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A question for aromantic asexuals


Tarfeather

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What are your experiences with, well, not being interested in sex / romance? How often has it happened to you that a person would take your lack of interest as a personal insult and try to get back at you? How often has your platonic interest been misconstrued as romantic and/or sexual interest? And yeah, anyone else is free to share their experiences, too, of course.

 

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I'm increasingly getting the impression that sexuality is something that permeates all kinds of social relationships much more than we are being honest about. In particular, it seems to me that romantic and sexual attraction can often play a huge role in, say, groups of friends, where the official line is that it's all platonic, but deeper down subconscious romantic / sexual tensions can emerge, which can lead to things like power games, rivalry, etc. If that's the case, it makes me curious whether aromantic asexuals are experiencing problems with maintaining friendships within such systems, as they can not relate to all the subconscious stuff going on.

 

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Never have I encountered someone that took my "Ohhhh, that was a date?" personal.

 

I am however interested in partnership, it's just not romantic... 

 

I sadly wish however I was, because I do have longing for someone to be with.

 

(I AM a bit confused in the aromantic spectrum, I know that I'm not 100% aro... but very very very demi... it takes a long time I'd guess...)

 

I have a hard time relating to peers, often making me an outsider, loner, alien. 

 

Sigh, I'm sorry with whatever you're going through, I wish you well.. :)

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I'm not sure how much help I can offer here. Even if this dynamic exists the reality is I would not know. People have to be pretty clear about their intentions for me to get a clue. On the other hand, my mom said my best friend was in love with me for a while and she's good at picking up on that stuff. That really scared me because I didn't want to lose her, but am definitely unable to reciprocate. Nothing came from it and my mom says she gets the feeling that my friend got over it (yay!) and that's all I've got. You might be better off asking allosexuals about this since they seem to have the "sexdar".

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Lord Jade Cross

Trying to get back at me for not being interested in them thankfully has not happened (though I was kind of scared of one girl who was 2 steps short of acting like a total nut job)

 

However I have seen the dissapointment and/or anger in people when I dont return their feeling/interest. Happened for a while growing up and as I got older, it died down to the point where I havent had anyone express interest in me for a considerable amount of time. 

 

I think that the fact that I dont do any sort of shared activities with anyone (not even eating lunch together) helps in this regard and mostly keeping quiet and to yourself will ward off most people, unless you stumble upon one that takes that to be a form of playing hard to get. 

 

In a way, early situations of this kind sort of reinforced the idea that I shouldnt be around people for too long as familiarity tends to breed emotions of afection (I think the correct term for it is propinquity) which can then sort of fool the person into thinking about a relation between you and them as something more and the longer that goes for, the more possibilities it has of causing alot of trouble, especially in this day and age.

 

 

 

 

 

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9 hours ago, Tarfeather said:

How often has it happened to you that a person would take your lack of interest as a personal insult and try to get back at you?

Never

 

9 hours ago, Tarfeather said:

How often has your platonic interest been misconstrued as romantic and/or sexual interest?

A few times that I know of. Apparently my trying to be nice and socialize has gone too well before because people have thought I was flirting with them or interested. It's especially awkward when you find out that the time you went out with a friend was actually a date. That's happened at least 3 times. 

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So over the course of the eight or so years that I've known my boyfriend and before we started our relationship, I saw this happen to him oh I don't know, four or five times.  We all work in a community workshop so often times what would happen is a girl would come in and interact with him for some type of fabrication project, and then that person would keep coming back and lingering. You know, in a I'm kind of interested in you, do you think you might be interested in me kind of way. Those would fizzle out pretty quickly.  

 

There was another incident where a mutual friend's sister took interest and was actually vocal about it. I think they attempted a date or two, but he didn't interact with her in a way in which she considered flirtatious or flattering so she peaced out pretty quickly.

 

The biggest incident was another mutual friend really taking advantage of his wanting physical affection IE cuddling and her inviting him to do fun things that he was interested in, like concerts and other things like that.  But she was using him, because she didn't like where her marriage was at, and she was also trying to make her ex-girlfriend jealous, (purposefully making a show of it around her) and a lot of us could see what was going on and we had to confront her on it so she's not really around anymore because she didn't like being called out on her shitty behavior.  

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On 8/27/2019 at 8:35 PM, Tarfeather said:

What are your experiences with, well, not being interested in sex / romance? How often has it happened to you that a person would take your lack of interest as a personal insult and try to get back at you? How often has your platonic interest been misconstrued as romantic and/or sexual interest? And yeah, anyone else is free to share their experiences, too, of course.

 

Background:

  Hide contents

I'm increasingly getting the impression that sexuality is something that permeates all kinds of social relationships much more than we are being honest about. In particular, it seems to me that romantic and sexual attraction can often play a huge role in, say, groups of friends, where the official line is that it's all platonic, but deeper down subconscious romantic / sexual tensions can emerge, which can lead to things like power games, rivalry, etc. If that's the case, it makes me curious whether aromantic asexuals are experiencing problems with maintaining friendships within such systems, as they can not relate to all the subconscious stuff going on.

 

You have really interesting outlook on "just friendship" between allosexuals. I'm aroace, and I'm also pretty blind when it comes to sexual/romantic interest and cues. Which have often lead me to problems when things lead too far too fast before I recognize it and quit it. Nothing physical has luckily happened, but a few times the person have had a serious crush on me and since I've kept contacting them, they've thought I feel the same way. Nobody has insulted me so far (it could help that I avoid places where alcohol is served like the plague especially due to my aroace blindness), but I hate the feeling of making people disappointed and embarassed. I should note I've never been in relationship with anyone so there really haven't been situations where a person could take my lack of interest as a personal insult.

 

I indeed feel that "just friendships" are very confusing thing to have with allopeople. To this day I don't know if it's a joke or truth that "(allo) girl and boy can never truly be just friends". I really don't understand how sexual urges can be so strong they could destroy your good friendship with someone. Any time I say I want to be just friends with a guy and they say it's okay I'm extremely suspicious (I'm assigned as female at birth). And I feel that even a friendship with an allowoman is never truly just a friendship but they're always comparing themselves to you in terms of sexual attractiveness. It's kind of constant subconscious competition. Some of my female allo friends are pretty kind though, for they seem to be rather worried about my (chosen) sexual unattractiveness than relieved thanks to it.

 

I'm at a point where I've recognized how there's a whole new (sexual & romantic) level to relationship among allo people I can't get into and I'm pretty exhausted trying to figure it out on every turn on every single context. But I'm too nervous to make a turn and find a meeting where I could possibly meet other aroace people to make friend with irl. So I just pretty much stay alone (/surf on the net lol).

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I am probably not social and outgoing enough to have a large amount of experience to draw from. I tend to prefer a small amount of close friends. I have not really run into anyone getting aggressive about me being uninsterested in them. I have had to turn a few people down, but so has most people I'm sure, not an ace/aro thing. People have mistaken platonic affection for romantic though. Now I try to make sure my friends know I am unromanceable before I get so close to them as that mistake might be made.

 

I must say, I have never noticed any underlying sexual tension or rivalry of that kind among my friends. Either there is interest, or there isn't. I have not encountered an instance where me being ace/aro has made it harder keeping friends.

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  • 2 weeks later...

No one has ever tried to get back at me for not being romantically or sexually interested in them. People often try to convince me to give them a shot when I tell them I'm not interested. Then they ask why and tell me that they would make me happy. Sometimes they do it multiple times over a long period of time until they realize it's not going to happen. I generally stay friends with these guys because I like hanging out with them and it doesn't bother me that they want more (I stay friends with those who want to stay friends some people don't). 

 

This usually happens with friends who are interested in being in a committed romantic relationship with me but there are exceptions. There was one night when I was out with a friend and he tried to convince me to sleep with him after he learned that I wasn't interested in a committed relationship and that I'm an extreme commitment-phobic. Obviously I didn't sleep with him but it was definitely an interesting experience. He kept telling me that I needed to lose my virginity at some point and he could help me with that. And that I was about to move away so it would be perfect because we could just casually sleep together until I moved, no strings attached. I stopped talking to him after that night. It felt awkward to continue being friends with him knowing that all he wanted to sleep with me.

 

There was one time when I was at a friend's house and he started touching me (nothing serious, he basically touched my arms and tried to hold my hand or something). I felt extremely uncomfortable but I didn't want to offend him so I didn't say anything and just pushed his hands away (I was a clueless teen with zero experience at the time). He completely failed to get the hint and kept trying to touch my arms and I kept pushing his hands away. That went on for a while until it started getting late so left and I went home. He stopped talking to me after that night and a few days later I learned that he spread a rumor about me almost kissing him. I was like "seriously? wtf? So that's what he's been telling you? This soooo did NOT happen! Not even close.". Honestly, I didn't really want to talk to him after that anyway, but I was still kind of sad he didn't want to be friends anymore because we were kind of close. To this day I still don't know whether he completely missed my not-so-subtle hints that I was not interested at all and that he actually thought we almost kissed or whether he spread that rumor and stopped talking to me because he felt rejected. Obviously I was furious at the time but I learned to let it go. A few years later we started talking again but I never brought it up. It had been long enough and he never attempted anything so I let it go (but kept my distance to some degree).

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  • 2 weeks later...

Mine is a road accident on this front. He got into two relationships giving extremely mixed sexual signals (and probably another one in his past, but I don't have access to the woman's version, and his is that their relationship never went to that level in two years :eyeroll: )

 

In the first, I reciprocated to what seemed to be a LOT of interest in touching me. He enjoyed being touched in reciprocation, but when the touch got more, he was genuinely surprised. Then enjoyed it for the sake of touch, affection, whatever, even though the sex never clicked.

 

We are in a poly relationship, and while we were long distance, he made this friend locally, with whom he really enjoyed spending time, going to the theatre, and so on. Eventually she made a move on him, he went along with it. They had sex once, then she turned out to be a cowgirl and he fucked up badly with me and things went south. But given the way the other woman got nasty (she also was a legit psycho babe and massive other things were very wrong with that relationship), I wouldn't be surprised if sexual frustration also played a role.

 

But with neither of us he saw the sex coming till it slapped him in the face. Also, from my experience of being on the receiving end, him being physically demonstrative, enjoying touch and so on definitely gives signals of more would be very welcome. I am actually rather remote and asocial, so he definitely was the one doing all the initiating in our relationship, not at all realizing that he was sending major signals of sexual interest - which on his end turned out to be massively awestruck "pedestalization" of me. Like he couldn't believe a "celebrity" (I am not) like me could possibly be interested in him. Or something. Whatever it was, from the other end, it looked a lot like he wanted me any way he could get me.

 

The joke was on me.

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