shotinthehand

I like to see how far along in a song that is romantic-coded I can pretend it can be about a relatively normative friendship.

Hi! I started identifying as asexual and on the aromantic spectrum at age 14. I'm 17 now, and I am still identifying as asexual. When I was 15, I did get a crush, and I'm now dating my crush. Stuff changed. It was OK. It did feel a little embarrassing to tell people. That wasn't my fault. I never said I expected to never have a crush in the future. I just said I wasn't holding my breath and I wasn't sure if I had ever had a crush. People can just be insensitive about having your labels change. I'm not telling you that to scare you or discourage you from identifying as aroace. I just think you should know that yes, there is a chance that people will tease you if your labels are a phase. There's nothing wrong with going through a phase. Your identity being a phase doesn't make it invalid. Some people don't understand that, and if you have to deal with that, it can be uncomfortable. That's just the way it is. If calling yourself aroace makes you feel happy though, go for it. I don't think you should do it if you just feel like you need to have a label for others' convenience or because it's expected of you. Your label should be for you to feel happy. I understand that other people giving you crap for not having a label can make you unhappy though, so it's a gray area. Anyway, my point, is do what makes you happy.

I'm staying on here even though I have a crush...but I'm continuing to identify as on the aromantic spectrum You do you!

A character is established canonly aromantic in “The Penumbra Podcast”, in “Sportive Nymphs (Part 2)”. I don’t know how to get the little spoiler bar; I’ll try to figure it out tomorrow (err...today after I wake up) on my computer. Just, uh, don’t scroll down if you don’t want to know who it is! It’s Sir Talfryn! He comes out to his brother by telling him “I don’t like women or men” and it’s pretty clear he means he doesn’t like women or men romantically and sexually.

Hey there! I'm in a situation really different than yours. Maybe what I can say about my personal experience isn't exactly relevant to you. That said, I think it's ok if you want to identify as "aromantic" or "on the aromantic spectrum". You're not hurting anyone by doing that. It's just a label that you can put on if you want to. The founder of AVEN, who, yes, I know is a problematic guy, at least had it right when he said labels are tools, in my opinion. Use them if they fix or better something, like your self-worth or you validation or how you like to express yourself, and put them down if they are making the situation worse or feel clunky. If calling yourself aro or aro-spec feels like a way of validating the way you do your relationships, go for it. If it feels limiting, you shouldn't feel any pressure to use it as a label. Whatever you decide to do, we're glad you're here and even if you decide you aren't aro spec and therefore aren't part of this community, we're glad Arocalypse was here for you and could help you figure it out. Welcome!

I'm so happy for you that you found us! It's stories like yours that remind me how lucky and grateful I am to have found the terms "aromantic" and "gray-aromantic" in ninth grade. Better to be a *special snowflake* in high school than feeling lost and confused with unforgiving consequences as an adult. We've always existed. There's plenty of adults out there like me, who have lived their whole lives feeling like me. We've just never known it until the internet birthed forums like these. Now we have vocabulary to describe ourselves, a community, and silly in-jokes like the ice cream gag. And we're the group of people who get to nurture this infant community! We're watching it turn into a toddler before our eyes! Anyway, welcome!

Well, I'm a teen on this site, and I know there are a lot of other ones here too.

Actually, you know, you and your community are fetishizing mlm relationships. Mlm are tired of being treated this way by mostly teenage girls and ready for y'all to knock it off. I can find some quotes breaking this down into better detail if you want, but I had to get it out

Hi, Courtney! I turned seventeen this February 15th (2018) so it doesn't take much to transport myself into the mindset of my sixteen-year-old self. Maybe some of the other people who responded are about your age too. I must admit I didn't actually check. As a lot of people have already outlined, the aromantic spectrum and the asexual spectrum are two different spectrums! You can be allosexual (the opposite of asexual) and aromantic at the same time. It sounds like those might be some labels that fit you, if you are looking for labels. In addition to what others have already posted here, I'd like to tell you: don't worry about being sixteen and it's ok if it is indeed "just" a phase. If you aren't experiencing romantic attraction right now but you do experience it later, it doesn't mean that you weren't really aromantic when you were sixteen. It just means that that label doesn't describe you well anymore. You hurt no-one by using that label now. Even if you did, it isn't your job to play respectability politics and worry that by identifying with this label at a young age and potentially dropping it later, you might reinforce stereotypes about people who identify as aromantic. It is not your responsibility to make people who identify as aromantic worthy of respect from bigoted people. It's their job to educate themselves and to let us educate them if we're feeling up to it. If it turns out to be a "phase" aka a temporary stage in your life, that's OK! Being a teenager is an age for exploring your identity and figuring out what and whom you're into and what you like being called and calling yourself. It's saddening that "phase" has become a dirty word. Having a fluid romantic (or sexual) identity, that is, going through phases, is fine, no matter what age you are. It's always OK to change your labels later if you like and it's OK to be fast and loose with your labels if you want to be! In ninth grade, I knew one other person who identified as on the aromantic spectrum. They worried that they only identified as aromantic because they were on hormone blockers, and that as soon as they got off hormone blockers, they would start experiencing romantic attraction. It didn't help that their family told them this, or at least insinuated this, a lot. I told them that if that were the case, it was fine. They were hurting no-one by identifying as aromantic in that moment! They weren't getting crushes, so they got to call theirself aromantic! The label is for you to feel better about yourself, not to play respectability politics with. The label is for you, not for other people. Just like there are a lot of mentally ill or neurodivergent people on this server who had to deal with self-doubt and/or invalidation about their identity because of their mental state, they realized that it doesn't matter if that's the "reason" they're on the aromantic spectrum. They get to decide if they identify as on it and they are not obligated to consider how that might impact the image of the aromantic community. The community exists to support each other, not to throw vulnerable members under the bus. I started identifying with the word aromantic about the time I was turning fifteen. At that time, I had only had at most two experiences that were sort of crushes but not really. After about a year of identifying as gray-aromantic because I felt unsure of one of those experiences, I got a full-on crush on someone. I got to stick with the label I was already using since I was already using gray, but I did move on the spectrum. I was less aromantic than I was before that, and that was OK. No-one was hurt by that. If I start getting lots and lots of crushes, at what is considered the "normal" rate/amount, then I will drop my label as a person on the aromantic spectrum, because it wouldn't fit anymore, and that will be OK. I will still advocate just as strongly against amatonormativy, allonormativity and stereotypes against aromantic people. Maybe even more people would listen to me because I'd have allo-privilege then. If I used any terms you're unfamiliar with in my post you can almost certainly google them and get a good explanation, or you can search for them on this server, or you can ask me! I'm happy to clarify anything if that would help. I hope this post is beneficial for you or for other people.

It...uh...sounds like you're romanticizing/cutesifying gay relationships

Whoo! More aro trekkies, yes please! I'm an original series trekkie too. And yes, the aro ice cream is all over on this site