I never was interested in romance or sex stuff. Relationships remained a mystery to me. Kids got crushes all the time wjhile I could not understood that feeling. I tried to force myself to “like” someone but it didn’t work. From early on, I knew I was different in that regard.
Middle school time, my classmates started dating. I just wasn’t interested. I did my own thing and lived my life. In sex ed, I understood how sex worked and was grossed out (to be fair, my teacher showed an extremely graphic video that traumatized my entire class but I digress). I remember thinking “that’s sex? People do that for baby-making AND fun? How is that fun?”
Then came high school. I still wasn’t interested. By then I got a lot of bullying from my classmates because of it. At first there were rumors how I was gay, then turned into how I was undesirable, eventually becoming stupid things that were obscene & way off the mark.
I hated that. I tried to “like” someone and still felt nothing. My friends tried to be match-makers but nothing worked out. At first I wondered if I was gay because I wasn’t compatible with any guys. So I tried to look at other women and evaluate myself. Nope. I didn’t like women either. I thought something had to “turn me on” but I never felt sexually aroused before. There was nothing.
I was panicking and wondering if something was wrong with me. Did I have some sort of disease or physical abnormality? I wanted to ask someone. Who could I ask? My friends didn’t get it nor did my family. My doctor said “You’re just a late bloomer” when I mentioned I wasn’t interested in dating. No books in my school or public library helped.
I got desperate and did some internet searches. There had to be SOMETHING out there to explain this. I scrolled through numerous links when a word caught my eye.
Asexual
My biology teacher was going through the chapter on how some plants & animals produce through asexual methods. What was that word doing in a search like this? I clicked on it. It took me to the official asexual website. I read through the information page as well as the forum topics. Everything felt familiar. I kept thinking “that’s me” when reading through articles. That’s when it hit me.
I was asexual.
That was the only explanation for everything. And I felt better. I wasn’t broken or insane; I was just a little different than the norm. It’s ok to be asexual.
So long story short, I think I knew from early on that I wasn’t a sexual person. I just didn’t know what it associated with until high school.