confuddled Posted April 20, 2023 Share Posted April 20, 2023 hello everyone! I would like to start this off with saying i am an alloace person looking for advice from aro folks about my current relationship. a tad bit of background information on this is me and my boyfriend have been in a relationship for over 9 months, but getting right into it we are both on the ace spectrum, but today we had a talk and he came out to me as being on the aro spectrum (aro-flux) we talked about it and both are more than a little lost on how to continue it. I was doing research on aromanticism at a point in my life where i belived i may be aro but decided that is not me, so i do understand and i made sure to express the fact that that was 100% valid and i didnt feel any negative feelings over this realization, that i would never be upset at someone for being who they are. My boyfriend has periods where hes 100% comfortable with physical touch (kissing, cuddling, handholding, ect) and does feel romantic attraction towards me, sometimes he feels romantic attraction but isnt up for romatic gestures/touch, and sometimes he doesn't feel any of it, i think that nobody is 100% compatible in a relationship but success in one takes comprimises and i am willing to make them, i just dont know what they are, and how we can go about still being in the relationship as we both agreed that we didnt want to break up, and i dont think a QPR would be the best situation because i very much do have a lot of romatic attraction for him. so i guess my main question is: does anyone have any advice or suggestions of what things we should talk about relationship wise? how to continue the relationship? we talked briefly about possibly taking breaks when he had moments of no romantic reciprocation, is anyone in a aro-allo relationship and how do you make it work? thank you! TLDR: Does anyone have any advice or experience on maintaining a allo-aro relationship? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
hemogoblin Posted April 21, 2023 Share Posted April 21, 2023 This is a very tough question. I don't have advice based on experience, but I will try and help you consider what to think about. What would breaks mean? Are you opening your relationship? Are you free to date others (maybe just casually) while on a break? Will you be low/no contact during breaks? Will you be able to separate platonic/romantic during times where you need to if you'll be staying in the same amount of contact? Will breaks mean your relationship is in a platonic phase but you stay in regular contact? Is there a limit to the amount of time where lack of romantic attraction or being on break would be a deal breaker? For each of you, what's the difference between romantic and platonic? Is it directly tied to specific actions for either of you? Is it merely feelings based? Is he comfortable with you acting romantically when his romantic attraction fades? (Romance is more than touch; are there gestures or time together he'd be uncomfortable with other than specific kinds of touch/intimacy? Ex. spending [x] amount of time together, love notes, going out together and having it look potentially like a date, etc.) What are your future goals for this relationship? Living together? Sleeping in the same room/bed? Having another room for necessary times? Shared finances? (If show, how do you foresee doing this? Completely combining finances or keeping separate accounts + a joint account you both contribute to?) Marriage? Or a commitment ceremony of some type? Do you want to wear rings? Children? Are there times where you'd end up coparenting separately if you're doing breaks? What do you imagine your custody arrangement looking like? Where would you like to live? Where would you never want to live? The only advice I have is the advice I give anyone for any type of relationship: keep communicating. It seems like you two do that pretty well already, so just keep doing that and don't lose it. =) 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
confuddled Posted April 21, 2023 Author Share Posted April 21, 2023 16 minutes ago, hemogoblin said: The only advice I have is the advice I give anyone for any type of relationship: keep communicating. It seems like you two do that pretty well already, so just keep doing that and don't lose it. =) Thank you so much, this did help a lot with where I was stuck in my processing the situation and i really appreciate it :D 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rob Posted May 4, 2023 Share Posted May 4, 2023 it could be a good idea to not think so hard about the specifics. go with the flow, learn to work with each other in these new circumstances. the right words will come when you are both ready and if they never do that doesn't mean you have to break up, some relationships are a bit more vague and out of the norm and there's nothing wrong with that 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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