Quote:
Originally Posted by treevoice
Hi! You posted this a few days ago so I don't know if you'll be back, but your post broke my heart so I wanted to chirp in and say that Asexuality is a perfectly acceptable lifestyle choice. I've known several asexual individuals throughout my life who had normal, happy relationships without ever having sex. If you haven't read much about asexuality, I would encourage you to look into it. I would add that you may want to allow yourself to experience sex once before making that decision (if and only if you get to a point where you want to do so), but if you decide that you just don't have sexual feelings, there's nothing wrong with that. I would add however that it is important to communicate that to your partner. I know it is very difficult to do so, but sex is a very large part of marriage. That decision may change the course of your relationship, which would be very sad, but also for the best if your lifestyles are not going to be compatible in the long run. It's important to be clear about who we are with our partners so that they can also make the best decisions for themselves, as I'm sure you'd want him to do for you if he had to make a lifestyle choice that could potentially be a deal-breaker for you. This may be a bit too much for you to think about this early on in your journey, but I have known asexual individuals who had successful open marriages by allowing their partner to satisfy their sexuality by sleeping with other people while maintaining an asexual emotional relationship between the two of them and living long, happy lives together without sex.
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I'm not asexual myself (quite the opposite, in fact), but I agree so, so much with the above post. I was only going to quote the first few sentences (that I bolded) but read on and found that treevoice made so many excellent points that I had to include the whole thing. I really hope the OP takes the above into consideration.
I also want to say that some people just aren't that into sex, even if they don't meet the actual criteria for asexuality, and that's perfectly okay too. Different people have different libidos and different levels of interest. I won't say that some levels of interest aren't problematic - for instance, people with sex addiction - but on the whole, there's no "right" amount of interest in sex because we're all unique individuals.
And forgive me if I'm crossing a line here, but I'm very concerned with the tone of most of the responses here. For one thing, there are subjective religious beliefs being presented as universal fact. And while they may indeed feel like facts to the people who believe them, not everyone shares those beliefs, and that's why it's really unfair to suggest that this is the only acceptable way for someone to live their life.
Different strokes for different folks, as they say. Pun somewhat intended.
That being said, there's a difference between asexuality - which is considered its own sexual identity and which is basically an intrinsic lack of interest in sex - and a fear of/revulsion toward sex. The latter IS often a cause for concern, especially if it keeps someone from getting what they truly want from life. (It can also be symptomatic of past trauma in some cases, which is best addressed through specialized therapy.) It's worth considering both possibilities.
In any case, I felt compelled to respond to what came across as borderline shaming of the OP for feeling the way she does. Uncommon doesn't always equal abnormal. I don't personally think there's anything "wrong" with her. It's actually refreshing in a way to see a young person asking herself if she's truly ready for sex and putting lots of thought into the matter rather than rushing into it recklessly like so many others do.
xxxyyyzzz, I wish you all the best in your soul searching. If it becomes confusing or overwhelming at any point, talking with a therapist can be very insightful and comforting. Or even if you're just looking for a more experienced perspective on things. Please don't hesitate to do so if you feel it might help.