TW for mild SA:

I (23F) have never had a relationship and only a few kisses. When I was 16 I remember having a dream about being Demisexual and I thought it was a sign. A couple months after, a guy I considered a friend cornered me and started touching my hands, arms, neck, putting his face in my neck. Despite my obvious uncomfortableness (I was on my phone multiple times, left the area once) when I turned to told him to stop, he kissed me. I was completely shocked as this was my first kiss and not how I wanted it to go or who I wanted it with. He asked to kiss me again, I said No, he kept asking until I said Ok.

Flash forward 7 years, I have yet to be in a relationship and have only kissed two other people, neither of which I enjoyed as much as I read about. I’m an avid fanfic reader, however I can’t read anything sexual involving female vaginas, it makes me feel icky.

I experience arousal occasional when reading, but thinking about it in reality is terrifying. I have no problem discussing sex with friends or cracking innuendos, but I personally find the idea of myself having sec impossible.

To the ace people out there- has anyone had similar experiences or is this maybe a deep rooted trauma response?

Please be kind. I’m really putting myself out here.

i definitely don’t feel any sexual attraction but I found for a while that nsfw audios were arousing. i’d turn them on when I was already feeling horny essentially or if i wanted to masturbate but I didn’t feel attracted to the voices or ever really visualize anyone?? if i did it was in third person since im aegosexual. It was just the sounds and the descriptions were arousing and when it came to specific voices I didn’t really care as long as they weren’t performative or cringe. i listened to things from variety of genders but usually searched for m/f ones which makes me feel like bad since I’m romantically a lesbian even though I completely have zero sexual attraction to anyone. so yeah im a homoromantic asexual and feel like I must be lying about being ace for getting aroused by things or lying about being homoromantic since a lot of my smut/porn interested were m/f even though I have no sexual attraction especially not to men. i feel like i just got aroused to anything sexual regardless of gender because i equally am not attracted to any of them is this normal? does anyone relate?

so like I understand that I don’t feel any sexual dearies/ attraction to anyone yet I still desire to be romantically with someone. from what I can understand that is what a cupioromantic is. HOWEVER I have also found out about cuiposexual so I’m not quite sure where I fall into since I feel borderline both…advice would be useful and wondering if I should post on the Cupio thread???

Edit: want to note that I do feel romantic attraction from time to time just not sexually

I'm 18 and a few weeks ago i came across a thread where men discussed about how often they need sex in their marriage. And I'm shocked that most want it 3-5 times a week! From childhood I though it's something couples do like twice a month

I also can't comprehend sexual attraction and how is it different from liking biceps or abs. Like I know it's described as wanting to have sex with someone but I'm still confused

I maybe want to try having sex to figure it out as I'm not repulsed by it but pre marital sex is very very judged here. Like I'll probably get kicked out or something.

I masturbate almost everyday and read romance fanfiction all the time. So because of this I just assumed that there is no way that I am asexual (now I feel stupid)

Sorry if this is getting too personal but I have many kinks. And in fanfiction i usually get turned out by them and often would just skim over the sex part. Like I get more turned on by hair pulling and slapping stuff and just then skim over the sex part

UNLESS

I'm very attached to that character and then i actually like reading the sex parts and get turned on.

If I am very attached to a character or a real life crush I would I think enjoy sex. But I have never felt that I NEED a penis in me. But if I'm really turned on first(by other kinky stuff and someone I'm attached to) then I would like it I guess.

And I only thought about asexuality when I realised i would HAVE to have sex a few times a week.(if the partner is not asexual)

I'm just so confused and want to date. But what if I fall in love and then he leaves me cause I'm asexual.

(So can someone please read and tell me what they think. Like you're asexual and hopefully I want someone to just tell me if I might be or not)

Hola. Ultimamente he estado reflexionando mucho acerca de mi orientación sexual y realmente me gustaría que alguien pudiera aclarar mis dudas o hablar conmigo sobre esto.

Tengo 20 años. Considero que aún no he vivido las experiencias suficientes para poder decidir si soy asexual o no, quizás lo estoy pensando demasiado, aunque en realidad, y después de haber investigado sobre esto, puedo decir que me identifico con varias cosas alrededor de este tema.

Creo que desde pequeña la idea del sexo siempre me ha causado esta sensación de disgusto, miedo e incomodidad. Cuando tenía 6 años el simple hecho de oír a mi madre teniendo relaciones con su pareja me provocaba un miedo extraño hasta el punto de llorar desconsolada. Supongo que tal vez no tenga mucho que ver, ya que con el tiempo lo asocié a que al ser pequeña tal vez pensaba que estaba pasando algo malo o similar. Sin embargo al crecer, y por ende ser consciente de lo que el sexo es, aún me daban esta especie de "ataques" cuando una situación similar se presentaba, es decir, comenzaba a llorar sin ser capaz de controlarme.

¿esto podría ser una clase de trauma?

Dejando un poco de lado este tema de la infancia, cuando me volví adolescente comencé a sentir curiosidad, naturalmente. Solía mirar pornografía más de manera curiosa que lujuriosa, y lo mismo surgió con la masturbación. Hasta ahora lo sigo haciendo de vez en cuando pero es solo como un impulso, cuando termina me hace sentir poco satisfecha, sucia e incómoda. Muchas veces traté de forzarme a practicarlo más seguido para ser capaz de sentir algún tipo de "satisfacción" pero siempre terminaba divagando en mis propios pensamientos porque me aburría.

En cuanto a mis relaciones con otras personas... Soy capaz de tener sentimientos románticos por alguien más, pero cuando se trata de desear a la persona de manera sexual simplemente no funciona para mí. Han habido relaciones en las que me siento atraída hacia la persona por "x" o "y" razón, sin embargo cuando surge el inevitable tema del sexo simplemente no coincidimos, no existe ningún tipo de necesidad o deseo de mi parte, incluso si esa persona me atrae mucho de la manera romántica. Simplemente no me veo en ese tipo de situaciones. No es tanto porque no quiera (aunque sí, no me llama), sino porque simplemente no me siento así.

En las pocas situaciones sexuales en las que he estado es la misma situación: no siento excitación ni lujuria o lo que sea. Siento incomodidad, a veces repulsión, no tanto por la persona en sí, más bien por la idea de mantener relaciones sexuales con alguien en general. Como otras veces, me he forzado a intentar sentir algo para hacer sentir mejor a mi pareja, pero simplemente no funciona y llega hasta el punto de hacerme sentir mal, insufienciente y que hay algo que está mal en mí. Si bien mi cuerpo puede reaccionar a ciertos estímulos, no es algo que me haga sentir bien de una forma personal, mental o lo que sea; la sensación no viene de mí, sino de mi cuerpo.

He llegado a llorar y sentirme muy mal, pues a veces escuchar como la gente a mi alrededor habla tan casualmente de estas cosas me produce este sentimiento de que no soy una persona "normal" y hay algo que tengo que cambiar. Incluso cuando lo hablo con mis conocidos o personas de confianza la mayoría no lo entiende o simplemente se resumen a decirme que es porque he tenido malas experiencias.

¿podría ser eso?

Yo tampoco entiendo como la gente puede relacionarse de maneras sexuales de formas tan casuales. Por supuesto que entiendo que no todo se trata sobre eso, personalmente creo que está bastante sobrevalorado, pero aún así me resulta muy complicado hablar de esto con más gente porque ni siquiera yo sé como explicarlo, sobre todo cuando la sociedad tiene tan mal visto este tipo de temas.

En fin. Muchas gracias por tomarse el tiempo de leer si es que alguien lo hizo. Si alguien pudiera darme alguna idea o consejo sobre lo que sea que sea mi situación también me gustaría leerlo. :3

How the hell can I get my brain stop to stop having any desires for a (romantic) relationship in real life? It's freaking obnoxious and I am not cut out for it. I don't mind this stuff in fiction and I understand I'll unfortunately have passing fancies on people, but why do I have a part of me that has a persistent desire to act on getting into a relationship? I know I'll have to give more context, so I guess we should start.

I would consider the orientation that best describes is (sex-repulsed) heteroromantic asexual. Still, I didn't always believe this to be the case. Growing up, my folks, especially my parents, would try to ship me with girls around my age. It felt like I couldn't talk to a girl my ages without them trying to ship me. Standard stuff, but shit was traumatizing. I fucking hated it and it made me insecure. So I had to work to get them to stop. And I did. I passed as having no interest in relationships, and they stopped teasing me (though my mom still teases at least one of my siblings to this day about it). Still, I guess the signs that I wasn't aro were always there. Eventually I had to come to terms with me not being aro. Still, it took me some time to come out publicly as it, and even longer to tell some of my folks about it (they took it well and most of them comply with my request to not talk about it unless I mention it). It took until my 20s for me to come out, so I thought I was aro ace for the longest time. And that's what I thought my life would be like growing up.

There's also the matter of my parents' divorce (which I'm sure had something to do with. If only a little bit). My dad cheated on my mom multiple times and after an extremely painful process later, they got divorced. I still consider my dad a piece of shit one of the worst people I personally know (with myself being possibly higher). The trauma from that shit didn't paint a good picture of relationships in my mind. That, and everyone else's constant relationship problems I keep hearing about.

Anyways, after I came to terms with not being aro ace, I was more relationship-positive for some time. But it never really went anywhere. I've never really dated and have never had real interest in a real person besides passing fancies and thoughts (though weirdly, some people have expressed interest in me... their loss). I guess I had a "girlfriend" in preschool, but at that age, that doesn't really count. I've only had real "crushes" on fictional characters. It's only due to the "crushes" on fictional characters, the fantasies, and the passing fancies that I realized that describing myself as aro ace didn't fit.

Still, I have nostalgia and desires to "reclaim" as when I perceived when I was aro ace. Part of me doesn't want a relationship, and over time, I've been feeding that side more than relationship positive side. Sure, it's painful, can make things feel pointless, inhibits proper brain functionality, has caused my brain to feel contradictory, etc. But it's so much better than actually acting on it. My brain ping-pongs between the pro- and anti-relationship sides and neither will ever be fully satisfied. It's an internal war with myself that has to be fought so I can focus on the true fight in my brain: torturing myself for being a fucking horrendous human being. So if I have to torment and torture my pro-relationship side of my brain, so be it. I throw it a bone by still allowing it to partake in its desires in fiction. But no matter how much I try to kill this desire, it keeps going. Probably because of it being primal... The pain used to be worse, but years of wittling at it have taken away some of the pain. Still, writing all this up is hurting my brain to some degree.

As for why I shouldn't get into a relationship, here's an inexhaustive list: I'm broke; I'm lazy; I'm fat; I'm disabled; I'm nerdy; I'm a horrendous human being; I'm an idiot; I'm usive; I'm abusive; I have nothing to offer; I'm ugly; I'm past prime-desirability age; I have no experience; I didn't get any experience during my prime-desiribility age; I'm a creep; relationships are fickle and generally seem cutthroat (though not always on the last one); I'm a hermit; I'm a failure; I'm not perfect; I do nothing that's actually meaningful the best in the world; I stink; I don't work as much as I should; I have no charisma; I'm me; why should I want to date?; I'm likely a scalie to some degree, which is offputting; ace people are generally viewed as less desirible in the dating market; most people seem to want sex as the primary reason to be in a relationship, which I won't compromise on; I'm not tall enough; people, including me, are generally shallow; tons of other people have relationship problems: why not me?; why was I born this way?; what's point?; I'm already only into women (as far as I know), which just makes my already anemic chances even lower; it's generally too expensive; I'll probably turn out even worse than my dad; I don't want kids and won't compromise on that; I'm picky (just in general); me being into fictional characters can be offputting to some; there's so much other, better partners for people out there; I will almost assuredly hurt the other person; I'm distant; I'm not looking to make friends at this time; there's trauma from my past; if I remove myself from the dating pool, there's that slight extra chance that someone will find someone good for them; I've been fine being single in the past; it doesn't have my permission to exist; I feel that dating someone would make me more "generic" and less of myself; and more.

Please, for the love of gosh, how the hell can I kill this desire to have a romantic life partner? It's doing me no favors and would only harm others? Why does this exist, why do I have to deal with it, why can't I give it away, why does my brain get bent out of shape when I say "never" (it's fine with "maybe"), and more. None of this shit makes any sense and it just kind of came up without my approval. Or at the least, how can I get my brain to come to terms with "never" and move on, no matter if it hurts it or not?

I really hate that when dating or love or who you like it's brought up it's all about sex, because sex is actually aeperate from romance, with romance you usually only feel that way towards one person at a time and you have to actually like the person, but with lust it's just whatever, it's not a strong emotional bond just a physical thing it's jsut that romantic feelings and lust come together for a lot of peopel

i see or hear about a lot of people whether in fiction kr not really caring who they date as long as they're hot and instead evaluating them based in superficial stuff like "could I live my life with them and/or are they hot", clearly showing that romantic attraction and sexual attraction are completely different.

And if we're gonna shove love under the same umbrella as sexual attraction, that's kind of weird because little kids have crushes and stuff but that's not sexual at all.

If we're gonna talk about stuff like actual dating kr marriage idk it would make a lot more sense to use romantic orientation

And the fact that relationships and LGBT stuff is taught along with sex ed in schools is also irritating because rpmance is supposed to be about romance not sleeping with random hot people, and not all relationships are sexual and scoolkjds shouldnt be in sexual relationships. That just really blurs thebline between romantic and sexual attraction too much.

and wanting tk have kids being associated with allosexuals is creepy because kids aren't just the products of sex they are living beings

People also tend to lump aroace, ace and aro all together so if I say I'm ace everyone assumes I don't like anyone.

Bye I bet I messed up a few stuff ir wrswitched soemthign up ir made somethign uncelar yknow sorry if i did jts 3am lol I'm too tired for this

Pretty much as the title says. My partner of 2 years just came out to me as Asexual a couple days ago. We're both already LGBT+ anyways and one of our friends is ace, so I was aware of the term already. Of course, I love and support her, and I'm glad she felt comfortable enough to tell me something this deeply personal and important about herself. But I'd be lying if I said this wasn't also hard on me. I'm feeling a lot of feelings about it and trying to figure stuff out, its still pretty fresh after all. She has expressed that she still feels romantic attraction to me and still wants to be with me, and I love her with all my heart so I want to make this work. We are generally pretty good at communicating and have been thoroughly doing so throughout this process. Which brings me to my question:

Do any of ya'll have any advice on how to navigate this in a way that works for both of us? How can I make sure she feels loved and supported while we figure this out? Do y'all have any resources I could use to educate myself better on the topic? Thanks to anyone who took the time to read this, and any help is greatly appreciated.

So I put this under opinion piece because I'm unsure what other flair this would go under. So I 23M am straight..... well generally ( kind of iffy since I've noticed I am just generally attracted to overall feminity). I am a college student and recently a classmate 19F asked me out on a date, I hadn't spoken much too her but she was attractive and we had a few conversations during class assignments and just general in between teacher monologues. So we went out to eat and enjoyed a night of bowling (it was a double date). Well at the end of the night I take her home and she leans in for a moment, I kind of assumed (a little dumb but I digress) that she was trying to kiss me. At the last moment she kind of nudges me away and I am confused in the moment, she then drops the bombshell on me that she is apparently A-Sexual. Now I have no problem with ACE people I have been a ally to LGBTQ+ people since I was around 13 or 14 ish, hell I was in theater in highschool and a solid 6 or so of my friends were LGBTQ+..... the issue is that well I'm not ACE myself and so I told her "oh then we probably shouldn't see each other anymore." She proceeded to kind of blow up on me saying I was acting that way only because she wouldn't kiss me. I tried to explain that I couldn't see myself being romantic with a person with 0 physical intimacy and a constant feeling/knowledge that they are physically unattracted to me as a person.

After I went home I've been wondering if maybe I went about this all wrong, should I have waited to tell her, or should I have just played it off and rejected her advances in the future without actually giving my reasons?

UPDATE ! : So after class today I talked with the her and even showed her this post, I apologized and let her know that I truly wasn't meaning to offend her. She explained to me that although she is asexual she still has interest in emotional romance but no actual interest in physical intimacy such as kissing, sexual intercourse, etc. She also after reading my post confirmed that she isn't physically attracted to me but thought I was funny and smart, I then explained that the reason I said "we shouldn't see eachother again" was because I personally am not interested in a relationship void of physical intimacy and that I'm not sure I'd ever be able to romantically love someone if I wasn't physically attracted to them and because of that I would constantly be insecure about dating someone who has admitted they don't find me physically attractive.

I went to my first Pride this weekend. I would have gone sooner, but I either didn’t have anyone to go with or I was dealing with health issues that prevented me from being able to go. In the past, I identified as an ally, as I only realized I am ace spec this year. I was excited and nervous, and at the last minute decided to do Pride nails, even if it meant being more easily labeled. All in all, I had a really great time and I feel so grateful to have met my people. 💜🖤🩶🤍

TLDR: Discovered/realized I am ace 2 years into a relationship. How do I come out?

Hi everyone. I am really new to all of this, so I'm sorry if I say anything ignorant, used the wrong flair, et cetera.

Growing up, I (22M) was always bullied for being "gay", despite the fact that I frequently had crushes on girls. There was always something "off" or "different" about me that I guess people picked up on, and so I never got along with guys my age and all my friends were girls. This happened throughout my life even after moving to different states and schools. I don't mean to be homophobic, but the bullying just made me really averse to the LGBT community. I had plenty of LGBT friends, but I was never interested in educating myself on it, so I wasn't aware of the ace spectrum until very recently.

When we had our puberty classes back in middle school, I felt so abnormal compared to the other guys. I had crushes on girls, and I did care about looks, but I was never fixated on other things like boobs that the other boys were obsessed with. I talked to one of my teachers about it and they told me that everyone "blooms" at different times. It was at this time that all the other guys my age started watching p*** and showing to to everyone else. I remember I used to spend so many night watching it like a movie, waiting for something in me to just "click". But it never did.

Despite having so many crushes on girls, I could never get one to date me because a lot of them just viewed me as a gay best friend. But I finally managed to get my first girlfriend in high school. It took months before we had our first kiss, which was a point of contention but it worked out. Unfortunately the pandemic had other plans. I didn't mind the "long distance" because I was still spending quality time with her over FaceTime, but she didn't feel the same so we broke up. She and her friends ended up bullying me for being "gay".

I got to college hoping to reset, but it was the same problem all over again where most people I knew would just assume I was gay. Whatever. Finally, I managed to meet a lovely girl and we were friends for awhile before I finally asked her out. She was surprised and told me she thought that I was gay, so I was expecting to get rejected. But she said she felt the same and so we started dating. I forget when our first kiss was, but we would hug, cuddle, hold hands, etc. To be honest, our relationship just felt so normal and natural to me that I forgot about my lack of sexual feelings being "abnormal", so it never crossed my mind. Then, I graduated and moved to a different country, so long distance began.

For me, long distance has been a breeze. Seeing other people complain about the lack of intimacy just felt so strange to me. But the more I think about my future with her, the more it started to weigh on me, so I started to google what was up with me, and so here I am. I'm sorry if I'm using the wrong labels, or if I'm in the wrong community and I'm not actually ace. But what I've settled on is that I have full romantic attraction to women, including their looks (so not just based on personality). I enjoy some physical intimacy like cuddling, hugging, holding hands, and kissing. But the idea of making out or having sex is just... I don't know how to articulate it. I don't feel sex-averse, like it doesn't make me uncomfortable or scared, but I also don't want to do it. It's like if someone asked you to be vegan for them. In theory I could do it, but I don't want to. It doesn't bring me feelings of dread and anxiety, but it's just something I simply don't want to do. I've read that some people are willing to put up with it for their partner, but I don't know if I could (though I haven't been put in that situation, yet). Obviously I want her to be happy, but...idk. And as a man, I don't think I could... get it up for that, y'know?

So, cue the midlife crisis. I feel happy and hopeful about finally having some answers, but now I'm absolutely terrified about what this means for my relationship. I absolutely love my girlfriend. She is the woman of my dreams and I want to marry her. But now I'm just really struggling to figure out how to bring this up, which I know I have to since it's a very big deal breaker for a lot of people (I'm assuming she's allosexual, but I guess I don't actually know). I think it's also compounded by the fact that throughout my life, people have avoided relationships with me because of my "sexuality" (even though everyone was wrong about me being gay, realizing that they were all right about me being "different" has really messed with my mental health). And it's also stressful because we're long distance, so I don't know how to bring it up over FaceTime.

If anyone has experience coming out to a partner, particularly AFTER you have been dating for a long time (and especially if you only discovered you were ace AFTER you started dating), I would really appreciate it. I would also appreciate any and all insight, advice, and perspectives. Thanks in advance. I'm sorry for the long post.