Wondering if I'm demi / Demisexuality and comfort

[Scatterbrain]

Hey y'all! 

I'm someone that's very much in the process of figuring out my sexuality, and I thought I'd make a quick post on here to get some input. 

I've felt a little out of place with my sexuality for pretty much all my life, and in the past few years I've been having more and more thoughts that I might be somewhere on the acespec. This is partly because I had a long period of time where I had no interest in sexual activity with my partner, whom I love very much and have been together with for very many years (actually, all my adult life). I know that people go through "dry spells", but it felt like more than that. While I still had a libido and masturbated, I felt absolutely zero desire for partnered sex with my partner or anyone else, no matter how aesthetically pleasing or nice they were. I connected this feeling to other, general experiences of "not feeling as sexual as other people" that I'd had all my life, and started thinking I was somewhere on the acespec. At times aegosexual felt like a fitting microlabel, as I did masturbate to porn and things like that. 

However, when I got my thoughts more organized and mustered up the courage to talk about these feelings with my partner, something unexpected started happening. As we had good conversations and my partner started to seem to understand me, my sexual attraction gradually started coming back. It's like I started seeing my partner in a whole new kind of way and started desiring to do things again. 

This has led me to think that demisexual might be the right identity label for me. Clearly, I require a certain kind of connection to a person to want to do sexual things with them. I'd obviously had that connection to my partner in the past but momentarily lost some component of it along the way. In my case it seems to be that I require a high level of trust and need to be veeery comfortable around the person. I am also quite private about my sexuality, so a high level of comfort is required for me to even open up about it. Good thing I can post on AVEN under a pseudonym 

While demisexual feels like a good label, I am a little conflicted. Can I really call myself demi when I can, for example, look at pornstars that I find good-looking and masturbate? Do y'all think there's a contradiction? Can it be that I am basically aegosexual when I don't have a comfortable-enough bond with someone? Or am I just an allo with some "problems" concerning my comfort level with sex and sexuality? I guess I personally wouldn't think so, as there has been nothing in my upbringing or life history that would make my relationship with sexuality "problematic". It's just in my nature to be private about and a bit averse towards sex-related things. Not feeling sexual is also not in any way distressing for me; when I am that way, I just feel like myself. 

Yeah sorry about all that rambling, and thanks for reading all of it. Feel free to offer any kind of input you like. I won't feel bad if you have a different theory about what a suitable label for me would be.

[Monke Jimmy]

Hello, Scatterbrain!

 

Since you feel like you are asexual to a degree, I agree with the label of demisexual. I think that enjoying porn and masturbating is not relevant to sexuality, because you don't actually want to have sex with another person, it's just stimulating. Aegosexual seems like it could be a good label for you too, but I think it might not be as relevant. Libido and masturbation is a separate topic; more biological than psychological. 

 

At least, that's what I think. 

[a-bee]

Your post made me totally understand demisexuality better. I've always kind of thought that once you made that connection and found the person attractive that it was like that for good. I didn't really think of it as a fluctuating thing depending on how comfortable/connected you feel, but that makes soooo much sense. 

[meinherzbrennt]

(Possible TMI)

 

Speaking from personal experience, I think it's totally possible to be demisexual and enjoy looking at porn. For me, sexual attraction means wanting to have sex with a specific person, and while I've certainly been aroused by erotic images and masturbated to them, I don't desire to have contact with a person's genitals (or for them to have contact with my genitals) just because I enjoy looking at their boobs or butt. At most, I might fantasize about touching their boobs or butt, but it never goes further than that.

[Scatterbrain]

18 hours ago, Monke Ilahi said:

Hello, Scatterbrain!

 

Since you feel like you are asexual to a degree, I agree with the label of demisexual. I think that enjoying porn and masturbating is not relevant to sexuality, because you don't actually want to have sex with another person, it's just stimulating. Aegosexual seems like it could be a good label for you too, but I think it might not be as relevant. Libido and masturbation is a separate topic; more biological than psychological. 

 

At least, that's what I think. 

Thanks for your reply! That is very much along the lines of what I think as well, but it can feel very difficult to make distinctions between things like "having a libido and responding to sexual stimuli" and "sexual attraction". For most people these things all seem to go hand-in-hand, and in everyday discourse the phenomena get all jumbled up. 

 

14 hours ago, erinxblan said:

Your post made me totally understand demisexuality better. I've always kind of thought that once you made that connection and found the person attractive that it was like that for good. I didn't really think of it as a fluctuating thing depending on how comfortable/connected you feel, but that makes soooo much sense. 

I have also not encountered demisexuals talking about this kind of fluctuation, but I'm glad it makes sense to you! I would love to hear from other demis what that "special connection" means to them personally and whether they have experienced it fluctuating.

 

6 hours ago, meinherzbrennt said:

(Possible TMI)

 

Speaking from personal experience, I think it's totally possible to be demisexual and enjoy looking at porn. For me, sexual attraction means wanting to have sex with a specific person, and while I've certainly been aroused by erotic images and masturbated to them, I don't desire to have contact with a person's genitals (or for them to have contact with my genitals) just because I enjoy looking at their boobs or butt. At most, I might fantasize about touching their boobs or butt, but it never goes further than that.

Yes, thank you, I largely relate to this!

[LadyL]

Yes, this is how I experience my demisexuality- if the connection isn’t strong, I lose interest sexually even if I love them and still romantically want to be with them. I’ve noticed that once the connection is strengthened, I feel more sexual desire for them again.

[Guest17]

On 8/25/2022 at 8:27 PM, Scatterbrain said:

Hey y'all! 

I'm someone that's very much in the process of figuring out my sexuality, and I thought I'd make a quick post on here to get some input. 

I've felt a little out of place with my sexuality for pretty much all my life, and in the past few years I've been having more and more thoughts that I might be somewhere on the acespec. This is partly because I had a long period of time where I had no interest in sexual activity with my partner, whom I love very much and have been together with for very many years (actually, all my adult life). I know that people go through "dry spells", but it felt like more than that. While I still had a libido and masturbated, I felt absolutely zero desire for partnered sex with my partner or anyone else, no matter how aesthetically pleasing or nice they were. I connected this feeling to other, general experiences of "not feeling as sexual as other people" that I'd had all my life, and started thinking I was somewhere on the acespec. At times aegosexual felt like a fitting microlabel, as I did masturbate to porn and things like that. 

However, when I got my thoughts more organized and mustered up the courage to talk about these feelings with my partner, something unexpected started happening. As we had good conversations and my partner started to seem to understand me, my sexual attraction gradually started coming back. It's like I started seeing my partner in a whole new kind of way and started desiring to do things again. 

This has led me to think that demisexual might be the right identity label for me. Clearly, I require a certain kind of connection to a person to want to do sexual things with them. I'd obviously had that connection to my partner in the past but momentarily lost some component of it along the way. In my case it seems to be that I require a high level of trust and need to be veeery comfortable around the person. I am also quite private about my sexuality, so a high level of comfort is required for me to even open up about it. Good thing I can post on AVEN under a pseudonym 

While demisexual feels like a good label, I am a little conflicted. Can I really call myself demi when I can, for example, look at pornstars that I find good-looking and masturbate? Do y'all think there's a contradiction? Can it be that I am basically aegosexual when I don't have a comfortable-enough bond with someone? Or am I just an allo with some "problems" concerning my comfort level with sex and sexuality? I guess I personally wouldn't think so, as there has been nothing in my upbringing or life history that would make my relationship with sexuality "problematic". It's just in my nature to be private about and a bit averse towards sex-related things. Not feeling sexual is also not in any way distressing for me; when I am that way, I just feel like myself. 

Yeah sorry about all that rambling, and thanks for reading all of it. Feel free to offer any kind of input you like. I won't feel bad if you have a different theory about what a suitable label for me would be.

I feel exactly like this and it felt so hard to explain. I have also been with my husband all my adult life and before him sex was a big no, I was never a teenage girl that really was into boys and sex, I did have a bit of trauma around sex and had a friend that pressured me into giving him sexual pleasure, it always felt uncomfortable and as long as I wasn’t forced to have sex it was tolerable. I loved romance and the idea of having a loving relationship, I was very much stuck in my head with fantasies.

When I met my husband we really connected and I felt comfortable enough to want to have sex with him. However, there have been times in our relationship when he has really hurt me, for a long time I was not able to enjoy sex with him. 
 

I was most of the time ok with having sex just for him, I craved the romantic side of things and got that from it. It took 4 years into our relationship and a lot of work for me to start enjoying sex with him. Then it was really up and down over the years, I felt a big disconnect for a long time, but I loved him and we had a great family life and got on good as friends. 
 

I eventually wanted more, I wanted things to be better between us, so after discovering some difficult  things from his past and my own healing journey, we are putting in a lot of work and he is being the person that I need in our relationship. However, things from his past have really hurt and my sexual connection isn’t great. It’s hard to get over what feels like a life time of hurt and hurtful sexual experiences. I think being Demisexual for me plays a big part in this.