Early signs that you were aro

[AroGhost]

Looking back there were a few signs that I was aro, like when I got my first boyfriend I replied to his confession a month after and when I accepted, thinking that I’d grow to like him, the awkward atmosphere when I had to hang out with him was horrible so I just ignored him till we broke up. When we did I felt was like a weight had been lifted off my shoulders, even though I was told that he was an ideal boyfriend I just couldn’t find anything to like about him ^^’

Later I was told that he was cheating on me but I was a horrible gf anyway lol 

Another thing was that I’ve  never had a crush, but I just thought it was because I was too cool for them xD

 

 

Edited April 21, 2022 by AroGhost

[Guest Icicle]

The Unflirty trait in The Sims 4. When I was making myself in The Sims 4, I'm pretty sure I gave myself it. I might've swapped it out for another trait in the end, but I definitely found "not being fLiRtY and rOmAnTiC" very relatable. Also, when reading those girly romance books (with plots along the lines of "My parents bought a shiny new bakery and I fell in love with the popular boy Jake but I'm gonna have to kiss Brandon for the play next week!1!1!") I couldn't relate to them AT ALL.

[arotr]

I think this is a mix of things (transness + mental stuff + maybe being aro/aspec) but I remember being 5 years old and already incredibly perplexed at the idea of crushes and romantic relationships (and even forcing myself to crush on a boy I didn't even like). When other kids would play house I was always the dog, lol. In elementary school all these kids would have weddings and I just wanted to be the wedding planner. Never wanted to have a wedding myself. To this day, I have never been able to picture myself having a wedding.

[willow-]

I had forced crushes and was constantly debating over whether they were real or not. qwq

[Deltalorian]

When I was a kid, I would semi-regularly have dreams where I was the father of a young toddler. Conveniently, the mother of my child had always passed away by the time the dream was set in, so I didn't have to imagine her in any way. In the dream, I was obviously distraught by her passing, but the dream never lingered on those feelings.

[Gökotta]

I lost interest in multiple children's book series (His Dark Materials, Harry Potter, etc.) when the characters began showing romantic interest in one another. I just wanted them to get back to the adventure already lol.

[YokaiDisarray]

Another one of the super obvious signs was how anytime someone had a crush on me, my first and immediate thought was, "How??? Why???"

[Mari]

Watching romance and just thinking " wow these people really don't know to make good decisions " and being romance repulsed for my entire childhood 

[Guest Gigantimaxie]

On 6/3/2016 at 6:00 AM, Elluna Hellen said:

When I was 12 I was a fan of a singer. Cue some random aunts/family members. "OH, do you have a little crush on him? " And I just remember being like "will they just shut up I like the music that's all >_>"

I honestly love certain actors for their roles and personalities, but nothing else. Like, I love hearing Jeff Goldblum talk whatever, but I'd never want to cuddle. (da frick???)

[FroggyPrince]

When I was dating this girl in middle school I would play Mario kart with her on my 2ds while talking on the phone. Every time we would end the call she would say I love you. I hated it but went along with it and would mumble I love you and quickly hang up. I don't think she even heard me when I do that. I never felt anything towards her I just went along with everything because I thought you were supposed to do that. Nothing changed as well we just did things as we normally did. In the end, after I switched schools I stopped all contact feeling awkward talking with her, but I felt a lot happier knowing I didn't have to do all the couple stuff anymore.

[The Gray Warlock]

Looking back at my early childhood, I can remember seeing portrayals of marriage on tv and thinking "Why would anybody want to do this?" I also related to cartoon characters being chased by somebody who was lovesick for them and trying to get away. I also didn't like it when girls got crushes on me.

[Acecream]

i was so much afraid of „having to start to date“. I didn’t want to get older as I thought this meant I would have to. But I was getting older and older and felt like the time was coming to start, and than I was ashamed of the thought to date in my hometown, bc hell, there were people who knew me and they would see I’m trying to date… so I decided to wait until I leave the town. In a new town nobody would know me so it would be a good possibility to start. Well, but I didn‘t want to start and also, why should I directly start… and then I knew some people so it would be the same as before and people would recognise me and would start to talk to me about my dating life or about dating in general…

 

hell was I relieved when I discovered that I don‘t have to date and that that‘s totally fine haha

That I always thought, when someone had a crush on me that I should automatically have a crush on them too

bc you‘ll all know, that’s how love works. You immediately have to like people back bc otherwise you‘ll break their hearts and I wanted to be a nice person

[Guest Local chaos gremlin]

When I was younger, I never really had very many crushes - though it could just be thanks to my shitty memory - and the ones I can distinctly remember were a) from me confusing platonic/aesthetic attraction & gender envy with romantic attraction(particularly my earliest 2 from when I still thought I was straight™️ and thought that attraction to girls was the only form of possible attraction), b) caused by me thinking I had to do it because everyone else was, and c) faded relatively fast and only stayed for about a few weeks I think(though I'm mostly just extrapolating because time dilation™️). In fact, one of my most recent crushes had inadvertently made me realize I was partially on the aro spectrum in the first place (aroflux to be specific) since I would cycle between having a crush on this one guy in my sophomore year 3rd period and not having romantic feelings for him at all every few hours or so. This eventually led to a full blown romantic identity crisis about a month into the crush when I consulted my friends about it and one of them suggested I was aroflux, so I did some research on the term and the aromantic spectrum in general and stuck with it(plus I found out the guy I was crushing on was straight and all romantic feelings I had for him had completely disappeared almost instantly after that).

[The Gray Warlock]

On 6/29/2022 at 4:51 AM, Acecream said:

 

bc you‘ll all know, that’s how love works. You immediately have to like people back bc otherwise you‘ll break their hearts and I wanted to be a nice person

Then may God have mercy on me for all the hearts I broke.

[bro-im-nerodivergent-af]

Throughout my whole life I never had crushes, was always a bit confused as to what having a crush meant, and why I had to have one in the first place.  The thought of kissing someone makes me wanna throw up, and holding someone's hand/cuddling used to make me uncomfortable bec it was always associated with romantic relationships when I was growing up. I would find girls pretty and think it was a romantic feeling, but then I would be like "NOPE nooo ssssir kissing is gross EWW- also being in a committed relationship is dumb rn anyways bec im like 11... doesn't seem very practical lol" 

And I always though that being a romantic relationship was just stupid lmao

 

[Guest whatthehellislove]

I used to know this girl who I thought was just genuinely cool and a good friend, but people started to look at me weirdly whenever I was near her. This confused me, and after a while some people said I had a crush on her (I still didn't get it) I thought it was obvious that we were just friends. I didn't show any signs of romantic or sexual attraction towards her. I hate stereotypes 🥲

[Mihiko]

The latest, clear sign I was aromantic that I can remember was during my primary school. My classmates were talking about crushes in class, who they like and why. And I was just listening to them thinking 'why they are so excited about?' 'isn't she too young to be in love? She is like 11'.

So I was just being silent and awkward in my head. And then the most feared question come: Who is your crush? - moment of thinking and I said I don't. Of course, it's weird to not to have crush in age of 11 and I was obviously lying. That what my classmates assumed and they pushed me to tell them who was it. I come out with the first name I could recall and it was the name of the boy in my class. Fortunately, they weren't strong in trying to get us together because there was another girl who liked him and they were her friends. But then there were a few situations for which I wanted to hit myself in the head at that moment.

[itsrainingtacos]

There were plenty of signs in my childhood, all of them seem to be pretty common experiences within the aromantic community (which is how I came to the conclusion that I was aro, fun fact). For example, I would:

• easily get bored of romantic plots in films/shows and preferred non-romantic songs
• fake multiple crushes, especially when I felt pressured into having one by my classmates
• physically cringe (or at the very least be uncomfortable) when anyone assumed that I was going to get married and have kids as an adult
• feel awkward when people had crushes on me or asked to go on dates
• (in my early teenage years) always put off getting a boyfriend, and used the excuse “I’ll start dating when I’m 18/19/20” or “I’ll settle down with a nice man eventually” lol

And now here I am, 20 years old, a proud child-free aromantic person, never dated and likely never will. I’m sure younger me would be proud too 😌

[toastthegeneral]

When I think back now, there were a few things that could have been early signs of being aromantic - if I would have noticed them.

I never really had a crush on anyone or been in love. The "crushes" I've had were just intensely liking somebody but not in a romantic way. I still like the idea of a relationship, things like cuddling or doing fun things together or even things that are normally considered romantic, or simply spending really much time with someone I really like. But all of that not romantically, just platonically.

When watching shows or reading fanfictions or books I always tried searching for the non-romantic ones and found it really annoying if the story was centered around romance, since I really didn't care about it. It was always kinda sad when I found a really good story, but then it got more and more romantic.

I've been in relationships before, when I didn't realize yet that I was aromantic. There were never really any feelings while doing romantic couple things and I remember wondering if I'm supposed to feel something while kissing, and things like that. Another thing that I never liked was being with a partner in public, the whole holding hands or even kissing in public thing. I always wondered if we really needed to do things like that and felt really uncomfortable and even repulsed by it. But everyone was doing it, it was normal. And apparently it was very important since the other person would get sad if I said that I didn't like those kind of things. It just was lost on me how those things could be so important so someone.

And also, I tend to feel awkward or weirded out if people show their (romantic) affection for their partner in public.

And another thing that just came to my mind, when I imagine myself in a few years, it's always either living alone or, if I have a family, it isn't with a partner or anything like that.

Edited August 26, 2022 by toastthegeneral
The last point came to my mind in the moment that I posted .

[Ilikecats]

I never thought about romance or any of that stuff when I was a kid. Then in 6th grade my friend got a boyfriend and I was completely shocked, I thought people only did that in college! I also was completely oblivious to crushes, bored with romance, and I never had a crush, I just never saw myself having a romantic partner or getting married. I still think, Whaaat!? when someone tells me or mentions anything related to romance, weather it is crushes, it I have one, romantic partners, planning/wanting to get married, everything romance and sexual. It is all just crazy!

[Garlic Bread]

 I didn't have many early signs but the ones I had should have been an obvious clue.

As a kid I never had any crushes on anyone and whenever I told someone they didn't believe me which always confused me (this should have been a large sign). Also I always hated most romantic relations in movies and books because I thought that they were just wasting time and ruining the already good platonic relationship between the characters and I didn't like how I couldn't relate to any of it.

[Ilikecats]

I agree! whenever the romance part unfortunately happens in a book I would, and still do read it as fast as possible to get it over with.

[illumi]

not interested in romance in general i suppose

i really just want to befriend everyone and never thinks about advancing into the next step which is to form a romantic relationship let alone sexual. even during my teenage years rn [when everyone started crushing on others] i just never developed a crush at all and i never felt excluded. maybe because i thought not feeling romantic attraction ones whole life was common

[TormentDubz]

Didn't really have any "crushes" while I was growing up

On 9/10/2022 at 1:39 AM, Garlic Bread said:

 I didn't have many early signs but the ones I had should have been an obvious clue.

As a kid I never had any crushes on anyone and whenever I told someone they didn't believe me which always confused me (this should have been a large sign). Also I always hated most romantic relations in movies and books because I thought that they were just wasting time and ruining the already good platonic relationship between the characters and I didn't like how I couldn't relate to any of it.

Yeah same

[Merli]

I have got told afterwards (since I don't remember it, not important information) that my best friend in preschool had walked out and said something like "I'm in love with *my name*". It didn't affect me at all and I had no thought about that it could lead to a relationship, which it also didn't. We was best friends and I just didn't had any thought of an romantic part of it.

I also was totally clueless about what to say when they started talking about crushes in school at like 12 years age. I choosed one guy that was my "crush" but it was more an combination of aesthetic appreciation and that I just thought he was quite nice, but no attraction was a part of it. I was never nervous to talk to him (more then that it's a stranger) and simply didn't care about him if he didn't came too near, then I'd shy away as from everyone. And yes, I thought about choosing a girl instead but no one seemed nice enough and he was the least bad alternative. Kept him a few years, until I realised that I was aroace. I am now crushless and plan to continue that.