r/Relationships: Asexuality Edition

Transcript

Courtney: Hello everyone and welcome back. My name is Courtney. I am here with my spouse Royce. Together we are The Ace Couple, and today we are wading back into the deep, dark depths of Reddit with a new subreddit that we have not extensively explored before today: r/relationships. Now just a quick glance over some of the titles when we search the word asexual in this subreddit. It seems like we have a diversity of threads here. We have aces talking about their parents, we have aces talking about their non-ace partners, we have non-ace partners talking about their ace partners. So I think this is gonna be an interesting one, and we’re just gonna jump in and see what we find.

Courtney: Our first post today is entitled ‘Almost Girlfriend.’ 26, female, came out as asexual. I’m 23-year-old trans man, unsure how to navigate this. Back in October, I met a woman at a friend’s birthday party. We hit it off extremely well. I think I’ve never felt such an instantaneous spark with a person. I was interested in her immediately in a way that wasn’t platonic, and I’m quite certain she felt the same. Since then, we’ve been talking nearly every day and going out up to twice a week, normally for coffee on Wednesday mornings. and to a bar close to both of us on Saturdays. We have also kissed for the first time 2 weeks ago and twice more since then.

Courtney: By our second Wednesday ‘date’— date is in quotes— I told her straight up that I am transgender. I pass well and live stealth. However, I don’t have all my surgeries done, so I thought she should know given the direction our relationship was headed. She took it well and didn’t appear to have qualms about it. Great, I thought, and we proceeded as normal. Yesterday we didn’t go out, but rather she came to my place. We talked a lot and eventually landed on the topic of us. I expressed I was pleased with where things seemed to be going and that I really liked her romantically. She expressed the same. Also absolutely fantastic, probably the best response anyone could hope for. I tentatively mentioned the word couple, which she was also very enthusiastic about.

Courtney: Point being, I was genuinely about to officially ask the cliché, “Will you be my girlfriend?” She then told me she “had to tell me something.” Which doesn’t tend to bode well, and it kind of didn’t. She told me she was asexual, basically. I think I probably looked as disappointed as I felt because she apologized immediately, which I assured her she didn’t need to because she couldn’t change that about herself. Things sort of became pretty awkward after, and with things still up in the air, she left soon after.

Courtney: She texted me earlier today another apology, basically that she’s sorry for not telling me sooner. I hate it and I’m kind of upset. I brought up my transness to her over a month ago because I knew it could have been a dealbreaker for her, and I didn’t want to string her along if so. It was an immensely difficult thing to do. I was anxiety-ridden all damn week leading up to it. There was no reason in my view she couldn’t have come clean about her asexuality then and there. I feel incredibly disrespected right now. But moreover, I’m not interested in being in a sexless relationship. Not only am I a human being with desires, I also need to have a partner love both me and my body such as it is. This isn’t something I will compromise on.

Courtney: Clearly we are incompatible. I just— don’t really know how to break it to her, nor do I really know how to move on, I guess? My life has kind of revolved around this woman since October. I was so sincerely interested in her. I don’t really want to be friends after this because I need time and space to get over her, but also not sure how to just pretend none of this ever happened. I’ve never dated for obvious reasons. This is my first brush with some kind of heartbreak, if you could call it that. I also strongly suspect she would want to continue being friends, and I don’t know how to tell her I can’t do that. Any advice is appreciated. Okay, well that’s a lot to unpack right there.

Royce: Okay, so this is being— okay, so this was posted the day after this conversation. It looks like they have had zero discussion about what the other person’s asexuality would even entail in a potential relationship.

Courtney: Mm-hmm. Unless that was part of the initial conversation and it just didn’t, you know, get relayed to us here, but it sounds like they were not in any sort of named exclusive relationship and that they have kissed, what, 4 times? And he’s saying that he feels disrespected that she didn’t tell him she was asexual sooner.

Royce: Yeah.

Courtney: That’s wild.

Royce: Uh-huh.

Courtney: That is absolutely baffling to me. Because it sounds like she brought it up the minute there was a conversation about actually changing the nature of their relationship. So that is like— wow. Wow, that’s baffling. [laughs] Now, I gotta say, extremely not okay for him to use the “I am a human being” as the reason why he doesn’t want a sexless relationship. That, not okay. That, that is very much not okay. I, I would think and hope that someone who has just recently, by his own admission, had to sit with the anxiety leading up to coming out to someone— I would hope that he would be empathetic to her situation. But he very clearly did not take it well. I feel awful for this girl who immediately apologized for being asexual and followed up with another apology. Like, I’m— I, I really, really wanna know what his actual reaction was to warrant that, ’cause that sounds like some deep asexual insecurity, which unfortunately many people in our community do have at some point or another.

Royce: Yeah, this post didn’t get a ton of attention, but the comments that do exist basically say, dude, turn this around and see if it feels okay still. Like, if the asexual person came out first and then you weren’t ready to come out as trans and like waited a few weeks longer, would you still have— like, would you have the same reaction?

Courtney: Yeah, which, which makes me think there, there could be one of two things happening here. It could be that he is not conceptualizing asexuality as the orientation that can come with insecurities and hangups and social pressures, and that he’s just not treating it with the tenderness that, that deserves. Or it, it very well could be, as a trans man, that he does have some of his own hangups about his own relationship to sexuality, his body. There was one very specific sentence that makes me think this. where he said, I need to have my partner love both me and my body such as it is. Which is very understandable that he feels that way. And he absolutely deserves to have that.

Courtney: However, we know a lot of times with allosexual people, the very thought of being in a relationship with an asexual person, whether or not— sex is a possibility in this relationship, whether or not the ace person is neutral towards sex, favorable, or repulsed. The idea of having a partner who doesn’t inherently, from within— inside of them feel sexually attracted to you, queer or not, trans or not, a lot of allosexual people have this immediate defensive barrier and a feeling of insecurity. that can and often does get projected onto, uh, the ace person in that scenario.

Courtney: And I totally understand that that can be even more complicated and further compounded with other such identities, um, like transness. But that very much does need to be something that he can sit with and unpack and figure out for himself. Because whatever horrible immediate reaction of disappointment that he felt and emoted. [laughs] Um, and the very immediate explanation of, “I am a human being with desires.” I try to at least on a— on an individual basis give especially queer people a little, little tiny bit of a benefit of the doubt when they pair sexuality with humanity. And I mean, same as well, we’ve talked about this with the very sex-positive branch of like the disability community, because often having a sexuality that is outside of social norms is also paired with dehumanization. So both with the queer community and with the disabled communities, there’s very often a societal— protest to intertwine humanity with sexuality.

Courtney: But I do think that is fundamentally a harmful way to, um, deal with these sort of social prejudices. It really, really dehumanizes asexual people. And it’s hard with these Reddit posts because you don’t know the individual writing this, but— There have been many a post in our previous r/episodes where, you know, someone will be like, “I’m not acephobic, but—” and then they’ll say something like a little bit acephobic. [laughs] There are these little slips that come out in a lot of these anonymous posts, and I do consider “I’m not interested in being in a sexless relationship because I am a human being with desires.” He so, so very easily could have said, you know, “I personally really desire a sexual relationship,” and that would not have fundamentally dehumanized asexual people. And I do kind of wonder how he feels, because he was nervous to come out to her as trans, and was relieved when she said, “Not a problem for me,” and now she kind of did turn it back on him and said, you know, ‘Here’s the thing I have to tell you.’ Maybe she was feeling a little anxious about it, and it sounds like he reacted terribly.

Royce: Yeah, I will say, reading this, he says that his life has revolved around her since October.

Courtney: This post was made in December, so 2 months since they started dating, which is not very long actually if you are saying you feel disrespected because someone who you were not even, you know, boyfriend/girlfriend with yet. Like, he said, I was about to ask, will you be my girlfriend? So they had not had that conversation yet, only known each other 2 months tops. That is such a reasonable amount of time to come out to anyone.

Royce: It does kind of seem to me that someone who states here that they haven’t dated up to this point was feeling very into the prospect of a relationship and probably had it pictured in their mind what it was supposed to be. And when the reality didn’t match the vision, they had a very, like, harsh emotional reaction to that.

Courtney: Yeah, which that, that’s the sort of thing we see with lots of different posts from people with all walks of life. So it does sound like that scenario for sure. It’s also curious because every individual person in every relationship is going to be different, but, you know, an allosexual trans person dating an asexual could be the best thing or the worst thing, depending on individual preferences, individual emotions. I have heard some trans folks who are like, yeah, I love my asexual partner because, you know, maybe there is a little, um, gender dysphoria, maybe there is a concern about, you know, in trans dating people might bring up genital preference, like that, that’s— those are concerns that might be going through someone’s head when they come out to a prospective love interest as trans.

Courtney: And there have been some situations where it’s like, oh, you’re ace? You do not care at all about bodies or genitalia? That is a relief. [laughs] Then there are some who really do want and need, as this OP put himself, someone who loves my body as it is, and that can be a difficult hurdle to overcome if you’re in a relationship with someone who doesn’t. However— and of course there’s all kinds of things in the middle, it could be neither the best thing or the worst thing, it could very easily be somewhere in the middle— but I suspect when he came out as trans to her, she may have done a little mental calculation and been like, this would be a really inappropriate time to come out as asexual. ’Cause that could, like, totally take the wind out of his sails when he’s doing this, you know, potentially very anxiety-inducing thing, being vulnerable and open and honest with her. It could also present a new problem. And later on when she did, it did present a new problem.

Courtney: And, and maybe she sensed in him that he wasn’t going to be totally okay with the asexuality. Maybe she had some sort of reason for feeling anxious about it. ’Cause I am trying to picture that now. Don’t you think that would be a little strange if, you know, you’ve been hanging out with someone regularly for a couple months, and he’s like, ‘Hey, I need to tell you something. I’m trans.’ Instead of just being like, That’s wonderful. That’s not an issue. You know, I’m gonna be really supportive of you. By the way, I’m asexual. I— wouldn’t that be weird? I feel like that would be weird, but it sounds like, based on what he’s alleging, he wanted that conversation to happen then. And I don’t— I, I get the sneaking suspicion he didn’t.

Royce: I’ve been going back and forth in my head about whether that would be too abrupt or it’d feel dismissive or it would immediately spiral into a conversation, how it’s not exactly the same thing, so why’d you bring it up now? Like, yeah, because gender identity and orientation— I, I don’t know. I think, I think there’s no real telling if that would have been a good conversation or a bad one, because I think the answer would vary drastically based off of the two people having the conversation.

Courtney: Yeah, it would, because I mean, with the least generous reading possible It could be like, “Oh, by the way, I’m trans,” and it’s like, “Great, I wouldn’t be attracted to you either way.” That’s terrible. That’s terrible. And the thing is, like, unless both parties have a very specific, uh, pre-established type of humor, like, I, I don’t recommend that. [laughs] But, um, even if she didn’t say it that way, that is how it could be received. And I imagine she is very aware of that as an ace person who knows she’s ace. To the point of, oh, if this relationship is going any further, I need to come out to this partner or prospective partner. I imagine she’s hyper-aware of the fact that that is how it could be received. All right, I think that’s all I have to say about that one. Your turn.

Royce: Yeah, we spent more time discussing that one than I expected.

Courtney: I just kept having thoughts. The words are flowing and endless. [laughs] Well, this one is short.

Royce: Me, a 22-year-old guy, likes an asexual girl, 24, who keeps giving me mixed signals. What is up with our relationship? The post follows: There’s a girl who I’ve come to know as my crush. She and I have become great partners in terms of working on assignments and stuff. College, I assume? But she self-identifies as asexual and aromantic. She knows that I have a crush on her and she does not— wish to be friends with anyone she personally knows in real life. Not me, nor anyone else. She spends her entire life on her computer, from what I can tell.

Royce: It’s also worth mentioning that both of us are diagnosed on the autism spectrum and have a terrible time socializing. But what’s weird is that she and I will end up getting into stupid quibbles, and she’ll tell me that she hates me/dislikes me. And yet, that she still wants to work with me and take classes together. From my perspective, I feel like she obviously doesn’t hate me, or why would she even dream working with me or interacting with me at all? So I explained this to my psychologist a while back, and he strongly believes that she does have a crush on me.

Courtney: What?

Royce: And that the reason she is lashing out is because she can’t decide whether she wants me in her life or not.

Courtney: No.

Royce: That is, she secretly hopes that she is asexual but that she does in fact like me.

Courtney: No.

Royce: And the— that the crux of the conflict is within her, not within me.

Courtney: No.

Royce: I’m just so confused. —about what this is, and further, what I should do. So that’s what I’m asking the community. Can you guys figure out whether she likes me or not? Is my psychologist correct?

Courtney: No. Uh, what you should do is fire that psychologist immediately.

Royce: I picked that one out of the big list because I knew you’d get fired up about—

Courtney: You want me to rage about psychologists? I will rage about psychologists if that’s what you want, Royce. [laughs] [laughs] Uh, no, absolutely fucking not. Um, okay, okay, okay. Um, you’re not getting mixed signals. She seems to have made it very clear that you are classmates and that’s the extent of it. And she doesn’t want a relationship further than classmates, uh, and I don’t know, working study partners, whatever the situation is. Maybe they’re lab partners? I don’t know what kind of— schooling they’re doing, but, um, if that’s what she’s telling you, that, that’s, that’s it.

Royce: Oh wow, I just saw that this post was made 10 years ago.

Courtney: That’s it? That’s, that’s your answer? Okay, any psychologist— first of all, this sounds like one of those psychologists who doesn’t think asexuality is real, and, uh, fuck him or her or them. Uh, fuck all of the psychologists who don’t think asexuality is real. I know they exist. I used to have one. But asexuality aside, a psychologist I don’t think should ever, ever be telling a client of theirs what someone else is thinking or feeling. This is enabling, like, potentially dangerous predatory behavior. It sounds like there is a young woman here saying, this is the extent of our relationship, this is all this is.

Courtney: And this young man is going to his psychologist being like, “But I don’t know, I really think she likes me. She says she’s asexual, she says she doesn’t want me, uh, she says she doesn’t even want to be friends.” And the psychologist says, “Yeah, she totally has a crush on you. This is how girls act when they’re interested in you. You should pursue that.” Absolutely not. Absolutely not. If this man becomes harassing, stalking, abusive, anything in that way, this psychologist is partially culpable. I also want to know what this, uh, alleged conflict is. Okay, also, she secretly hopes that she’s asexual? What does that mean? What does that mean?

Courtney: That should never come out of anyone’s mouth ever, let alone an alleged— mental health professional. She does in fact like me, and the crux of the conflict is within her. What? It sounds like the conflict is she doesn’t want to be more than fucking lab partners and he does. That’s the conflict. Absolutely not. This is some boys will be boys ass shit. [laughs] I can’t, I can’t.

Courtney: Gosh, there are so many psychologists in this world that are so worthy of hate. That was— that was the other option when we sat down at the microphone today. I have a whole episode rant about a very specific bullshit fucking psychologist that I need to rant about, and I just didn’t have the energy today. And yet here we are. Alright, let’s find one that doesn’t have to deal with psychologists. Whom I hate.

Courtney: This OP is a 28-year-old man who says, my girlfriend, also 28, of 10 years tells her family that we are both asexual. I found out recently that the entire time we have been together, she told her family that we are in no way interested in intimacy. Not that we are celibate in waiting, but that we are disgusted at the thought of it. However, we are sexually active and her family knows she is on the pill. She doesn’t want her family to know about the intimate details of her life, and I get that. I suggested she just tell her parents to butt out of our personal life, but she definitely prefers this way. Is this really harming anyone? This obviously isn’t a regular topic of discussion since it hasn’t come up in the decade we’ve been together.

Courtney: It blows my mind because this is the first time I’m hearing of this. At the very least, shouldn’t I have known beforehand so that I could avoid exposing her lie? I feel weird that she would lie about my sexuality. Lying about herself is one thing, but I’m more weirded out about her lying about me. Again, I feel weird, but I don’t really feel mad because I don’t know what I’d expect. Like, I wouldn’t know what I would want her to say to them or what I would say to them. I in no way want to have a conversation like, ‘Sometimes we have sex,’ with her parents, and it hasn’t naturally come up in 10 years, possibly because of what she told them. Maybe she spared me the awkwardness with her lie. Logically, it’s a perfect situation.

Courtney: Now here’s the part where I buried the lead. She is mostly asexual. Where I very much am not. That is the biggest struggle in our relationship. We are working to escape a dead bedroom situation and it is going okay. There are moments when she desires sex and we are honest with each other and things are improving, but yeah, I believe when she said she was disgusted at the thought of intimacy because it’s true most of the time. This is most likely the root cause of why this bothers me.

Courtney: Other quick info: we are in a long-distance relationship. She lives with and is very close with her family. I am pretty close to them too and stay with them about 5 days days per month. They like me and I like them. Both of us are childfree and they’re— and the family knows. Both of us have no plans to marry and the family knows. My family is 100% out of the picture, so I have a very different perspective. I came here because I want to talk about it with her, but I have no idea what I want or how to feel. It’s just so strange of a situation that I had to ask, what would you guys do or think? Has anyone heard of this... strategy before?

Courtney: Okay, here’s the part that I’m like, I need more information than you gave me because— I don’t know, maybe there is— maybe that’s all there is to it? I just feel like the way some of these things were worded allows for a lot of gray area or paraphrasing that might not give the full picture. Thus is the nature of a lot of these posts and hard to tell, but— she is asexual. [laughs] It’s— it kinda sounds like he hasn’t come to terms with the fact that she is asexual, and that that might be part of the overarching issue that hasn’t actually been identified here? Now I’m playing armchair psychologist, oh no.

Courtney: Uh, ’cause why would you bury the lead and several paragraphs down be like, “By the way, she is asexual and I’m not, and that’s actually an issue in our relationship.” Like, not, not knowing exactly what was said to whom, that would at least seem a little more understandable than neither one of them is asexual and she just doesn’t want her family to know that they have sex, so she’s lying and she’s like, we’re actually both asexual.

Courtney: But if she is asexual, and if this is something— if she’s so close with her family that they knew about this already, if she has come out to them, if they’re aware she’s asexual, Like, maybe this was a concern about their relationship that the family had, ’cause that happens. Like, I don’t know where people get this idea where like, oh, your family doesn’t wanna know about your sex life, you don’t have to come out to them as asexual. Like, no, actually, a lot of— a lot of families do actually ask about the details or give the little wink wink, nudge nudge.

Courtney: So if they in any way knew that she was asexual and then started dating someone, it would make sense to me if they were like, “Is that gonna be a problem?” And— I don’t know, maybe, maybe in that situation, it felt like the easiest out to not having a deeply complicated relation— or like, a deeply complicated conversation with them, might have just been like, “Oh, he’s ace too.” Maybe, [laughs] maybe that’s an easier out than— especially if it is a very contentious part of the relationship. Like, if the two in the relationship are actively working through it, that might not be something you want to share with anybody right now, if at all ever. Is lying about it a little bit weird? Maybe.

Courtney: But I feel like this is not a question you ask to people on Reddit. I feel like if it’s bothering you, you first decide if that’s really what’s bothering you. Like, is the lie actually what’s bothering you? [laughs] Or is the fact that the lie is skirting around an underlying issue you have— is that underlying issue actually what’s bothering you? Because then those are two different conversations. If it really is the lie that’s bothering you, ask her why she’s— why she said that about you. And like, maybe that’ll be a really illuminating conversation. Maybe she will have a story like, ‘I said it here in this situation because it felt like the safest, easiest thing to say.’ and now we’re just running with it.

Courtney: And if that’s something that is forgivable to you, if that’s something that you can work through, then you can start from there and have that conversation. But I don’t know, weird, I, I, I don’t have this instinct at all to ask for strangers’ opinions on things like this. Uh, to his credit, he did end with, kindly skip suggestions to break up, that’s not what I’m here for. Which is good, because I will be honest, 90% of the non-ace specific subreddits that are talking about like, I have a partner who’s asexual and I’m not, most of those comments are just a cesspool of there’s no fixing this, there’s no salvaging it, an ace can never be with a normal person, because of course they’re not using allo. [laughs] And they’re like, break up now, there’s no way, it can’t happen, fundamentally incompatible.

Courtney: So like, good on him for I guess skirting that already, but I feel like people who don’t understand her, or asexuality, or the actual family dynamic here. It is kind of just opening it up to a bunch of allosexual people who do not know you or her or your relationship or her family to just be like, she’s got issues, man, right? Like, that— I don’t know, maybe I’ve been a woman, uh, peripherally on the internet for too long, but it kind of feels like you’re just opening it up to a bunch of strangers to be like, like, I don’t know, talk to your girlfriend. Talk to your— talk to your girlfriend. Ask her why. Why? Don’t, don’t ask strangers why. [laughs]

Royce: Yeah, the comments for this are all over the place. There’s one that I would have liked to read, but it was— the comment and the account were deleted by the user. But OP seems to indicate in a reply, but, that it was a, a good response that basically mentioned that communication was the right way to go and that they’re going to try that. But yeah, there’s clearly here— OP says lying about herself is one thing, but I’m even more weirded out at her lying about me. So that seems to indicate that OP does not believe asexuality even though they say—

Courtney: [laughs] That was the one slip-up line. That’s, that’s the slip-up line. I feel like he’s more concerned about the fact that she might actually genuinely be asexual than the fact that she said whatever it is she said to her family.

Royce: There is a comment OP makes somewhere down the line trying to clarify some things because a lot of people are asking for more information or more context.

Courtney: And I always want more context. I want every scrap of context I could possibly lap up.

Royce: Well, at one point OP says low libido might be more accurate, so there may be some medicalization going on here.

Courtney: Uh, yeah, I, I also— yeah, I don’t think so because The post says, “She tells her family we’re both asexual.” So, like, if that’s what she’s saying, I don’t think that word just came out of nowhere.

Courtney: Alright, well, speaking of people who have those one-line little slip-ups, uh, and have some probable issues pertaining to having an asexual partner, this OP: Me, 25-year-old man, on my third date with a 26-year-old woman, found out she was asexual. Not sure where to go from here. I’ll try to keep this brief. I just got back from my third date with a chick I met at my college. Wonderful girl, a lot of interests line up, I find her extremely attractive, and generally been getting a very good vibe.

Courtney: We both are flirtatious with each other, which is why I’m really confused about something that came up in our third date. Turns out she’s asexual. Naturally, I asked a lot of questions while trying not to step on her toes. Stuff like, how long has she been this way? Does she still find people attractive, etc.? I might have come across as ignorant, but she seemed to take it well. I think I did as well, but internally it confuses the ever-loving hell out of me. Let me just say here that I have no ill will, nor do I blame her for anything, but I have to look at where I am and think on where I want to go.

Courtney: Basically, I’m trying to weigh between dating a beautiful and honestly wonderful woman but being sexually frustrated, Or taking my chances on another girl and having the chance to park my dick somewhere warm? I have gone years without sex before but am unsure if I want a relationship without it. I honestly am out of expertise here and hope somebody can clear this up. Putting aside my dick, is asexuality a red flag in a relationship? Has anyone been in a relationship with someone who identified as asexual? Did that ever change?

Royce: When I opened this page, there are a couple of phrases that just popped out, and I was like, oh, Courtney’s gonna have fun reading that.

Courtney: No, I immediately regretted, uh, pulling this tab open. [laughs] I am a woman of very, very few regrets in life. —but reading that particular sentence, gotta say, is one of them. [laughs] Um, you know, there are times when I will say, you know, if the relationship is great, everything is wonderful, the only, “Oh, I expected this to be a sexual relationship, and if that’s not gonna be exactly the way I pictured it, now I gotta question some things.” Normally I do advocate for allos to sit with themselves and really, really think. If having their idealized, honestly socially ingrained vision of what a sexual relationship or romantic relationship should look like, and whether or not it’s worth sacrificing a wonderful interpersonal relationship you have with someone.

Courtney: But like, the— This guy, I gotta say, like, do her a favor and call it off. Like, honestly, Honestly, it sounds like she handled all of your questions with grace. And that’s honestly so needed. I— like, nobody has to do that. But anybody who has the patience and the self-confidence to talk through these questions with someone who hasn’t encountered a specific sexuality before is wonderful. And oftentimes a lot of people, ignorant though they may be, are ultimately well-meaning and can be educated and do genuinely want to learn, and that’s fine and great.

Royce: Unfortunately, it still confuses the ever-loving hell out of him.

Courtney: Unfortunately, the thing is, I’m glad he’s asking the question of, like, she is wonderful, is she worth staying with if sex is off the table? I think— That’s something that people need to actually question. Because whether or not that’s the fundamental reality for what this relationship would look like, whether or not you decide that that is something that you could handle or not, I think asking that question and really, really digging deep is like phase one of unpacking all of these societal expectations between sex and romance and relationships. And I think a lot more people should do it.

Courtney: And honestly, I wish more people would do it before getting into a potential relationship with an ace person, just because no matter what you ultimately decide for yourself, it’s good to have these questions. It’s like— it’s like cis+ people who really sat with the concept of gender and really, really thought about it and were like, no, I, I, I am actually the gender that was assigned to me at birth. I, I thought about it real hard. I thought about the social construct. The social constructs are bad, but goddammit if I don’t identify with them. Like, those people, like— people need to do the same thing for allo and asexuality. [laughs] The world would be a better place if more people just had these thought experiments with themselves.

Courtney: That said, maybe this is the denial phase of the stages of grief, and once he gets all the way through them, he will come out as a better person on the other side. [laughs] [laughs] But my guy asking, “Did that ever change?” Don’t stay with this poor, poor woman hoping that something will change. Just don’t. Just don’t. That is borderline, if not outright, predatory. Just, just don’t do it. Same thing with like friendships. If you ask someone out and they turn you down, but like, “Oh, I still wanna be friends,” and you say, “Yeah, I still wanna be friends too,” but you don’t, you don’t wanna be friends, you’re just like, I’m gonna getcha someday. Just you wait. That’s not okay. Absolutely not okay.

Courtney: So, helping you clear this up, ask more of these questions, not to Reddit, not to strangers on the internet under the cover of anonymity, ask these questions to yourself and really, really sit and think about the answers. Really, really sit and think about why you thought, like, well, I have gone years without sex and that was fine. Ask yourself what changes when you’re in a relationship. Is it something fundamentally from within you, or is it you’ve had this societally imposed vision of what a romantic and sexual relationship looks like, and that’s what you always expected, and therefore default to what you want? See if you can separate those two. Ask yourself more questions. Yes, please put your dick aside, always. That’s— [laughs] Always put your dick aside. Is asexuality a red flag in a relationship? No! Has anyone ever been in a relationship with someone who identified as asexual? Yes! Did that ever change? How dare you ask. Go sit in a corner and think about what you’ve done. [laughs]

Royce: So this next one is called “Boyfriend has told me he’s asexual and I don’t know what to do.” The post says: So my boyfriend, 24, and I, a 23-year-old woman, have been together for 6 years and I’ve always said he’s— the guy I’m gonna marry. I’ve always felt like we’re super compatible in all the key ways, and even though we’re currently long distance whilst he studies, I was feeling super secure in the relationship.

Royce: Recently I realized though that he was being kind of weird whenever I mentioned anything sexual. We’ve always been fine with this stuff, super compatible like I said, and in the past have had our ways to keep the spark alive when we’ve been long distance. But in the last maybe 3 months, anytime I mention anything about sex, he kinda acted strange, like immediately wanting to change the subject. There’s been literally nothing sexual between us in these last few months, which has been so unusual because it’s usually okay.

Royce: So this caused me major anxiety. I’m already riddled with self-esteem issues, which is— which I’m trying super hard to work on, so I felt super rejected anytime he shot down my advances. Sometimes he’d even say stuff like “ew” in response to me making a sexual joke. I’ve also gained a bit of weight since COVID and working from home, so I’ve had a hard time feeling good about myself, and this has made it so much worse. So I sat down on FaceTime one day and brought it up. Initially he denied anything was different, but I pushed, and he just blurted out that he is asexual. I admit I kinda took it bad, and thought he was kidding, but he seems pretty sure.

Royce: A few issues have come from this. Number 1: Immediately I’m thinking it’s my fault. I’m unattractive, and this is his get-out-of-jail-free card for not wanting me anymore. Trying to battle with that way of thinking, because I do believe— Asexuality is legitimate, it just seems so out of the blue after 6 years of a really fulfilling sex life. Number 2: If he really is as sex-repulsed as he seems, I don’t really know what to do with myself. Sex definitely isn’t everything to me, but it is something I think is important to a relationship with me.

Royce: On the other hand, he’s literally my soulmate, and as my high school— and as my high school sweetheart, the idea of even trying to end the relationship over something like this terrifies me. Basically, has anyone else overcome a similar situation, or even from an outsider’s perspective, what is the best way to approach this moving forward?

Courtney: Of course, the only two comments are both terrible.

Royce: One is breakup, and the other one is— have him see a doctor.

Courtney: Yup. But extremely common in posts like this. So, the thing I think that’s interesting about this is that— she has the self-awareness to name that her primary concern is largely from a personal insecurity. I do have a bit of a hunch that there are personal insecurities that get projected onto ace partners in a lot of mixed orientation, found out my partner’s asexual kind of posts like this. I just think a lot of people don’t— have the self-awareness to name that for what it is. So that’s already a big step in the right direction, I think. Although it’s really not good that he, he said he was asexual and her immediate reaction is, you’re kidding. Yeah, that’s not good. That’s, that’s not good.

Courtney: And to me, that is— although she says, I’m battling this way of thinking because I do believe asexuality is legitimate I, I guess if you try the trick of swapping this out with a different sexual orientation, which I usually advise allo people to do when working through their thoughts on asexuality, I guess there’s still a chance if he was sitting here going, I’m gay, that she also wouldn’t believe it right away and might be in a little bit of shock. I suppose that’s possible, but— I don’t know, something tells me it’s a little less likely, a little less likely that it would just be shrugged off as not a real admission.

Royce: Yeah, I’m not really sure what else to comment on here. This is definitely something that OP is struggling to figure out, and it’s something that is going to need a lot of communication. And the fact that insecurities and other things like that are all wrapped into it is going to make that really complicated. But yeah, it’s yet another case of It’s yet another case where someone needs to decide what they actually need in a relationship and what those boundaries or parameters are.

Courtney: I mean, the answer is always talk to your partner. I mean, even if you have this insecurity, like, that is also still a good thing to voice and work through with your partner. I mean, you need to do your own individual personal work on that as well. But like, if that is something that is just nagging you in the back of the mind, like, uh, let him know. Give him a chance to try to confirm that that is not the case for him. The thing that sticks out to me is that she says, “Sex definitely isn’t everything to me, but it is something I think is important to a relationship.” [laughs]

Royce: Oh, you read that with a different inflection than I would have pictured.

Courtney: I mean, inflection’s hard to tell from text, and I’m, I’m overemphasizing the way I read it anyway, uh, for podcast purposes. But— porpoise! [porpoise noise] Okay, uh, [laughs] I think it’s important in a relationship to me. That is still, even if she’s saying it with more definite, like, I think it’s important to me, it is inherently softer than a lot of posts that we do see where it’s like, I need a partner who would— like, I need sex in a relationship. People say, people will say, I need sex. People will say, I crave sex. People will say, I can’t have a relationship without sex. Those are much harder, stronger reactions than I think it’s important to a relationship for me. But sex definitely isn’t everything. On the other hand, he’s literally my soulmate.

Courtney: Now, people who do identify with the concept of soulmates are the ones who confuse me the most when we get into conversations of like, oh no, is this relationship doomed assumed they’re ace and I’m not. Because my understanding of soulmate is like such a strong visceral feeling of this is my one and only end-all be-all person. And in my mind— you, maybe I’m a little biased as an asexual person, but— if you really, really do genuinely feel that, and you also admit that sex is not everything to you, I kind of feel like you can find a way to work it out. Okay, I kind of feel like you definitely can find a way to work it out.

Courtney: However, little caveat to that, the cynical part of me is when you are using the word soulmate in the same sentence as high school sweetheart. Yeah, I really can’t help but feel like if you are someone who identifies with the concept of a soulmate I at least generally think I have an understanding of what you mean and what you feel and your general worldview on the type of relationship you have. But when someone uses my high school sweetheart, it’s really, really, really hard for me to not see that as just a societal romanticization. —of, I guess, amatonormativity in general. Just, find your person immediately. Find your person young, lock yourself into a relationship, and— like, you did it right. You did it the best if you were able to attain this societally glamorized type of relationship at a very young age and stick with it.

Courtney: And I think that general mindset that comes from the idolizing of this concept of high school sweethearts is generally very detrimental. That’s why you have people who, you know, once they reach age 30, if they’re someone who does want to have a long-term monogamous relationship and they don’t have it yet, they start to feel like it’s too late for them and they start to feel hopeless. And if you’re, you know, the last one in your friend group to get into a relationship, or if you’re someone who wants to opt out of relationships like that entirely, sometimes society will infantilize you by treating you as fundamentally more immature for not buying into this very narrow way of living.

Courtney: So there’s always, always a little niggling feeling in my brain that if you’re sitting here being like, wow, the concept of Ending a relationship is terrifying because he’s my high school sweetheart. Is it actually him or the idea of staying with your high school sweetheart that you like better? I think that’s an important question to ask. [laughs]

Royce: Or is it the fear of needing to date again after so long? If you’re in a long-term relationship with your high school sweetheart, they’re 23 and 24 at this point in time. If you’re afraid of ending relationships, how many relationships have you actually ended? You certainly haven’t ended one that has lasted this long.

Courtney: No, definitely not. I mean, they are still very young, but I mean, he’s 24. I know a lot of people who socially, like, dream of getting married by 25, and that is an aspect of our culture that I would love to do away with. And it is getting a little better. On average, people are waiting longer. Younger people aren’t as aspiring to these wildly accelerated timelines as often as they used to. But I think that’s the first question. Is it the possibility of ending things with him that is so painful, or the possibility of not living happily ever after with a high school sweetheart?

Courtney: Because if your answer is, no, it is him, it is him, he is my soulmate, it’s always been him, then I gotta ask why you’re even starting to even— think of, does this mean we have to break up? Because if it is him, it is him, it’s always been him, he is your soulmate, it’s not just a glamorized ideal of the high school sweetheart, this is the real deal, then is it really coming from inside you that you’re thinking maybe we need to break up because he’s asexual? Or is it society? [laughs] Has, again, just like buying into the concept of a high school sweetheart, have you bought into the social narrative of you need to find your high school sweetheart, you need to stay with them in a long-term romantic monogamous relationship that’s eventually gonna end in marriage and children, and along with that it’s going to be a sexual relationship, and you’re gonna have the nuclear family, you’re gonna live the American dream, all these things.

Courtney: Because if it’s the latter, if it’s really not coming from inside of you, You love this guy, sex isn’t everything to you, you think you can find a way to make it work, you can have some more conversations, then maybe some of these questions don’t even need to be asked. [laughs] I just think there, there is something that society does condition within people where, whether it’s a case of, found out my partner’s asexual, or if it is just a case of, you know, my wife lost her libido after we have kids, or we have a dead bedroom situation, or we just don’t have sex anymore, there is a wide societal bias that says that relationship is over. The end of sex means the end of the relationship, period. No gray area, no further discussion.

Courtney: And that is very well highlighted by comments in posts like this on Reddit, where time and time again we see people go, “Break up, incompatible, a sexual person cannot be with an asexual one.” Doesn’t work. So, yeah. Are you asking this for yourself, because you’re genuinely thinking and feeling it? Or are you asking it because that’s what society has trained you to do? But above all else, regardless of why you’re asking this question, don’t, don’t, don’t ask strangers on Reddit. Don’t. [laughs]

Courtney: Maybe, maybe, maybe, if you’re really at a loss and need a sounding board and you don’t have a person in your life that can be that, at least try to curate the pages you post this to a little more. Like r/relationships is so wide and vague and expansive. Sometimes you do see posts like this on, like, r/asexuality, and you see people going to forums, or you see people finding AVEN and saying like, hey, I am an allo partner, I’m trying to understand my ace partner better, or hey, other asexuals, do any of you have a partner who wants X, Y, and Z in this relationship? And then you can at least get hopefully much more sensitive answers from people who might have a closer lived experience, uh, to you and/or your partner. But in general, I don’t like the concept of getting advice from strangers. I really don’t.

Courtney: Uh, there are so many nuances, and even if you think you have a very detailed post about the situation, even if you think you gave all relevant information. There are cultural differences, there are age differences, there are so many individual nuances where something that might be great advice for one person might be really detrimental to another. And if it’s not someone that you know really well who knows you really well, there’s just a lot of, of room for error there. So there’s nothing wrong with soliciting other, like, experiences, like, tell me your experience with this, as just a way of learning more and getting other perspectives, I think that’s great, I will always condone that. But ending this with, what is the best way to approach this moving forward? I think the closest thing I, I tried to get to blanket advice is, talk to people more, think harder. [laughs] Ask yourself more questions. More conversation with your partner and yourself. The end.

Courtney: So I think that’s gonna be all for this episode. Some of those are not always fun to read. So allow me to give you something that is a lot more fun to read. From today’s featured Marketplace vendor, S.L. Dove Cooper, where you can find aspec, often cozy, science fiction and fantasy. Links, as always, are gonna be in the show notes on our website, as well as the description box if you’re listening on YouTube. But we’ve got some aroace retellings. We’ve got The Ice Princess’s Fair Illusion, which is a gleefully aroace retelling of King Thrushbeard. We’ve got A Little Gentleness and Other Stories. 10 cozy stories in which nothing terrible happens. The Princess Who Didn’t Eat Cake: A Demisexual Fairy Tale. Or even if you’re not a science fiction or fantasy fan, uh, you can also pick up Inklings of Invisibility: Essays on Asexual and Aromantic Traces in Speculative Fiction. You know I love a good essay. All that and more from S.L. Dove Cooper. Check out the link in all the usual places. It looks like there are over 15 titles here, so hopefully you will be able to find something that you like. Love. As always, thank you all so much for being here, and we will talk to you all next time.