Early signs that you were aro

[SirWalterTheThird]

This is for the new teens (13-14) if you just feel unrelated to ppl talking about kiss marry kill or crushes. It sucks especially when everyone does KMK at gatherings

[arodime]

I remember a concrete moment with maybe being around 10 knowing that if I had no family I would be more cool with it than others, because it did mean less to me, I knew I'd need it less than them to feel fulfilled. also marrying weirded me out. so much so, that when gay marriage became law I had no understanding why you would want that weird practice. it took me while to realize that me needing no partner is the exception.

[A_Mess]

Think I was like 11 or 12 when I was asked by my older brother’s gf if I had anyone I liked. I vividly remember saying “No. Boys are gross!” 
Everyone else in the room, including my mom, just laughed and said things “You’ll see when you get older,” telling me I’ll grow out of it.

Spoiler alert: Never grew out of it lol

[batbath]

When I was younger and I would be playing truth or dare with people, I'd often get asked who my crush was. Never having had one, I simply said that I didn't have one. Of course, this was followed by being told I was a liar by all my peers. Those moments stuck with me, and it took years later to figure out my aromanticism. 

Edited May 15 by batbath

[Jexen]

some of my early signs I can think of:

-being more comfortable with violence than anything romantic

-being annoyed that so many words have to have secondary romantic/sexual meanings, and how nearly anything positive I might say about someone else can easily be misinterpreted as romantic, especially in certain years of school. (in my native language the words for "female friend" and "girlfriend" are the same, also "male friend" and "boyfriend") like why isn't there a distinction between "love" and "love"or "like" and "like"

-never having a crush

-wondering why so many songs were about love

-I was also kinda the "aren't we to young for that" kid when my classmates would talk about dating and such

-it came as a shock to me that kindergarten/early school kids get crushes

-being somewhat scared of people thinking I like someone romantically

-never really thinking much about romance/my orientation before learning of aromanticism/asexuality and starting to question

[P4R4D0X]

On 5/20/2024 at 11:52 PM, Jexen said:

-being more comfortable with violence than anything romantic

Relatable.

[TheSpaceArrow]

On 5/20/2024 at 8:52 AM, Jexen said:

-it came as a shock to me that kindergarten/early school kids get crushes

-being somewhat scared of people thinking I like someone romantically

I probably said this in another discussion at some point but I once googled when kids start to get crushes and then look up really confused because do kids really get crushes at age 6 or do people just push heteronormativity onto them?

And wow, that second point is too relatable. Like, whenever someone asks me if I like anyone, my response is always "Of course not, I have a reputation to maintain" because I really don't like the idea of people assuming I like people, especially boys, romantically.

[allhailtheglowcloud]

39 minutes ago, Leistorm said:

And wow, that second point is too relatable. Like, whenever someone asks me if I like anyone, my response is always "Of course not, I have a reputation to maintain" because I really don't like the idea of people assuming I like people, especially boys, romantically.

THIS

This is why I act really weird around anyone that someone might presume I "like" which I think makes them assume I am romantically interested in them even more... Oh well 😅 

[Bren-Ae]

On 5/20/2024 at 10:52 AM, Jexen said:

some of my early signs I can think of:

-being more comfortable with violence than anything romantic

-being annoyed that so many words have to have secondary romantic/sexual meanings, and how nearly anything positive I might say about someone else can easily be misinterpreted as romantic, especially in certain years of school. (in my native language the words for "female friend" and "girlfriend" are the same, also "male friend" and "boyfriend") like why isn't there a distinction between "love" and "love"or "like" and "like"

-never having a crush

-wondering why so many songs were about love

-I was also kinda the "aren't we to young for that" kid when my classmates would talk about dating and such

-it came as a shock to me that kindergarten/early school kids get crushes

-being somewhat scared of people thinking I like someone romantically

-never really thinking much about romance/my orientation before learning of aromanticism/asexuality and starting to question

The "Aren't you too young for that" was similar to my experience. I sort of realized that I related to queer people  but I didn't understand in what way. I thought pan romantic or pansexual but really meant was that I was not attracted to people based on gender and as a whole. So many people online romantically "like" the characters the read about in romance and people have discourse about it, so I was thrown off for a long time because I thought I had to naturally innately feel that way. 

[Jexen]

On 6/8/2024 at 4:36 AM, Leistorm said:

"Of course not, I have a reputation to maintain"

Pretty much sums up my feelings on the matter, even if I might not have said it that way before. I will keep this response in mind tho

[Ekaterina]

On 5/20/2024 at 6:52 PM, Jexen said:

-being annoyed that so many words have to have secondary romantic/sexual meanings, and how nearly anything positive I might say about someone else can easily be misinterpreted as romantic, especially in certain years of school. (in my native language the words for "female friend" and "girlfriend" are the same, also "male friend" and "boyfriend") like why isn't there a distinction between "love" and "love"or "like" and "like"

... 

-I was also kinda the "aren't we to young for that" kid when my classmates would talk about dating and such

... 

-never really thinking much about romance/my orientation before learning of aromanticism/asexuality and starting to question

🤝Same here. 

(The "annoyed by too many secondary romantic meanings" part still stands) 

Edited June 10 by Ekaterina

[batbath]

Another one I just thought of - whenever people would confess to having a crush on me in high school, my response was generally along the lines of "ew", "gross", or "why?"

Looking back, part of that was definitely the result of having an extremely low self-esteem and unrecognized gender dysphoria. However, even the last time I got asked out (which wasn't too long ago, actually) I was sick to my stomach for a day or so.

[root22]

I was the exact opposite of a shipper. Up until my late teens I never saw a romantic relationship in films or shows coming. I would be watching, for example, Warehouse 13, and think "wow, these two are really great friends" with no denial in it whatsoever. I just didn't think that they had romantic chemistry. They are all 'just' really great friends.

[P4R4D0X]

Once I flat out asked a highschooler why ppl fell in love (she probably didn't know either, lol) and she said it might be cuz ppl don't want to be alone. I said that I was fine with being alone.

[MEOWXFS]

On 5/15/2016 at 7:59 AM, Zema said:

I didn't even notice the people around me were getting into romantic relationships during senior school unless someone specifically told me (and that didn't happen very often). I think I was only ever aware of three romantic relationships that the people around me were getting into, but looking back I feel like that was nowhere near the number that actually occurred.

Omg same,, I have this friend who tells me like just talking and he says "she likes him bro.." and im like WHAT??! WHO?!!?1

And he's like "Uh, you couldnt tell, its so obvious? LMAOO" and then, from so on, i would realise actions she did that were (damn) obvious and i didnt even realise,, 

Istg and he does that everytime and then im haunted cuz im so aware thanks to him.... grr

[tiger_hoods12]

The biggest one for me was this one time in middle school, I was talking to my friend. We started talking about what we would look like in the future, what we would imagine ourselves being. My one friend starting talking about how she couldn’t picture herself ever being a mother and said how she didn’t ever want kids, just a whole bunch of dogs and maybe a husband or wife. Then I replied with “I could see myself as a mother, but a wife to anyone, no way!” I then imagine myself being of these different types of things, with these different jobs, life purposes, and goals. I imagined my future self as an astronaut, an explorer traveling the world, a film director, a CEO, even a mother, and all these other things that honestly brought joy, excitement, warmth doing. But when I imagined myself as a wife, there was this feeling of dread, hesitation, and coldness. I honestly couldn’t picture it. All of the other visions I had created of myself were clear as day and so vivid. But imagining myself as a wife to anyone made the picture dark, cold, and vague. Me being 11-12 years old at the time, I shook it out of my head and never thought of it again because I didn’t think it was that big of a deal. But that was FOR SURE my biggest sign that I was on the aromantic spectrum.

Some other times were just me being a kid and thinking that romance was overrated and boring. Always rolling my eyes at romantic scenes. Getting frustrated when someone on a TV show stay single all throughout it but randomly got together with some random character in the end. LIKE HOW DARE THEY STAY SINGLE! Also always latching onto and adoring characters that never dated anyone. And as I grew up, being a hopeless romantic but only towards people who wanted romance. Like I was the only single friend you could talk to about how much you love your boyfriend/girlfriend/partner without me getting jealous. I loved seeing others find love and being happy, but if it ever happened to me…yucky, gross, and just no 🤢!

Edited August 14 by tiger_hoods12

[AugusttheFraugust]

one of the main times i should have realized i’m aro was when i first found out i’m gay and have 0 attraction towards guys, so i was like, “okay, time to have a crush on a girl now” and then just picked someone randomly out of the room??? like the person i picked was nice, i liked talking with her and found her cute, but i had no feelings of wanting to date her or anything. i just figured that now that i had accepted myself as gay, it was time to start having crushes, and literally just picked someone?? i found out later that this a pretty common experience for other aro people, i really should have realized sooner haha 

[Dragon_Lover11]

Never had a crush, all the supposed "crushes" were squishes. Thought the idea of anyone liking me (romanticly) was disgusting... though I was sad when I had to leave a good friend in kindergarten. It was platonic though.