’s confusing and annoying sometimes and I don’t know what to do about it because I know that once I finish this fanfiction again I’ll be fine again and the questions will go away for a while. 

 

Does anyone know what this is and/or experience something like it or am I weird? Thank you for all your help. 

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I totally understand what you're talking about. I used to read a lot of young adult fiction when I was younger and be super into TV shows.

 

I say it doesn't matter if you're influenced like that. It's not necessarily a bad thing and it's a way of learning about your own orientation. I get it's super frustrating at times and especially when you feel like you're having romantic feelings for a fictional character.

 

When I went to high school I didn't have as much time and my reading hobby pretty much disappeared. I noticed later how into I was in all my OTP's and how frustrated that had made me at the time. I was a huge fangirl and although it has plenty of good sides I sometimes cried over the lack of relationship and companionship I only experienced through reading.

I'm in much better headspace now and to be honest, I never want to go back to being so consumed by fictional characters and romantic relationships.

 

I still watch the same tv shows and remain a fan of all the books I've read but in a different way.

 

Hope this made any sense.

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Didi the Dragon

I don't think that's weird at all. It's a known fact that everything we take to heart has an influence on us, so this might be your relating to the characters but not the relationship itself, or your emotional connection to the characters making it seem like that's what you want, too - it might be the case! Who says you're not just finding your own identity through these fics?

If you go back to "normal" once you're done reading, it's just an out-of-sight-out-of-mind type situation. That means your immediate desire to have a poly relationship is tampered because you're not exposed to a scenario like that anymore, which does not mean there isn't a scenario where you are in a happy and healthy poly relationship yourself, at some point. You have other stuff to think about, more things for your mind to move on to, but the thought that you'd enjoy a poly relationship like the one in your fic, is worth exploring I think.

Again, it might just be your love for the characters, the setting, the writing style - but if there weren't a love for the circumstance itself, you wouldn't be enjoying reading it so much, no? Exploring your identity and trying new stuff out, like a poly relationship, is natural and wonderful as long as you do it in a healthy way. If you try and it makes you uncomfortable or you simply don't like such a relationship for yourself, that's a-okay!

I hope this helps a little bit!

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Purple_Panda

@Didi the Dragon, I do love the characters, but just thinking about it last night (because I couldn’t stop) I realized again that I tend to confuse the love I have for my friends with a kind of romantic love, at least when I first meet them. It does fade eventually as time goes on, but I still love them, just in a different way.  

 

I’ve never been in any kind of romantic relationship either, so that makes it even harder to understand how love really feels, even though I can read it and write it with no problem. 

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