Lupin-

Ocean

Going through a referral for autism. They (school, family, NHS(?) people on the phone) reckon I'm on the spectrum but it takes foreverrrrrr to get a definitive answer / diagnosis (or so I've heard and experienced). Until then I feel kinda guilty saying anything for sure.

Ooh, I've got some. (Coming back up here to say, oh man, this got a bit out of hand, I didn't realize I had so many examples...) I've also never had a crush, didn't get the idea of "celebrity crushes", etc. I once got asked who my first crush was and I said, after a moment of consideration, that I liked the flea off A Monster in Paris. I dunno if anyone else has ever seen that movie (if not: movie about a flea (in Paris!!) that gets turned big in some kinda accidental science experiment. It turns out the thing has great musical talent. Yeah. It's a good movie but I don't know what was going on either). I don't know why I picked it. I think my instinct was to just treat the whole situation as a joke. That flea did have some pretty dapper outfits to be fair. Then I had some guy tell me when I was 11 that he thought I was pretty and he liked me. I was just like yeah, right, sure you do, and told him something along the lines of "dude, we're 11. What are we even gonna do if we start dating? Go to Tesco while our parents wait outside?" He cornered me in cooking class a while after that and asked me AGAIN if I'd go out with him, which I said no to, and then after that, he started being mean to me. Real charming fella. I forced myself to have a crush on Sirius Black from Harry Potter despite knowing at the back of my mind that I just thought he was a neat character. I stated outright to my best friend at the time (12 years old) that people couldn't have "real" crushes in primary school, because they were too young to know what love was (I assumed it was a conscious decision). I was also the kinda person not to get why people didn't just break up. I would always be like "told you so" (mentally, not verbally, thank God) when relationships ended. Or if someone was sad, I wouldn't get it, because surely if whoever it was broke up with you then they're not the "right person" anyway. My aforementioned best friend had a rocky relationship and subsequently broke up with their online girlfriend, and then came to me afterward all miserable, saying it was all their fault, and how they felt so guilty. I was just like man, she wasn't that great of a girlfriend, who cares that she's gone? Good riddance. Before this, Best Friend would constantly slide "X just flirted with me 😳", "I flirted back with X", "She called me cute OwO", my girlfriend this, my girlfriend that, etc. into conversations. Logically speaking, of course they'd assume they could tell their best friend about their relationships. I mean, who better? But I was just so disinterested and annoyed whenever it got brought up. I feel kinda bad now looking back on it. OK, final thing, I swear I'm almost done: I never understood the way that people instantly changed their mannerisms and habits after getting into a relationship. This was one of the things that made me skeptical that anyone was really experiencing crushes, and not just putting it on because that's what everyone else did. For example, people I knew would get into a relationship, and where before they'd hold normal online conversations, now every chat message HAD to be followed by a heart emoji, or an "ily/ilysm". Or they would instantly set their phone background to their partner's face. I sat next to a girl in my Year 9 science class (12/13) who printed out her gf's Instagram profile picture (speaking of, why is it always Instagram???) and inserted it into a keyring on her schoolbag, which she would then continuously take out to look at. Even now I'm not sure whether that's normal crushing behavior or whether it's weird even by alloromantic standards.

I have a bunch of old art-deco travel posters up currently (16 y/o). I also have that "Chat Noir" theatre poster that everyone has somewhere in their house. You know what I'm talking about. Aside from that, I have drawings I made of my animal characters, an a4 picture of my cat that was a mistaken print, a map of Manhattan, and a canvas picture of Paris. When I was about 10/11 I had a pretty decent amount of Harry Potter posters up. My Marauders Map poster is the only one that remains, but I still love HP (evidently). Even further back than that, I didn't have any posters, but I did have some canvas pictures of kittens and some sweet doodle-style paintings of London (not made by me).

Aroace ISTP(-T) (represented by the guy holding a drill, and consistently referred to as LOVING hands-on practical work, despite me sitting around all day doing nothing). I don't set much store by these things, but I like doing quizzes and it's all in good fun. Plus, no matter how many times I take the quiz, even if I think I gave wildly different answers to my last set, I always get Mr. Drill. I've become pretty attached to him ...

Ikr. People can't resist the urge to add a cat, and then it's game over for everyone else. Thanks btw!

Yep! Love that guy. Best character.

My obligatory introductory post! I'm here from AVEN. I'm sure that's a classic line on this site. I think I prefer the layout here though, even if they're basically the same. At least I can add a background image to my profile instead of just sticking to the ol' abstract shapes ... Anyway, 2022 is the Big Year for me in terms of figuring out my identity. I've followed a pretty generic path. I started out assuming I must be cis and straight, not entirely because that's what society expects (although it is), but because they ARE the majority after all. Nothing out of the ordinary could EVER happen to ME! Turns out that wasn't true. I went through the whole rigmarole of discovering I was ace, and then I went through the same thing discovering I was (PROBABLY) aro. I say probably because 1. When you're a pessimist, you've always gotta leave room for doubt! 2. I'm only 16, which is old enough to be pretty sure, but still leaves room for potential drastic change, and 3. Because I don't know the entire ins and outs of the aromantic spectrum. I'm pretty sure I'm totally aromantic, but I could be wrong. I'm having a bit of trouble coming to terms with the fact that I'm kinda an odd one out in a SoCietY (joker voice) practically overflowing with romance, which it's always singing the praises of, but I'm getting there! As for gender, which I may as well put here, if you wanna get into the specifics I guess I'd be considered a demigirl, but I say girl for ease of use, and because I'm more comfortable with that. Still grappling with self-doubt in this department as well, but she/her and they/them pronouns are both fine by me.