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Suddenly Repulsed?


Artemis's Aro

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I used to be neutral on the concept of romance, since it just felt boring and not really my thing. I mean, sure, I liked reading some romance stories but only if they were actually well-written. Thinking about romance for myself was ok but, as I said, boring.

Lately I've found most depictions of romance and any indication of it for myself repulsive. I physically shudder and my muscles tense and it's altogether very uncomfortable. I was just listening to the song "Dusk Til Dawn" because the chorus is super cool and I like the atmosphere it creates, and also I wasn't really paying attention to the rest of the lyrics. Immediately after, some other song by the same artist started playing and it mentioned something like "I love this girl I wanna protect her" or some other cheesy romantic saying and I had to immediately close out of the song it made me so uncomfortable.

 

Has anyone else gone from being positive/neutral to repulsed?

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hmm i'd say i was neutral before i discovered i was aro.  i just didn't think much about romance, whether in media or in my own future, it was just like, whatever.  but afterwards, particularly after i'd been in a romantic relationship and knew how i really felt about it, it became more noticeable.  like if i saw people doing something romantic, i would think about doing it myself and how uncomfortable it was/would surely be.  and once you're aware of amatonormativity you can't help but notice how pervasive it is.  so yeah, i'm mostly repulsed now, not to the extent you described, and i can enjoy the very occasional romantic story if it's well-written, but i generally dislike it for sure.

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Hm, yeah I observed the perception of romance changes from time to time within me. Before learning about aromanticism I was rather positive about romance (provided that it wasn't directed towards me and I always found romantic movies very boring). Now I have times when I'm more repulsed, another time I can feel more neutral again. Once I realized I don't feel romantic feelings myself I stopped pushing myself to feel something I just don't and it changed my perception.
It's connected to the media I consume, too. Such lyrics as you wrote down can make me shiver sometimes, other times I'm less or not bothered when I really like the melody/beat of the song, etc. However, cheesy romantic comedies or "serious" romance movies make me very repulsed most of the time. It's boredom mixed with a feeling of "ew" for me so I stay away from watching them (there can be exceptions, really depends on the execution).

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On 9/22/2019 at 2:40 PM, NotHeartless said:

Hm, yeah I observed the perception of romance changes from time to time within me. Before learning about aromanticism I was rather positive about romance (provided that it wasn't directed towards me and I always found romantic movies very boring). Now I have times when I'm more repulsed, another time I can feel more neutral again. Once I realized I don't feel romantic feelings myself I stopped pushing myself to feel something I just don't and it changed my perception.
It's connected to the media I consume, too. Such lyrics as you wrote down can make me shiver sometimes, other times I'm less or not bothered when I really like the melody/beat of the song, etc. However, cheesy romantic comedies or "serious" romance movies make me very repulsed most of the time. It's boredom mixed with a feeling of "ew" for me so I stay away from watching them (there can be exceptions, really depends on the execution).

 

Yeah it's the same for me! It depends by how the romantic stuff is delivered to me, I really like romantic moments and also I'm moved when characters say "I love you" to others I ship them with, but at the same time I'm repulsed by all those cheese sentences I find on pinterest or by those kind of moments that usually make people goes "aaawww I want that too!!" and I can't stand movies or books that are all-about-romance, ew. 

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For me, I've always been more neutral or indifferent, but sometimes I'm more negative/repulsed. Like holding hands with someone in that way makes my skin crawl, and I get freaked out a lot when someone asks me out or has a crush on me, and I cannot speak to them at all. I also like reading romantic stuff but only if it's gay and it's well written, I mainly watch romcoms for the comedy and not the romance at all, for example. I've noticed it more this year as I've been questioning my romantic orientation. I remember being asked out for the first time and I immediately said no, even though I was sad that no one liked me (bc the other girls went on dates and I didn't want to be left out), and I also remember always being asked to marry this one boy all the time at age 7, and it felt so uncomfortable - part of it was because I've always disliked boys in that way, even before I liked girls, but I've just realised whilst writing this that maybe this could also be an early sign of romance repulsion. I don't know. 

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3 hours ago, TripleA said:

part of it was because I've always disliked boys in that way, even before I liked girls, but I've just realised whilst writing this that maybe this could also be an early sign of romance repulsion. I don't know

I don't know either but your story reminded me of the time in elementary school where I had a male best friend and I reacted upset whenever somebody would only suggest we had a crush on each other or said we were cute together. I also panicked as I thought another boy in my class had a crush on me. Very interesting you had similar feelings in such situations (and so early in life).

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Growing up I guess I was pretty romance favorable, though every time someone showed interest in me I’d get like, offended, and really indignant about the whole idea of dating them. Even if I thought our feelings had been mutual. I was romance favorable in the sense that I liked the idea of it, but when it actually came down to it I would get pretty squicked out. 

 

More recently now that I’ve loosely concluded that I’m greyaro and/or lithromantic, and therefore that it isn’t worth paying attention to the rare and fleeting feelings I have for some people, I’ve stopped having a favorable opinion of romance (in relation to myself) and am now much more neutral to repulsed. Although it’s very situational.

 

To me it it seems to have something to do with letting go of societally enforced ideas about what I’m supposed to want in life.

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I am not fully repulsed (i mean, sometime i am fine with it , under some conditions. ), but when i discovered i was aro (and learned about amatonormativity ) , i just stopped pretending to myself  it was the absolute form of happiness/love. 

 

Now i am more, like, amatonormativity-repulsed haha

 

But yeah, my tolerance to romance dropped.

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