Questioning for 2 years

[Rinpochard]

So I just wanted to share a little bit of how I discovered I was aro. Not a vent or rant.

When I was 13-14 I suddenly somehow caught feelings for a random stranger. During that time I was straight ace. It kinda confused me because I had never felt like that before and I realized that when walking to school behind said person, lol.

That started my questioning. I wasn't entirely sure about my romantic orientation because I hadn't given it much thought. I went through a ton of labels, including biromantic, grey biromantic, lithromantic, greyaromantic, heteromantic, aegoromantic, and others. I think during the autumn of 8th grade (I was 14) I told my friend about the thing and she of course assumed it was a crush, but I said I don't want anything romantic with the person. She kept teasing me about it and I kinda felt like I was supposed to date them, but I never did and I kinda pushed the thing aside until the winter of 9th grade, when I was 15. During that time I did a lot of questioning again and I found the label "aromantic". I just thought "yes, that's me" because all feelings I've ever had for a real or fictional "crush" were less than romantic. I came out to my friend as aroace, which I talked about here. (All times I mention "friend" it's the same person).

Now in high school and after turning 16 I've considered myself aegoromantic again. I'm not as repulsed by romantic media as I was before, but I still don't feel any attraction. I barely ever see the person I "liked" anymore and I can go weeks without thinking of them. My friend has dated some people and we've actually discussed alloromanticism and aromanticism, because she's very romantic and I am very not romantic.

Yeah, that's how I figured out I'm not allo