Asexual Crushes

[kokiri85]

I'm curious about how other asexuals experience crushes? I recently met someone and had a much stronger emotional reaction to them than I am used to, and I'm feeling kind of adrift about how to understand the experience. I kind of want to talk to my best friend, but she's sexual and also, well. Not that interested in talking about asexy stuff

Comments

[semisweetsoul]

squishes (...) a very strong sense of wanting to be in a close friendship with someone you admire.

There's a name for it? I feel like everything as a word for it in the English language! Interesting.

It makes me think about fantasies without the sexual connotation. Am I correct?

[kokiri85]

I'm never quite sure whether or not to interpret myself as romantic or not. I don't feel romantic, but then this happened and I don't know anymore. Though--the wanting to be in a close friendship does sound about right

[nike_victory]

I'm an aromantic asexual and I've done the crush thing. Heck, I do the kink thing on occasion, just not at the same time. But my crushes are just pretty much what you describe. I really like being around someone but not really want anything more than to hang out, even when the sexuals around me are all "Why aren't you dating? It's obvious you like him!" I usually just reply that I'm already getting what I want out of the relationship, and that's true. Sorry yours seems to be coming to an end, though. *hugs*

[kokiri85]

You can have aromantic crushes, then? That's the thing that always kind of confused me. What exactly "romantic" means, and how to differentiate that from other strong feelings.

Yeah, I'm feeling pretty low about it ending. I probably should have tried to get his email or something, but I always worry that other people are going to misinterpret me as attracted to them, and I let it scare me out of pursuing platonic friendships. Bleh.

[nike_victory]

You can have aromantic crushes, then?

Well, I identify "romantic" as wanting something more than just a standard friendship. Like wanting to hug and cuddle and maybe kiss and hold hands. I've never wanted that, even with a crush. The only reason I describe what I have as a crush and not "really fascinated by someone and wanting them to be my friend" is because whenever I get one on a guy (aka, the opposite sex), people assume I like them romantically. They never assume the same when I get one on a girl, though. Then, we're just "really close friends" when it works out. Well, except for that one girl that wrote me a Dear John friendship email, which managed to be both weird and heartbreaking.

[kokiri85]

Oh, man, on other girls? I've been doing that since I was, like, six. I remember being heartsick over girls I wanted to be my friend. Though it wasn't quite the same as this; I'm not usually so aware of the other person's physical presence, just their attention.

I wonder about that alot, really. What is it I even want? I think that's part of what scares me away from trying to pursue anything, feeling so vague and uncertain. I'm kind of stuck in this unrequited thing with another girl right now who thinks of me as a friend but just doesn't seem to take that as seriously as I do, and it's not the first time. There's a pessimistic part of me feels like that's how all my relationships will inevitably turn out.

[pico_the_great]

It's possible, yes. It's also possible to have attraction to people you know, intellectually, you should not have attraction to, and that you know, intellectually, you don't have interest in, just attraction to. Having experienced both this and the above recently, I'd just like to toss those two cents in.

[kokiri85]

I felt a little ambivalent about the appropriateness of it, too, since he was kind of/sort of my boss. Sorry to hear you're going through the same thing :\

[pico_the_great]

Yeah, I can understand that. Ever since I became a teacher, I became about a thousand times more leery of the idea of having students crushing on me, because .... students. I don't know. They're not even that much younger than me - 4-6 years younger. I don't even know how to explain my adverseness to being crushed upon by my students. It just makes my brain go D:!

At the same time, I have no qualms about having had a thing for a guy at the school who's not my student, nor does it change that I'm just as fine about being into younger guys as I was previously. Weird? Yes. I don't understand either. Brains!

As to that last point, I very fervently hope my brain has ceased attraction to that particular individual (different than the above-mentioned) because that was just a total bag of "no", and it was incredibly wearying having my brain constantyl at me about something I knew wasn't going to happen. Blah. Brains!

[camies]

Completely. It's what the Quirkyalone lot call an RO (Romantic Obsession). The trouble is if they get mistaken for sexual attraction.
Me: wil you have a drink with me?
Her (who I have previously snogged drunkenly some weeks earlier): Mm, not sure (thinking I want to have sex with her. I don't, I am fascinated with her and would like to know her. But because she thinks I want to have sex with her and doesn't want to have it with me, This Cannot End Well).

[kokiri85]

Yes, that. How do you express interest without it being mistaken for the wrong kind of interest? My strategy is to just keeping everything to myself, but it is not a good strategy.