I.B.

I'm interested in seeing if there are others here who feel a similar way I do, or just to hear people's thoughts in general about my situation. 

Like the title says, I'm a heterosexual who feels a very high level of sexual desire.  Honestly I even get the sense that my sexual feelings are on the very upper end of what most allosexuals feel.  As in, I feel sexual attraction very easily and often, my libido is extremely high, I feel essentially insatiable (only real limit on sexual activity is the time it takes up), and there's sometimes days where I just feel mentally aroused most of the time.  I'm tempted to say I'm on the edge of hypersexuality, although I'll use that word carefully because there's still ongoing academic debate about how to define "hypersexual" and how it relates to various other conditions.

On the other hand, I feel a very low motivation to actually pursue intimate relationships (either romantic or sexual) with other people. I honestly do not feel much if any interest in most romantic activities, and it's hard to envision myself feeling the same sense of attachment/"romantic love" that it seems like most romantic couples feel. Although for now I'm leaning more towards the greyromantic label than entirely aromantic. Also, so far I haven't felt any interest in pursuing sex outside of an emotional relationship, which also means that so far I've always been entirely single and have never actually had sex.

There's times where I feel kinda torn between simultaneously feeling "interested" and "uninterested" in intimate relationships.  It's been hard for me to figure out my priorities and decide what I want from life.... should I be more active in seeking out relationships in the hope that something "clicks"? Would I be happier being single my whole life? How much do I actually care about pursuing sex?  Those are rhetorical questions of course. My thoughts tend to sway back and forth.

Does anyone know if this is a common experience to have?  I'd definitely be interested in hearing similar stories, or links if this has been discussed somewhere else.

9 hours ago, vinniebandit said:

No doubt your choice of academic studies will help you try to sort out your questioning?

Perhaps it can someday. Although the sorts of answers that would be useful still feel very far off.  It would be nice to know the underlying cognitive mechanisms behind sexual/romantic attraction, and to be able to point to sources of variation between people.  Recently there's been plenty of advancements in knowing where in the brain certain processes occur, but there's a massive difference between "knowing where" and "understanding how".

37 minutes ago, Rony said:

It's not 'chromosomal disorder'. Let's call it 'chromosomal diversity', because calling it 'disorder' is very harmful for intersex people. Being intersex is not a problem, the problem are unnecessary medical interventions when a person was born with atypical genitalia.

I don't disagree with anything you say, I was mainly just following along with the terminology of the original post.  In this particular case I would propose "chromosomal aneuploidy" (or maybe just "chromosomal duplication") as something that's both more precise and more judgement-neutral compared to "disorder".

Edit: I suppose I should point out that having XXY/etc. sex chromosomes is definitely not the same as having intersex genitalia.  As far as I'm aware the overlap between the two groups is actually very small.  In my original post I meant "intersex features" in a more broad sense.

One of the most common chromosomal disorders is Klinefelter syndrome (XXY sex chromosomes). There's also variants like XYY, X, XXX, XXXY, XXYY, or even XXXXY.  Some of these are surprisingly common, with about 1 in 500 people overall having a sex chromosomal disorder. 

Any combination which contains at least one Y chromosome usually presents as male.  Any combination which contains only X chromosomes presents as female.  But combinations which contain multiple X chromosomes in conjunction with a Y chromosome can give rise to some intersex features.  Among these individuals there is definitely a higher-than-average rate of gender dysphoria.  Look up Caroline Cossey as an example of a trans woman with XXXY chromosomes.

22 minutes ago, Rainy Robin said:

What's your focus in your grad program?

My general area of interest is cognitive psychology (as opposed to, say, social psych).  Memory, decision-making, exploration, learning, etc. I like to straddle the line between psychology and neuroscience.

Hello peoples, I've decided to make an account after lurking for a bit.

I go by I.B. but you can call me whatever you feel like.  I'm mid-20s, male, grad student (studying psychology*). I live in the US.  Other interests include all the stereotypical "nerdy" things... you name it and I'm probably a bit interested in it.

I currently consider myself a greyromantic.  I've always had complicated feelings about romance, and I can definitely relate to a lot of the thoughts I've seen expressed on this forum.

On the other hand, I'm definitely allosexual (honestly on the edge of hypersexual), although I also have some complicated thoughts about that as well.

Also I'd like to thank arocalypse for being a useful source of information to help me understand myself better.

* favorite subject ever, ask me anything about how the brain works and I'll try to answer

self-proclaimed allosexual here... I'll try my best to answer this but of course it's a bit hard to describe.

If I had to sum it up in a sentence, I would say sexual attraction towards a particular person is an intrinsic mental push/nudge to have sex with that person.

- I say "intrinsic" because sex feels like a goal in and of itself.  It's separate from wanting sex to please them, or to have a child, etc. although a person can have more than one motivation simultaneously. I'm tempted to say that this idea is even a bit separate from the idea of "wanting sex because it feels good"... there's plenty of things that "feel good" but only sex is sex.

- By "mental" I mean to say that it's not necessarily related to physical arousal of the body. It is a mental feeling, although the lines are not actually clear.  Sexual attraction is often tied to mental arousal, which is then often tied to physical arousal. If you look at a "hot" person and feel mental arousal, that's probably sexual attraction, but if you just feel the more physical components then it probably isn't.

- I say "push/nudge" because sexual attraction is just one factor in the overall decision of whether to have sex with a particular person. I don't mean to play too many word-games, but I think it's important to point out that there's kinda two meanings to the word "want".  At one level, what a person wants is what they decide to do (the overall balance of pros vs cons).  But on another level, the "want" can just refer to half of the overall balance (the "pros").  When I feel sexually attracted to someone, I want to have sex with them, but that definitely doesn't mean I want to actually have sex with them.  e.g. if I feel attracted to a stranger, and then stranger asks me to have sex with them, I'd definitely say "no" regardless of the attraction.  In contrast, a demisexual also wouldn't want to have sex with a stranger, not because the sexual attraction is outweighed by other situational/social factors, but because they don't feel sexual attraction to strangers in the first place.

- And finally, it does involve a preference for partnered sex, over just having an orgasm or relieving "physical tension" of some kind.  Although the latter can sometimes work to satisfy the desires.

I hope this answer helps.... feel free to ask questions.

If I had to break it down, there's a few main components.  (I don't want to stick too strongly to any particular label, but greyromantic feels the most accurate.)

- Overall rarity of romantic attraction.  There's really only been a small handful of people that I've felt legitimate romantic attraction towards.  But when I do experience it, it's similar to the common descriptions of romantic attraction: I feel like I really want to interact with that particular person, it's inherently enjoyable to simply be around them, and it can be mildly obsessive in that I think a lot about them when they are not around.

- Feeling of disconnect from "romantic culture."  I don't feel much interest in dating, or really any stereotypical romantic activities.  When I see friends participating in those activities, it can be hard for me to "put myself in their shoes."  I generally can't connect to romantic storylines in books/movies.  Now that I have several friends who have gotten married, it's hard to see myself being that closely attached to other person.

- Lack of motivation to actually pursue relationships.  Even when I do feel attraction towards someone, it's still very uncommon for me to be motivated enough to seek out a relationship with them.  For example, there's only ever been 1 time, about 4 years ago, when I've asked someone out on a date.  I would also like to mention that I'm a pretty "sexual" person, in that I feel quite a lot of sexual attraction to other people, but even that doesn't motivate me to pursue anything.  I might still want to be in an intimate relationship someday, but so far I've generally been okay with just the regular friendships I have.

Feel free to ask me any other questions you have.