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Am I Asexual? Please Help


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Hi,

 

So I'll just jump right into this.  I'm 17.  I've never felt sexual arousal or pleasure, or had any sexual fantasies.  I don't get excited by the idea of sex and honestly don't care about it at all.  Maybe that's just my age, and maybe one day I'd try it, but again, don't really care.  I've kind of had one relationship, it wasn't very serious but I think I had a crush on her, so I had romantic attraction (and I'm obviously a lesbian or pan or something, not sure yet), but if I never had "sex" with her I would never care.  Or sex with a guy.  Don't care.

 

So when I heard about being asexual, I thought woah, this is totally me.  I'm asexual, or at least on the spectrum of it.  I have three questions:

1. Is this just because of my age??

2. This is the main reason why I'm posting this.  I was sexually assaulted and abused at a young age, and I've kinda developed a fear of men because of it.  I think I'd be fine having sex one day if I wanted to, but like, is THAT the reason why I'm asexual?  Is asexuality "real" even if it's there because of sexual trauma?  Or is that a reason people are ace?  Or is that not REALLY ace?  Do you know what I mean?  I suspect that I'd still be this way at least a little bit if that shit never happened to me but still. 

3. I ask my mom and she says "You think you're asexual because you're just young (like I said #1) and because of your trauma (#2) and one day you'll grow out of it." Is this a phase?  Like, I know not everyone grows out of it, but is it possible I could, since sexuality and everything is fluid?  What should I tell her?

 

So yeah I'm here, I'm queer, (filled with existential fear), maybe ace but I'm hella confused.  Any thoughts are much appreciated.

 

Thanks

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Do what you are comfortable with. I know it sounds bad at your age, and I do sound like your mom, but you are young. Please don't feel obligated to doing anything. Whether you don't feel like having sex because of abuse or not... do feel free  to talk to a therapist. That is never a negative thing.

 

But absolutely don't go outside your comfort zone. If you don't feel like it, that's the end of the argument. You're asexual. There is no reason to question that. If you do feel like it... don't resist it, but don't look for it because you feel like you should. I think you're addressing the situation appropriately.

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Alawyn-Aebt
4 minutes ago, blaisednp said:

1. Is this just because of my age??

2. This is the main reason why I'm posting this.  I was sexually assaulted and abused at a young age, and I've kinda developed a fear of men because of it.  I think I'd be fine having sex one day if I wanted to, but like, is THAT the reason why I'm asexual?  Is asexuality "real" even if it's there because of sexual trauma?  Or is that a reason people are ace?  Or is that not REALLY ace?  Do you know what I mean?  I suspect that I'd still be this way at least a little bit if that shit never happened to me but still. 

3. I ask my mom and she says "You think you're asexual because you're just young (like I said #1) and because of your trauma (#2) and one day you'll grow out of it." Is this a phase?  Like, I know not everyone grows out of it, but is it possible I could, since sexuality and everything is fluid?  What should I tell her?

1. Who knows. Only time will tell. I am 19 myself and have never felt this mysterious thing called sexual attraction. I do know, statistically, 98% of people aged 18 have felt sexual attraction, and it has been hypothesized that 1% of the population is Asexual so then 1% would have to be late bloomers. I do not know the statistic for 17 year olds though.

2. That is for you to find out. As someone who has had no similar experiences I cannot comment.

3. It is possible you could grow out of it, it is possible you or every other person who identifies as Asexual is really not. It is possible you are Asexual. It is possible you have just not met the right person. Pretty much anything is possible and since proving a negative definitively is very difficult there is no real clear answer for you. On the topic of parents, I have never told my parents (yet, if ever) because that is not their business. My sexual orientation only came up once in discussion with them, and I answered truthfully without using the term Asexuality.

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Personally, I knew how I felt about sex and sexual activity and that I never experienced sexual attraction throughout High School. 14 to 17. So if you know then you know.

 

It obviously could be a phase.

 

Trauma has affected how people look at things/aspects of their in a new way as well. So could be. But really, the only person who can know or decide in the end is you.

 

FYI: I also was abused at a young age by a guy. It didn’t luckily impact my later relationships and interactions with others.

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It really is up to how you feel and identify I'm 19 and I assumed I was gay most of my life but after I experimented with that I realized I was ace I'm not saying go out and try everything especially at your age but when the time comes try what you're curious about and go from there you're the only one who can determine what you identify as 

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Notajellyfan

I'm 15 and I still identify with Ace. I think that you can be ace if that's what you identify with the most. Loads of people who identify as Asexual have sexual trauma but they choose to identify this way. Personally, I still don't know if it's a phase but I'm proud of it still. I haven't felt sexual feelings yet so I'm Ace. So you can decide what you identify with.

 

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everywhere and nowhere
12 hours ago, Aebt said:

I do know, statistically, 98% of people aged 18 have felt sexual attraction, and it has been hypothesized that 1% of the population is Asexual so then 1% would have to be late bloomers. I do not know the statistic for 17 year olds though.

The real numer of asexuals is probably higher, rather around 5%. A counterproposal I could offer is that some people have taken romantic attraction for sexual attraction. Or, some consider "finding someone sexually attractive" to be sexual attraction, but still don't desire sex.

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Alawyn-Aebt
10 minutes ago, Nowhere Girl said:

Or, some consider "finding someone sexually attractive" to be sexual attraction, but still don't desire sex.

Could elaborate on that? According to the AVEN wiki "Sexual attraction is an emotional response sexual people feel where they find someone sexually appealing, and often results in a desire for sexual contact with the person." Sexual attraction, using the definition AVEN uses, means one is sexual, not asexual. One can chose to manifest that desire or not, but according to the AVEN wiki that would preclude those people from being asexual.

15 minutes ago, Nowhere Girl said:

A counterproposal I could offer is that some people have taken romantic attraction for sexual attraction.

Certainly that is a possibility, and I would in no way doubt that to be the case for some, but 5% seems like an awfully high number. 1.5% was what Kinsey grouped into group X, which includes Asexuals and a few other groups. For all the studies on human sexuality I find the lack of studies on Asexuality hard to comprehend if the number was truly more than 1 or 2 percent. I have found no studies that support a larger number than somewhere between 1-2%, on top of the fact it would throw out all sorts of other studies out of sync. 1% is statistically nothing and can be ignored or merely an error, 5% however is much larger and cannot be ignored nor instantly discounted as a statistical error, if the number is 5% then many studies would be instantly proven wrong, I find it hard to reason that such a large number remained ignored/invisible for so long.

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everywhere and nowhere

@Aebt -

A few examples of studies which indicate a higher number:

How many asexuals are there?

Apart from that, I'm beginning to notice a consistent pattern of a higher percentage of asexuals in studies done on a younger sample, particularly just on students.  Of course, such a sample is less random and results should be extrapolated with caution, but particularly the fact that these are results from younger samples seems significant for me - these are people more likely to have heard of asexuality.

I don't think that "such a large number remained ignored/invisible for so long". In fact, there have always been people who just didn't like sex. They didn't consider themselves asexual because they didn't have a language for it. Now people do, asexuality is becoming more visible and that might account for the higher number of asexuals in studies on younger people.

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Alawyn-Aebt
5 hours ago, Nowhere Girl said:

A few examples of studies which indicate a higher number:

How many asexuals are there?

I appreciate the link, some of those on there I had not heard of before. The two largest studies across multiple ages are Bogaert and Kinsey, Bogaert arrived at 1%, and Kinsey (which the blog post messed up on, stating ~5.5-7.8% whereas Kinsey according to himself found 1.5% were group X) found a similar number. I am not sure how the blog arrived at its conclusion that Kinsey found ~5.5-7.8% of people to be asexual, because Kinsey never said that, all the data even from the Kinsey Institute itself says that group X, which includes asexuals and others, was only 1.5%.

5 hours ago, Nowhere Girl said:

Apart from that, I'm beginning to notice a consistent pattern of a higher percentage of asexuals in studies done on a younger sample, particularly just on students.

It is particularly interesting, it could either be indicative of a larger percentage of asexuals that originally thought but it could also be explained any number of ways. So sadly not a definitive answer, but rather something that needs further digging. The Asexual Identification Score has promise possibly, but has never had a representative experiment run though it yet and some of the questions need perfecting since many sexuals could get very close, if not over, the asexual threshold.

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NickyTannock

A belated welcome to AVEN!

 

On 7/21/2019 at 2:52 AM, blaisednp said:

1. Is this just because of my age??

Your feelings could change in the future, but I don't think you're too young to know if you're Asexual.

In my case, I realised that I'm Asexual in my early teens, around 14 when I started hearing sexual comments from my peers and in media and found that they bewildered me. 

 

On 7/21/2019 at 2:52 AM, blaisednp said:

2. This is the main reason why I'm posting this.  I was sexually assaulted and abused at a young age, and I've kinda developed a fear of men because of it.  I think I'd be fine having sex one day if I wanted to, but like, is THAT the reason why I'm asexual?  Is asexuality "real" even if it's there because of sexual trauma?  Or is that a reason people are ace?  Or is that not REALLY ace?  Do you know what I mean?  I suspect that I'd still be this way at least a little bit if that shit never happened to me but still. 

I have an instance of sexual abuse at a very young age that made me wonder if it caused me to lack sexual attraction.

I can't answer your questions for you, but for me, I've realised that I would always have been Asexual, and the cause doesn't make it less real.

 

On 7/21/2019 at 2:52 AM, blaisednp said:

3. I ask my mom and she says "You think you're asexual because you're just young (like I said #1) and because of your trauma (#2) and one day you'll grow out of it." Is this a phase?  Like, I know not everyone grows out of it, but is it possible I could, since sexuality and everything is fluid?  What should I tell her?

It's possible for everyone including Sexuals. You could try showing your mum this: http://www.whatisasexuality.com/family-and-friends/parents/

 

Incidentally, it is a tradition here to welcome new members by offering cake, and here's a Rainbow Pegacorn Mama and Baby Cake (all edible),

ptqomvnfyrsvhi4gvebt.jpg

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