How do you start to live life more as your ace self, if you have a complicated history?
TL;DR How do you start living authentically as an asexual person, instead of compulsively seeking out sex due to trauma/hypersexuality, trying to use sex to make friends when you don't know how to make friends otherwise, etc? How do you make choices because you want to make them, instead of trying to be socially valued, when society seems to value me more when i have sex I don't want?
So a (not so) brief history of my experiences
cw brief mentions of trauma, and social stigma against people who don't have sex
Basically, I am on the asexual spectrum and also hypersexual due to trauma.
I am also late-diagnosed autistic, and have a hard time getting close to anybody.
I'm super friendly, but I get lost trying to figure out how to actually have close friends/confidants/etc. I struggle to ask for or accept help, or let people in on my genuine thoughts and feelings.
I have used sex as a tool repeatedly in my life to basically bypass all the stuff I don't know about how to make close friends, and to feel wanted in a controlled way as a traumatized person.
I realized a year or two ago i am on the ace spectrum.
At least half of the sex I have had (probably more) is sex I did not truly want and was just a tool, a violation of myself, an attempt at feeling valued, or a trauma response/something I did automatically instead of because I wanted it. I also have psychosis and use sex to escape the psychosis.
I don't know how to like, actually start living my life as my ace-spec self. Ideally, sex would be a pretty minimal part of my life.
I want to learn to bond with people through my interests and nonsexual bonding activities. I want to feel confident about myself regardless of whether someone wants to fuck me.
But so much of my life currently revolves around it. It's not something I can just cold turkey stop relying on in all these unhealthy ways.
Even when I'm alone, I'm thinking about how I could dress more attractively, or where to meet people who might want me sexually.
None of it is actually for me.
It's not driven by me wanting or enjoying sex. It's driven by wanting to feel wantable.
I genuinely don't know if I believe that anybody would still care about me if I stopped having sex. Even people I don't have sex with, I've internalized the stigma that if I want to have social value, I need to be "a person who fucks" (or better, the super hot fuckable person everyone wants but can't have).
I hate that. It's such bullshit. And also, it is sorta a very common aspect of the society I live in, unfortunately. The culture I live in is obsessed with controlling people's sexualities and making sex appeal a whole profitable industry, and if you don't have sex, you're treated as a failure who needs to be controlled/made over/etc into caring about being hot and having sex.
I don't know how to process these things and stop internalizing all that stigma. I just want to be me. I just want to live my life and feel like my life is valued by more than just me. But to be honest, if I stop having sex/being available for sex, I think it would be valued by a lot fewer people. (I am also a member of multiple other marginalized communities that can sorta add up to me being the one left out and expected to stay home and die alone tbh).
Has anyone else been through anything similar? How do you get through all this and just start being free and living life the way you want to?
It's so absurd because I put so much effort into pursuing sex I don't want, I could just stop all that effort. But trauma brain is terrified of that, it's genuinely a massive fear to me of what would happen if I just, stopped doing all the things the world has convinced me I have to do to be safe and valued.
cw more sexual trauma stuff
With sexual trauma, the way i made myself feel less scared during it was by going along with it. I pretend i wanted it because then it's not abuse and I wasn't in danger.
And i feel like i just do that every day now,
TL;DR How do you start living authentically as an asexual person, instead of compulsively seeking out sex due to trauma/hypersexuality, trying to use sex to make friends when you don't know how to make friends otherwise, etc? How do you make choices because you want to make them, instead of trying to be socially valued, when society seems to value me more when i have sex I don't want?
So a (not so) brief history of my experiences
cw brief mentions of trauma, and social stigma against people who don't have sex
Basically, I am on the asexual spectrum and also hypersexual due to trauma.
I am also late-diagnosed autistic, and have a hard time getting close to anybody.
I'm super friendly, but I get lost trying to figure out how to actually have close friends/confidants/etc. I struggle to ask for or accept help, or let people in on my genuine thoughts and feelings.
I have used sex as a tool repeatedly in my life to basically bypass all the stuff I don't know about how to make close friends, and to feel wanted in a controlled way as a traumatized person.
I realized a year or two ago i am on the ace spectrum.
At least half of the sex I have had (probably more) is sex I did not truly want and was just a tool, a violation of myself, an attempt at feeling valued, or a trauma response/something I did automatically instead of because I wanted it. I also have psychosis and use sex to escape the psychosis.
I don't know how to like, actually start living my life as my ace-spec self. Ideally, sex would be a pretty minimal part of my life.
I want to learn to bond with people through my interests and nonsexual bonding activities. I want to feel confident about myself regardless of whether someone wants to fuck me.
But so much of my life currently revolves around it. It's not something I can just cold turkey stop relying on in all these unhealthy ways.
Even when I'm alone, I'm thinking about how I could dress more attractively, or where to meet people who might want me sexually.
None of it is actually for me.
It's not driven by me wanting or enjoying sex. It's driven by wanting to feel wantable.
I genuinely don't know if I believe that anybody would still care about me if I stopped having sex. Even people I don't have sex with, I've internalized the stigma that if I want to have social value, I need to be "a person who fucks" (or better, the super hot fuckable person everyone wants but can't have).
I hate that. It's such bullshit. And also, it is sorta a very common aspect of the society I live in, unfortunately. The culture I live in is obsessed with controlling people's sexualities and making sex appeal a whole profitable industry, and if you don't have sex, you're treated as a failure who needs to be controlled/made over/etc into caring about being hot and having sex.
I don't know how to process these things and stop internalizing all that stigma. I just want to be me. I just want to live my life and feel like my life is valued by more than just me. But to be honest, if I stop having sex/being available for sex, I think it would be valued by a lot fewer people. (I am also a member of multiple other marginalized communities that can sorta add up to me being the one left out and expected to stay home and die alone tbh).
Has anyone else been through anything similar? How do you get through all this and just start being free and living life the way you want to?
It's so absurd because I put so much effort into pursuing sex I don't want, I could just stop all that effort. But trauma brain is terrified of that, it's genuinely a massive fear to me of what would happen if I just, stopped doing all the things the world has convinced me I have to do to be safe and valued.
cw more sexual trauma stuff
With sexual trauma, the way i made myself feel less scared during it was by going along with it. I pretend i wanted it because then it's not abuse and I wasn't in danger.
And i feel like i just do that every day now,
even outside of those situations and when im genuinely safe, I just pretend to want sex every day.
(Also i know i need therapy but i have so much trauma and mental health issues, asexuality has not had time to come up yet in the 45 minutes a week I get)
Thank you for reading if you read all this idk. Thanks for being here and hope you take care.
https://redd.it/1lgabhr
@asexualityonreddit
(Also i know i need therapy but i have so much trauma and mental health issues, asexuality has not had time to come up yet in the 45 minutes a week I get)
Thank you for reading if you read all this idk. Thanks for being here and hope you take care.
https://redd.it/1lgabhr
@asexualityonreddit
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It’s been a year since I came out
It feels so nice being able to put a name to how I feel about sex and intimacy.
https://redd.it/1lggffk
@asexualityonreddit
It feels so nice being able to put a name to how I feel about sex and intimacy.
https://redd.it/1lggffk
@asexualityonreddit
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I found a weird doesn't look like right to me ageosexal asexual flag I just want to know if this is a official or just a made up flag that someone randomly made?
https://redd.it/1lgi2ye
@asexualityonreddit
https://redd.it/1lgi2ye
@asexualityonreddit
How do you feel about anime?
I'm curious, I can't say this for every anime, but all the ones I've tried watching always have these sexual "jokes" and/or moments that always make me really uncomfortable, I don't even get what's the point.
https://redd.it/1lgjkwk
@asexualityonreddit
I'm curious, I can't say this for every anime, but all the ones I've tried watching always have these sexual "jokes" and/or moments that always make me really uncomfortable, I don't even get what's the point.
https://redd.it/1lgjkwk
@asexualityonreddit
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I hate when people go like "ooh who got you smiling at your phone like that?"
Like memes aren't a thing that exists and EVERYONE knows about, like you couldn't have read an news article about puppies from a shelter being adopted, or read about your favorite show getting a new season, or get a text from a friend telling you about getting a promotion or ANYTHING else. I swear I despise how fixated society is on romantic relationships so damm much, to the point people seem to think that's the only or primarily thing that could bring you joy. And this is especially done to people who haven't been known to date much in an attempt to "push them" to talk about their possibly love life like it's a novelty or a spectacle.
Man, just shut up
https://redd.it/1lgnarl
@asexualityonreddit
Like memes aren't a thing that exists and EVERYONE knows about, like you couldn't have read an news article about puppies from a shelter being adopted, or read about your favorite show getting a new season, or get a text from a friend telling you about getting a promotion or ANYTHING else. I swear I despise how fixated society is on romantic relationships so damm much, to the point people seem to think that's the only or primarily thing that could bring you joy. And this is especially done to people who haven't been known to date much in an attempt to "push them" to talk about their possibly love life like it's a novelty or a spectacle.
Man, just shut up
https://redd.it/1lgnarl
@asexualityonreddit
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