Apathetic Echidna

Many of us here have experiences where what we want in our heads has no connection to what we can deal with in reality. Much of that, I think, has to do with what we are taught by society as we grow up, that partnering up romantically is normal and has to be done to have a good life. Amatonormativity is everywhere. An ideal person that you can imagine doing things with is very very different than having a real person in front of you, focusing their feelings on you. Maybe try focusing on your reactions to all the boys you mention. How did their attention make you feel? Those feelings will be a good start to help figure out what feels right and wrong.

I don't think I have skipped events for romance-avoidance reasons. I did skip my big high school formal but that was because I thought it would be terrible (it was) and I didn't want to pay almost $100 for a ticket. Though I did get a dress, I just wore it for other events. oh wait. scratch what I said. Yes. I avoided heaps of events. I had a friend who wanted to set me up, so I consistently avoided all the parties they invited me to. There were at least 3 a year for 4 years while we were at university. Though that may have had something to do with me working out that groups of young drunk Australian men tend to be aggressive and I don't like being cornered or groped.

I already have the charities picked out, but while my parents are alive I'll let it default to them. I do have some specialised stuff and deceased estate auctions suck, so I guess I would have to figure something out to deal with all the family heirlooms (I am the end of the line so I have no close blood cousins to pass that on to) Just so you know, recently I've had several people die or be executors of wills and leaving small amounts of money can end up costing much more than just giving them an item. Depending on how the laws work where you are, and how much money it is, and what country the recievee is in, there may be a bunch of legal or processing fees. Same goes for leaving them a share in something, like a property or stock portfolio.

Well, I do understand the assumed unprofessionalism of being social with non-coworkers while at work. and if the female friend and her boyfriend were clearly in a 'moment' in their date, like feeding each other or making out then I doubt they would appreciate a greeting from someone else. But otherwise this is just reinforcing amatonormative ideas about the heightened specialness of romantic relationships. Sorry no one else spoke up in class, this stuff has to start being called out when we see it!

Big is relative, but I live in the capitol of my state, so it is the biggest around, so, True! TPBM has an allergy (including pollen and grass and flowers, I can already feel my eyes itching)

working on my entry already ?

There are several ways to approach 'digging deep'. Personally I found those lists of orientations (with definitions) helpful. Other people think those are useless and need to read about other people's experiences. I do hope you get to a point when you come across something and think 'That is me'. I wish you luck! Speaking of being on the spectrum, being somewhere in the grey-asexual umbrella, there are many many ways people experience their grey-ness. I am sexually attracted to people very very very infrequently, but I experience the attraction strongly. Other people speak about only realising they experienced sexual attraction in hindsight. They couldn't recognise it in the moment because it was too ambiguous, or so fleeting that it passed before they could recognise it. The common factor is we recognise this is not how many other experience sexual attraction and we have managed to come across a label or community where we feel a 'That is me' moment.

I am having a lot of trouble getting my thoughts out! I guess it depends on how close I feel to the 'actors'. It it feels very personal, like my personal writings and poems, things that represent 'Me' then romance generally doesn't come into it. But when I did roleplaying it felt like a separate character, further away from 'Me', so I was okay with romance when it cropped up in scenarios. Fanfic writing however.... I make those character dance like puppets on a string and most of the time it is centred around romance and love. Admittedly, I am mostly torturing them with love.... On a similar note some of the best erotica I have come across have been fanfictions written by authors who identify as being sex-neutral/repulsed asexuals. So I guess fanfiction, because they are not characters we created (even more distantly separated from 'Me' than a character I imagined and fleshed out), we experiment with feelings and situations we are not in-reality interested in. Fanfic is a 'safe distance'!

late reply, but yes. TAAAP is all public. It doesn't have a lot of activity but there are some really good ideas and questions that I like pondering. Here is a link to the topic. https://taaappridechats.dreamwidth.org/3415.html

haha Yay! I was literally just writing a belated post about attraction on the TAAAP pride chat blog. For ages I felt like the only one talking about being strongly attracted to someone because of their voice (and not anything else). So I'm glad there are many more of us speaking about it now!

So I was just searching some things (new memes!) and noticed that r/aromantic has offsite resource links. That consists of a link to an AVEN FAQ, a discord link, and something called the AACE Club FAQ. Never heard of the AACE Club before. I'm just wondering is we should push for an Arocalypse link to be added, or an @AUREA link? or even a link for carnival of aros main site? I just feel bad for people who discover aromanticism and reddit is their start point, cause those links don't really link to the community.

Hi, I've made an entry for this month here: https://mesotablar.dreamwidth.org/19788.html

Hello friend! I thought I was the only one who was attracted by a voice as I have been pinging around different forums and no-one has said 'me too'. Well, I'm here to tell you, Me Too!!!! ? So sensual attraction is just a type of attraction to something that is experienced through senses other than sight (that gets its own word, normally 'physical attraction' or 'aesthetic attraction'), so smell, sound, touch, taste would all be grouped as sensual attractions because for most people those generally aren't strong, or they come with other attractions that make the whole thing difficult to sort out. So when you hear that person and it is like golden sunshine is flowing from their worlds and you find you just want to bask in that glow and warmth forever. Let all your troubles float away because hearing their voice stills all the noise inside you so there is just placid peace and the rolling tone of their voice and you want to sit at their feet handing them reading material so it doesn't end. There was nothing sexual or romantic in that for me, it was all about his voice, so pretty pure sensual attraction, also it was the only time I was so strongly and clearly attracted by a voice. From what you say I assume you notice peoples voices more, so maybe voices are one of the things you specifically appreciate or are attracted to. So when people talk about your 'type' of ideal partner, 'voice' should be on your list, in the same way 'tall' would be for someone who appreciates feeling smaller than their partner, or 'blonde' would be for someone specifically attracted to visual presentation/colour. Though honestly, a lot of people are attracted by voices, they are just a bit more shallow on the subject; Just think about how many people say they like accents. You can possibly even work out the type of voice you like most if you can identify similarities in those you like. I have a friend that realised recently she only likes music where men sing in whine-y tones. Many erotica authors like describing voices as gravely or husky (one of my writer friends tends to use 'deep rumble' a lot and I had to ask her if she meant a voice like Kevin Grevioux!)

https://manofmany.com/entertainment/movies-tv/best-lgbti-movies-of-all-time?user_id=wolving_time@hotmail.com&utm_source=Man+of+Many+Newsletter&utm_campaign=f524eebe69-RSS_EMAIL_CAMPAIGN&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_8a6251cd7b-f524eebe69-84203758 So I got an alert about this article. I was so happy to see someone using 'LGBTQIA+' that I was hopeful it would be a good list even if it was basically a 'top 20' style list. Disclaimer, I haven't seen all the movies on the list and they don't specify the type of representation in the movie, and the website is called 'Man of Many' but there does seem to be a significant skew towards movies about gay men, which seems to be following the general media skew towards stories about white men. Buuuut.... I don't see no 'IA+' There is some L, a lot of G, a bit of B and T, maybe some Q....and 6 out of those 20 can arguably be called male coming-of-age stories.....and it made me sad.

I've been good at contacting friends recently, but in catching up I compare my life to theirs and I feel shame because I think I haven't achieved anything worthwhile. Which is some sort of internal desolate wasteland.....which make me feel lonelier when I'm with my friends.... So, completely not what you asked!

This pretty much sums it up. Romance is an internal drive rather than a visible action. I'm happy to do plenty of romantic coded things like hand holding, kissing, hugs, giving flowers and chocolate, having picnic 'dates', lying together on a picnic blanket under the stars, as long as it is all no romo. If someone wants to be in a relati❤️nship I would be uncomfortable doing any of these things. Except people feeding each other and baby talk. That makes me queasy.

haha, yeah that is par for the course. I can't address everything you have written, and really, you know yourself the best so you will have to work though these thoughts yourself, I only hope I can maybe give you some things to think about I'll let you know that several people here on Arocalypse thought they were pansexual but later realised they were asexual. Feeling the same towards people of different genders is an 'all' or 'nothing' thing, and it can be very tricky/confusing to differentiate between the 'all' or the 'nothing'. Personal experience, hindsight, and reading other people's stories is what is going to have to guide you on that one. Unless you were living in some sort of situation like Room (2015) I don't think this would be a significant influence. Romance and love are literally everywhere in media, fairly present at education facilities, somewhat occurring in public spaces. It is kinda hard to escape seeing it. On a similar point, being on the a-spectrum has (pretty much) nothing to do with your choice of books or movies. Sure, if you have an aversion to romance fluff it could be a sign but then I know plenty of alloromantics who don't like romance fluff and aromantics who like romance fluff. Basically personal preference in the media you consume is just that, personal preference, not an orientation. How you feel around the people who have admitted to liking you in a romantic way, and how you felt in a relationship, are probably the things you should try working out. Have a read around the forums and see if anything sounds familiar or clicks. I found my own label simply by reading an obscure orientation list and I instantly recognised the definition as representative of my experience, but many others here have found their labels by reading how others feel or how they reacted to situations. Good luck on your journey!

I'm really hoping that people in the Australian cities haven't forgotten the fires. I feel that the virus has taken over the news for so long that the devastation of the fires seems a million miles away. We haven't had a bad fire season this year but I hope the protections and policy changes that were getting momentum before the virus manage to be implemented. Lots of people say the lockdowns have helped the appreciate nature more. So I hope it is reflected by some activism in the future, because it seems the government used the virus as a distraction to blind people to all the environmental law reviews happening. Also, no-one talks about the swine fever still working it's way around the world as it has been for the past 4 years. I think a lot of things have been slipping out of public view/awareness. But those paying attention to the things they care about have had the time to look into those things deeply, so I think there will be some good thoughts about how to face the future, if those people speak to enough ears.

Hey all, The week of awareness is coming soon! Anyone got any plans? or any Aro week resolutions for 2021? I'm going to try to get back into being active in forums and writing, maybe try making my long planned 'The Friendzone' spoof picture.

It is cool that it is also a fidget! I would love to see what it looks like. My ring is plain and boring, though seemingly scratch proof/indestructible. I'm sure as long as you do fidget with it she won't question it further.

Welcome! I felt the same way. I had lots of joy reading the forums and learning the different words for things I had felt but never been able to describe. I hope you can find such joy and engagement here! (even if the forums are slow)

I know the original Little Mermaid is more of a dramatic tragedy but I didn't know about the song. That is so funny that my brain is fixated on the most romantic possible interpretation of both those things, all wrapped up in the disney package.

I woke up yesterday with a song stuck in my head, so every free moment I have I listen to it and sing along. It is still stuck in my head. I'm still singing along to it. It may be the ultimate in songs-that-ship-people songs.

Yes, it definitely should be something planned by the authors so there is consistency and direction to the character. But I don't necessarily think someone must state they are questioning, especially if they do end up finding their label and coming out. Movies and TV get tricky if the character story arc is spread over more than one movie or one season, especially if the production has no guarantees for future seasons. Even then it still comes down to the determination of the creators to stay true to the original plan for the character's orientation arc.

I though I would add a bit just in case you are still around checking this. @Neon Green Packing Peanut is completely right about setting boundaries, however knowing where your boundaries are is a learning process. I was in my early 20s and still finding new things to avoid, but also finding places where I could push further. Exploring the boundaries is just as important as knowing other people realise there are boundaries (and will respect them). Basically what I am trying to say is be open in case she wants to explore but let her know there is always a safe no-relationship zone that she can retreat to.[my own example was a friend announcing his engagement and I was horrified as I was completely taken by surprise (and by his instant expectation of joy from me), he had to give me some time and space (a few days) until I could work my mind around to being happy for his happiness (even explicitly asking him if it is what he really wanted). All because for me Marriage=Romance and Romance≠Happiness while Happiness=Happiness] One thing worth encouraging her to explore is whether or not she has touch aversions. Because I had very physically affectionate friends when I was growing up I don't perceive many things as romantic as they were things I did with friends fairly often, like hand holding, hugs, cheek kisses, sharing blankets, sharing umbrellas etc. This is of course very influenced by the society you both live in, and what is generally acceptable in public and private social situations. The outward social perceptions of certain actions can be painful to deal with, sort of what I'm trying to say is... thinking that everyone around you thinks you are in a romantic relationship can sometimes be just as repulsive and hurtful as more direct conflicts.