#17

#17

#15

This Pride Month, I thought I would share how going through my teens and early twenties was for me as an aromantic asexual. I was always an oddball - though that was mainly due to my autism - but I also felt like there was something fundamentally wrong with me when I looked around at my friends and classmates and their relationships. At first I thought it was fear of rejection, but I found that when people hit on me, my usual reaction was a panic attack, or on one memorable occasion, physically running away.

I thought maybe I was gay. This was put to rest after I had already come out - kissing a woman did not feel any different than kissing a man. Perhaps, I mused, the issue was how much I hated my body. My eating disorder became mixed in my head with how much I hated people telling me I was “a beautiful woman now”, a child no longer. The intertwining of these two feelings coalesced into a worry that perhaps I was trans. I ended up in therapy for gender dysphoria for several months, and even came out to several friends and family members. But I didn’t feel any better using he/him pronouns and I still didn’t feel anything really urging me to date or experiment.

I knew asexuality existed at this point, though I didn’t fully understand it. My best friend was asexual. But her experience of asexuality was different to what I experienced and there was so little information available to me. What was sexual attraction really? How did I know if the aesthetic interest I felt towards people I considered beautiful was sexual or not? I experienced a sex drive. I could appreciate someone’s beauty. Didn’t that mean I was allosexual? Eventually I read an account written of an asexual experience of the world which resonated with me. I could have vague romantic leanings and be asexual. I could care about someone but not want their tongue in my mouth. (Believe it or not I found that a strange thought in the heteronormative society I had been raised in.)

I told my therapist that I didn’t want to transition. I told my parents I didn’t want a relationship. While it took me a long time to settle into my identity and truly feel at home there, I finally felt like I had a space where I fit. For me, having a label made me feel less alone. Less strange. Less out of place. I’m so glad that as an adult, I can look at spaces like tumblr and other internet communities and see young people figuring out that no sexuality or gender is one size fits all, and being proud of who they are. Everyone’s experiences are different. None of it is binary. I grew up thinking you were either gay or you weren’t. I didn’t meet someone openly bisexual until I was seventeen. I was nineteen when I discovered my best friend was ace, when I was told that was even an option. I was twenty two when my (perceptive) little sister told me I seemed “a little aromantic”. I can honestly say I would have loved to understand my sexuality when I was a teenager. To know that being largely uninterested in relationships and sex was an option on the table. But the way I discovered who I was gave me a profound appreciation of how different we all are, and how much common ground we all share, regardless of how little some of us seem to have in common.

As such, for me, Pride is a vital time of kindness and understanding. And so, this Pride, I wanted to say that I love you. All of you. Regardless your age, gender, sexuality, ethnicity, political views, or country of origin. You are loved. ❤️

Sand Sculpture