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Another Story from a Lesbian Sexual Partner


coralie

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Hi Everyone,

I've been reading these forums for a while, but this is my first time posting. Everything I've read here helped me so much - seeing the different perspectives of people who know exactly what I and my (ex) girlfriend went through - that it really helped in surviving the past months of my life. I hope that my story will help someone out there. I also hope that people will continue to post their stories here.

So I'm a sexual lesbian woman, and the love of my life is asexual. The original post by QueerTO in the "Sexless Lesbian Relationship" thread is more or less what I could've written last year. Only we had been together eight and a half years, had two small children and did continue to have a sex life until our break up in September. It was then that she said she didn't want to keep trying any longer. She said sex was not among her needs, it felt exhausting to her, and the reason was that she was asexual. That was the first time in my life I heard that word, and I'm 33 years old. I can't explain how I never heard about this orientation before.

She didn't know this orientation existed, either, until she read about it somewhere online. In the beginning of our relationship, she didn't appear to be asexual at all. It was always clear that we had different needs, but the difference seemed small at first, and that's probably true for most relationships. For what seemed a long time - three years - once a week was ideal to both of us. And it would always be for me, but when were together three years, she started rejecting me sometimes, so we were down to once a month, two months, and so on. Then the usual happened: I thought she fell out of love with me, she said that was not the case, we worked together to solve our problems, but anything we tried worked only for a while, then the problems came back.

When she finally said she was asexual last September, we both had the same thought: It was the end for us. We didn't want to end it, but we knew we had to. The tension between us was so bad it started to hurt our children. It was a violent break up and not because we were mad at each other, but because we were mad at fate or whatever for doing this to us. We accused each other for not trying harder, while knowing it was the fault of neither of us, and we screamed in front of the children and broke a lot of glass. It was really bad. She moved out with our son, and for months I had self-destructive thoughts. I'm the biological mom of our daughter, so she stayed with me, and she is truly the only reason I'm still here today. I had to stand up and go on even when I wanted to die, because she needs me more than anyone in the world.

Jump to the present... AND here I am now, eight months after she moved out, now completely confident that I could live with her happily and not have sex ever again. It turns out that these past months away from her were exactly what I needed to arrive in this place. Many things happened during these months, most of them not in my world, but in my head, and I no longer feel like I'm the victim of some huge tragedy, which is what I felt after the break up. Being away from her this long made me miss her whole being and not sex. I realized that when I let her move out, I basically told her (though not with words) that "sex is more important to me than you, so you should go." Not true. I had plenty of time to think while being alone at night and I realized that what I went through was not a tragedy. I have both my arms, legs, eyes. People who lose these are victims of a tragedy, not me, and even they often learn to accept things they way they are. I've accepted that this was my life, this happened to me, and either I'm happy with it or be miserable all my life. So I chose to be happy about the fact that I found my soul mate, we love each other, we share a wonderful past, and I hope we have a future, too. I don't want anyone else but her, because nobody could replace her. She is the other mother of my daughter and the mother of my son. I lost half of my family, and all I want is to have them back. It took a lot of crying and thinking to get me here, but now I see these things clearly. I also started seeing a therapist and started a new job soon after the break up, and these helped as well to be where I am today.

Our love is still strong, we are in touch nearly every day, and I know she wanted to live her whole life with me. I hope she still wants to, and I'm gathering courage to ask her out on a date. I now know what I didn't know all those years ago when I first met her, that she is asexual, and I love her and want her the way she is. I hope she will say yes.

So that's my story so far. Again I hope this will help someone. I'm also open to reading anyone's thoughts on all of this, and if someone is / was in a similar situation to mine now, I'm curious to hear what (you think) happens next. :)

Coralie (not my real name:)

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Well then.. that was certainly a read.

It's good that you're optimistic. Keep that way. However.

Sometimes.. well..

No matter how good a relationship was.. sometimes it's better to leave it alone and let it stay dead.

It took me a few years to figure that out. Like you, me and my ex-partner are still very close friends, and we love each other.. but there was a fundamental disconnect. Of course, on my side of things, sex wasn't the issue.. it was affection in general.

But.. yeah.

Just think about whether or not you can really feel fulfilled by changing your relationship with your ex again.. without testing the waters elsewhere.

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Hi Coralie,

I have also found AVEN very helpful and I don't think asexuality is well known or understood.

I am also in a relationship with long term female partner and we have 2 children. I told some of my story in the thread you mentioned.

When I read your story I worry about the abuse you both went through. Has this been a previous pattern between you? Have you both come to a place where you can talk kindly and respectfully with each other now? I bet you are missing your family and your shared history. Maybe this is an opportunity to come together again in a new way with new understanding. ...I am not you, but I question whether your current idea about being happy living without a sexual connection forever is really true.

You are from Hungry - I have not been there but back in 2001 Sydney hosted the Olympic Gay Games and we hosted a lovely couple of ballroom dancers from your country.

I am happy for you to PM if you prefer.

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zoidberger

I guess my thought here is where is the compromise...? That's a huge thing in all relationships no matter the topic. The question is never "sex or me", it should be about finding a middle point where both people are happy. There are a lot of threads where mixed couples have worked out some form of compromise and a lot of relationships that have failed.

I know it's hard to hand out advice when I'm not in the situation itself, but make sure that you can be happy with all parts of you and that all parts of you are still present within a relationship.

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Hi and thanks for the responses!

It is interesting that all of you are expressing the same concern what my therapist has, that I may not be able to live happily with her even if I am now sure... that I should not give up a part of me. I have thought about this, and I know that if I have to live without her I will always be missing her. So either way I would always miss something. I think I have to make a sacrifice here, and I would not only make that sacrifice for my family. I would also feel better if I belonged to her again. So in that sense I would not be giving up anything but getting the most valuable part of my life back. Hmmmm. :)

Rain Girl, yes, I'm from Hungary. Nice to "meet" someone who knows this country. :) To answer your question, it was not like us to yell at each other at all. We never did that before the break up. We just took out on each other the stress that was caused by the situation, which was clearly a mistake, but we have both apologized since then.

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Coralie,

I understand your decision because it's what I have also chosen; to be with my girlfriend despite her asexuality. We have never separated. But at some stage of realisig that things wouldn't change I felt I had to make a decision. I needed to do this to have some agency, and not just feel stuck, or like I inherited a tragedy. I relate to your comments about that.

But my caution or concern about negating your sexual desire is about my experience only. I hear that you feel different. I share this as I hope it might be helpful or worth considering. It took us a long time to work out that things wouldn't change and to find some explanation. And during those years I used to not want to think about choosing between sex and her. I now don't think like that, it's not that black and white. I don't feel that sex is some luxury or extra that I can live without forever. I thought I could, but my heart has not been able to let it go, nor has my body and the need for physical intimacy. I have become less sexual, and our relationship has changed to more of a romantic friendship/partnership, but my grief just didn't go away.

I also love and adore her, so we are thinking about new ways to be in partnership. She has been tremedously encouraging and supportive of this. We're modern girls, we don't have to be tied to some historical view of marraige and ownership, or that one person is everything. She can't be, even if she wants to and that's ok. But it's also ok for me to have a sexual connection. It's not easy but we are trying to find a way to accept each other and our needs.

My experience is just mine, and I felt so alone with it for so long and so sad about it. I hope you know that you are not alone with it. If I sound protective of you, it's because I have come to consider me a little more in this process and i am probably just projecting my experience.

I hear that you are about to ask your girlfriend to try again and be together as a family. I hear how much you love her and miss her and your son. I hope that goes well, let us know.

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I know that if I have to live without her I will always be missing her. So either way I would always miss something.

No you won't. I know that deep down, you know this. Love is lost ALL THE TIME. We all move on, we fall in love again, and that new love becomes the best love we've ever had. It happens to pretty much every single person on earth. You are no exception, I have no doubt.

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sexualwithasexual

I know that if I have to live without her I will always be missing her. So either way I would always miss something.

No you won't. I know that deep down, you know this. Love is lost ALL THE TIME. We all move on, we fall in love again, and that new love becomes the best love we've ever had. It happens to pretty much every single person on earth. You are no exception, I have no doubt.

I'm less sure about this than Skulls. What she's saying is probably true for many, but not all.

My mom for instance. She's been married many times, and loved many, but only one true love ever claimed her heart. He has passed away and deep down she feels she'll never really fall in love like that again. Nor will she ever stop "missing" him. Maybe some can clear their minds and hearts of past loves, but for others, that hole never quite closes, and there's something to that.

We're all different. Some fall passionately in love over and over and over. Some never love deeply. Maybe some don't need to. Maybe some of us find a soul mate who helps us heal deep wounds. I dunno. I relate to the OP. I am still with my partner because I feel old enough to really appreciate that what we have as rare and special and the bond seems like a fated one - one to respect and not give up on lightly. I am picky, picky. I mean, I love easily, but I don't entrust my heart easily to just anyone.

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It's true that you may look back and be able to select a favorite lover amongst your lovers, but if you can't move past a failed relationship, that's not just a difference in personality, that's a really good reason to see a therapist and get some help. I'm always going to miss my ex, and I'll probably never love someone like I loved her, but that doesn't stop me from moving on with my life. Someone who is stuck because of an interpersonal loss, whether it be a divorce, a death, or a falling out, needs to seek a mental health professional. The inability to stop grieving is not healthy and it is not a matter of "different strokes for different folks".

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sexualwithasexual

It's true that you may look back and be able to select a favorite lover amongst your lovers, but if you can't move past a failed relationship, that's not just a difference in personality, that's a really good reason to see a therapist and get some help. I'm always going to miss my ex, and I'll probably never love someone like I loved her, but that doesn't stop me from moving on with my life. Someone who is stuck because of an interpersonal loss, whether it be a divorce, a death, or a falling out, needs to seek a mental health professional. The inability to stop grieving is not healthy and it is not a matter of "different strokes for different folks".

All good points. But even with my mom and her one true love, they had broken up many times before they got back together and stayed together for the next 20 years. Maybe the Coralie is just not moving beyond a loss and needs to seek counsel. (My mother and her last husband DEFINITELY needed that to get to where they could have a healthy relationship). Or maybe she's made a mistake about the most important relationship in her life. It happens.

What I'm unsure about is how mutual the feelings are in Coralie's case. If both parties aren't wanting to get back together, then yes, by all means, time to get a move on regardless of the pain.

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What I'm unsure about is how mutual the feelings are in Coralie's case. If both parties aren't wanting to get back together, then yes, by all means, time to get a move on regardless of the pain.

Ahh, I see.

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Well this is my opinion only, so take it with a large grain of salt (or several)... But personally I can relate to the feeling of wanting to make one more valiant effort to save your relationship. If you give it one last shot, and it doesn't work out, then at least you won't have that nagging question on your mind, for the rest of your life :/

In my case, a few months back my husband and I made an attempt at getting back together - which lasted, oh, about 6 hours - before we realized exactly why it didn't work before, and why it wouldn't work this time either. So that kind of sucked, but it did help me to accept reality, and move on.

(And of course there's the chance that you guys really might be able to work things out this time, and forge a stronger relationship than ever before... In which case giving it one more effort would definitely be worth it!)

You'd just need to set some ground rules, and both agree that there won't be any fighting that would be toxic for the kids. So if frustrations arise (which they probably will, unless you live in some kind of fairy-tale world!) you'll have to agree to deal with them in a better way. That was then, this is now; I'm a firm believer that people are capable of learning, and growing, and not doomed to repeat whatever mistakes they may have made in the past.

But in any case, I just wanted to say I feel a lot of the same things you're going through, having left my own marriage this past year. It's hard to move on, hard to accept that such a beautiful, loving relationship is truly over, and I too have struggled with feelings of wishing I could go back to my husband again, and somehow make it work.

Glad to hear you've come as far as you have, in the past few months... I'm wishing you the best, wherever your path may lead :)

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  • 2 weeks later...

Coralie, I love you for writing this. I'm a gray-asexual lesbian, and this is exactly what I needed to read today. I think what you're doing takes a lot of courage and strength. The parts you've written about breaking things and such seem concerning to me, I would probably encourage you two to try to take it slow and be careful to work back up to the strong relationship you had. This is a beautiful story, though, and I hope the best for you two!

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Hi Everyone,

Just read everyone's responses, thank you to all for posting your thoughts, and I'm especially happy that SSRIs found this story helpful. Thank you for your kind comments. :)

More than a month passed since my original post, some things have happened, we exchanged emails, talked on the phone for hours (talked a lot about the kids, too), I told her how I felt and she told me how she felt. Basically she still wanted to be with me but was afraid that one day I would flip out again, and I apologized for messing up where I could mess up and promised her I would never do anything again to make her feel there was anything wrong with her. That's how I could summarize all those hours of phone conversations. Then we had a date yesterday, which was a very good date. We take things extremely slowly, we probably won't live together for a long time - practical reasons, not for lack of wanting to live together - so basically, this is a new relationship, not continuing the old one, which is the way it should be I think.

I hope it's okay that I don't respond to each reaction, I'm not here to try to convince anyone of anything or to explain myself. This is just a story which I believe belongs on these forums.

Coralie

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I'm glad to hear things are going well with her now! Taking it slowly is a good idea, and I like that you are having a new relationship with her versus continuing an old one that was unsuccessful.

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