bronftw - Tumblr blog

[bronftw]

When I was in high school, there was this blog made by an openly asexual person and one day they made a post about asexuality. One section of the post said that a person can be asexual even if they masturbate or enjoy sex. I remember a bunch of people mocking the post and a lot of comments saying the same thing: "How can you be asexual and still like sexual activities?" I remember seeing those people mocking OP and joined in. I was struggling with my identity back then; I didn't fully realize that I was an asexual person. Looking back, I'm shocked at how ignorant I was about asexuality; that ignorance is what made it so difficult for me to realize that I was asexual. I have a libido and I consider myself to be sex favorable. The misconception that "asexual=does not want/like sex" is what kept me from embracing my asexual identity

[bronftw]

So I watched JaidenAnimation’s new video, and I had some Thoughts

[bronftw]

not sure if this has been passed around here already, but if you have dermatillomania/excoriation disorder or trichotillomania or any other BFRB, [ these worksheets ] may come in handy. I’ve been reading the book, and it’s been helping a lot so far. you have to create an account to download them, but that’s free.

not sure if linking directly to the pdf will work, but [ here ], I can try.

there’s also [ this self-help article list ] from the TLC Foundation

[bronftw]

Okay so everyone in my family has dyscalculia but we're all like,,,crazy good at conceptual math and we all love cooking and baking.

So we calculate our recipes constantly, right? We'll read like 80 recipes for a thing and then identify the most common combinations of ingredients and the most common ratios, and generally end up with like 4 to 10 archetypal recipes to test for the given food. We really science up this process so there's a ton of math. We know to double check everything in this process.

So here comes the easy math: fucking increasing or decreasing serving yeilds.

Which leads to having to on the spot do a ton of calculations to compensate for all the miscalculations.

This is how you get things like my (mathematician, physicist, and chemist) dad desperately asking for scratch paper as he real quick uses his knowledge of thermodynamics and calculus to calculate the cook time based on volume and estimated density for two loaves of bread he was making as they did not turn out the size he expected.

Best bread I've ever had and I cannot for the life of me figure out What we did. Which math errors lead to the most heavenly cloud soft bread with the perfect thin hard crust? We may never know.

[bronftw]

I don’t know if it’s an aplatonic thing or an aromantic thing or ?? but I always feel like an imposter, like an actor in someone else’s body when talking to people. They say things like “I wish you were here!” and”I miss you” and “I wish we could cuddle” and I’m just like,,, I’d really rather not. I feel so detached. Do other people just get attached more easily? Is there something wrong with me? I never know how to respond because saying how I actually feel would kill the friendship. They’d take it as a sign that I personally don’t like them and don’t want to continue talking. Even though I just want to take my time in getting to know them. I never feel like I can take as much time as I’d like. But also, that time feels so long. It can take years for me to warm up to someone and feel comfortable with physical contact, feel the desire to be around them. No one has that kind of patience unless I play pretend, unless I act like I care. I don’t like this /:

[bronftw]

Sex While Asexual: What’s Going On?

Disclaimer; I debated heavily on whether I should even write this. But with all my talk about how little sex education exists for asexual people, I’ve never taken a huge step towards explicitly describing the process of sex while ace from my own experience. It’s something that should be done, because very little of it exists.

This is a voice that needs to be heard for the asexual community as a whole. Also, there’s tons of non-ace allosexual people who have no clear comprehension of what goes on in the minds of aces under sexual duress. And more specifically, they don’t know what happens when you get a sex-repulsed asexual in a sexual situation. One that they willingly enter. Repeatedly.

Why is this information important? Because, chances are, this will be the first time you read a perspective like this. No one has ever given me answers about my aceness when it comes to sex. No one has ever taught my anything about sex education in the asexual experience. This is for all the aces out there. This is for all those people who have aces in their lives, and want to understand them. 

“But you said yes, didn’t you?” When come a scenario where the other party is unaware of my aceness or the true level of my discomfort, then they’re clearly not meaning any harm. I gave them consent through language that they understand. And that was my first mistake.

Asexual consent is not allosexual consent. When you’re not actually drawn to the other party, and you’re not interested in them sexually, then mutual sexual stimulation becomes something akin to a chore, or a favor. And that chore can so very easily become a stressor, and from there a danger. 

That’s not the case every time, of course. If we imagine sexual activity as a ‘dance’, then we can easily imagine a scenario where one person is interested in their dancing partner sexually, and therefore the act of dancing together is a sexually intimate moment for them. But the other person, an ace, simply enjoys the act of dancing together, or the act of dancing in general. And in that scenario, there’s no stressor.

But that’s never been the case for me. When I’m with another party, there’s obviously a completely different world happening in their mind. They’re seeing me, and the situation, through a lens that I don’t approve of, that I don’t empathize with. They’re getting something out of the situation that bothers me on a fundamental level. This ‘dance’ becomes a chore.

So when they give consent, it’s in a significantly different language than mine. They say ‘yes’ to something that I’ll never say ‘yes’ to. And from there, that imbalance of consent leads to disaster.

But they don’t know that. How could they? I certainly didn’t until it was far too late. But it’s affected me extremely adversely, in a similar way that my transness and my race has affected my sexual relationship in a white man’s world. It’s an issue of consent and how badly it can go when there’s a dearth of vital information.

“But what if you controlled the situation?” I’ve asked myself this question, and I’ve gone at lengths to test it. I didn’t want to live like this; my biggest regrets of my life are involving each and every awful night spent in these dangerous spots. I shouldn’t have gone to that party, I shouldn’t have done this. I should instead have done that. So I decided to try a different approach.

I got subs. The naughty kind, not the youtube kind. I looked for the most non-threatening, willingly-submissive people in the city. It always started out as a long talk beforehand (usually as a skype video call, as my preference, so they can see me outside the dom role) asking about their expectations, what their subspace is like, whether they want individual scenes or an extended episode, their experience, my experience, and so on. We started off on even ground, gearing up our tools and our knowledge of each other.

So what happens when I get full ‘control’ over the situation? Well, first of all, a sub/dom scenario gives an illusion of control. As a dom, your actions are for the benefit of the sub. You stick a bubble wand up their ass because they want to cry, never mind whether you got off on that shit or not. It’s a specific type of illusion that involves very real control, but it’s still not the control I wanted. I was again entering these dangerous spaces and expected to order people around because of something outside my control.

And when you take sexual activity out of the equation, it’s almost the same thing. I can get people to spend hours combing my hair or whatever, and have them do everything I ask of them without even touching upon sex. But to them, it’s all a clear act involving sexual attraction, which is something that’s not coming from me. In a very real way, they didn’t consent to me, even knowing well enough that I was ace.

“So what does sex mean to you?” I can easily imagine enjoying myself in a sexually explicit scenario, but the language and communication is markedly different. Masturbation becomes self-care, rather than a ‘precursor’ to sex. Skin-upon-skin contact has the context of taking a shower with your infant child, instead of a passionate act between lovers. Pleasuring genitals with whatever on hand is exactly what it is; it’s not elevated when done with someone you’re particularly fond of, and most of the time there’s no difference between your own stimulation versus someone’s inexpert fumbling.

Basically, sex to me is the same visually, but different through intention. And that’s what I’m missing in my sexual encounters, and also what I see missing in discussions involving sex and ace people. This is a gap that needs to be closed off. 

You can’t claim you’re sex positive, or inclusive, or lgbt-friendly without being aware of the ace experience when it comes to sex. It’s far past time that sex education includes what it means to be unnattracted to people in general, and how that affects sex as a whole.

It’s important that voices like mine are heard. I don’t want anymore aces to grow up and get the same aches and pains that I do because no one has any answers. If it takes my life, I’ll gladly make a new set of rules for my fellow aces, especially if no one else will.

[bronftw]

(Trigger Warning: Catholicism)

Catholic sex adverse ace culture is having your theology teacher teach you that humans are inherently sexual beings and the closest humans can get to experiencing God in this life is during reproductive sex and that’s why God made sex enjoyable to everyone, and getting really upset that you might never truly know God if you don’t force yourself to have sex and something must be wrong with you because you don’t want sex.

Catholic ace culture also is learning that your theology teacher was wrong, and that there is nothing wrong with you, and that God loves you because you are ace, not in spite of it.

[bronftw]

The confusion of sexual desire, libido, and sexual attraction

Ok I need to get this out because it's been bugging me for ages and I keep having arguments with people online about it, mostly within the ace community. I just need to get my thoughts down somewhere.

Most people in the ace community have some understanding that sexual attraction and libido are not the same thing.

In a discussion about being sex favourable and ace, there'll be several "sexual attraction and libido aren't the same" statements. Which is great. But then sexual desire enters the chat, and I quickly realise that they don't get it at all.

"sexual attraction and sexual desire aren't the same thing" - true. They're not, and they're both different to libido.

"Sexual attraction is the desire to connect on a sexual level with another person for sexual and/or emotional pleasure" - Nope, you've just described desire. You can desire to connect with someone on a sexual level without experiencing attraction towards them. I love my partner. I know that having a sexual relationship with him leads to sexual and emotional pleasure which is something I want, but I'm not sexually attracted to him.

"If you genuinely were wanting sex for your own pleasure, for the joy/pleasure of sex itself, that's 'sexual attraction" - Nooooooo. Stop right there.

Let me spell it out, at least as I understand it:

Libido: I feel horny.

Sexual attraction: that person makes me horny.

Sexual desire: I want to have sex.

Libido and desire are often conflated, I guess because allos usually want sex when they are horny and so put the two things together. But many asexual people describe experiences of feeling horny, yet being sex repulsed and having no wish to engage in any sexual activity. So clearly these are different things. You could further specify sexual desire as being horny and wanting to act on it. In that case I would still want some way to distinguish between wanting to have sex because you're horny, and wanting to have sex for other reasons (pleasure a partner, procreation). I'd love to hear others thoughts on this.

To put it in an analogy:

You're walking past a bakery and can smell the delicious scent of freshly baked bread on the breeze. You can see the loaves stacked in the window. Now you're hungry (libido), the bread has made you hungry (attraction), and you want to eat the bread (desire).

A common phrase I hear is: "hey but ace people can still have sex. They might want to please their partner, or have a baby, or-"

But another equally valid reason to have sex as an asexual person is simply because you enjoy it. It feels good. Being asexual doesn't mean your nerves don't work down there. That you can't orgasm.

Being asexual means you don't have, or have a significantly lesser amount of sexual attraction. Having a high libido and wanting to have sex for any reason doesn't make you any less ace.

So, to fix the earlier quote:

"If you genuinely were wanting sex for your own pleasure, for the joy/pleasure of sex itself, that's 'sexual desire' not 'sexual attraction', and it doesn't invalidate your aceness"

[bronftw]

Let Poland be a place where everywhere can live and breathe in freedom.

“O, let my land be a land where Liberty Is crowned with no false patriotic wreath, But opportunity is real, and life is free, Equality is in the air we breathe.“

- Langston Hughes (1902-1967)

[bronftw]

Libido: desire or arousal?

I often see people saying that libido and attraction are not the same thing (true), however then I usually see libido described as "sexual desire" which is a technically correct definition but one that I find confusing and inadequate.

What constitutes desire?

If my body becomes aroused despite me not wanting sex, is that still desire?

If I want to have sex, but cannot become aroused, is that still desire?

What my mind desires and what my body 'desires' might be two separate things, and I find the phrase 'sexual desire' to mean both to be unhelpful. To me these are distinctly different feelings and should be treated as such.

Can we use desire to mean what the mind wants, and arousal to mean what body wants / how it reacts?

[bronftw]

you don't need ANY type of love to live a happy and fulfilled life. you can be whole and enjoy your life without sexual love, romantic love, platonic love, etc etc. love DOES NOT and DOESN'T HAVE TO complete you or be a goal in your life. you are still you without love. you are still human and deserving of respect without love.

[bronftw]

[ID: The “Types of Headaches” meme. There are four diagrams of a head, each with a different region highlighted in red. The fourth diagram is completely red, and captioned “trying to figure out what kind of attraction I’m experiencing”. End ID]

[bronftw]

I feel like I’ve been all three of these over the years

i know there’s the “i thought i was broken for not having crushes like everyone else” aros and the “i thought everyone felt this way about other people” aros but WHERE are my “i didn’t think about crushes enough to even think i was abnormal” aros, because let me tell you. romance was so unimportant to me that i never actually thought about why i had never had a crush on anyone until 6th grade

[bronftw]

i know vitamin c basically neutralizes adhd meds but lemonade good

[bronftw]

I came across this article, and it got me thinking about neurodivergence and platonic relationships.

Like OP I'd heard of the term aplatonic, but I'd resisted applying the label to myself. It made me kind of uncomfortable, like a flickering light that I'd refused to look at or focus on. I'd think 'that can't be me, I want friends' then move on before I could think about it too much. Because deep down this term struck a chord. One that felt too much like saying 'I'm a bad person who doesn't like their friends'.

But I am bad at maintaining friendships. Not super great at making them either if I'm honest. Most of this can possible be explained by autism, and my struggle with friendships was the primary reason why I'd started suspecting that I might be autistic. (But am I really autistic though?)

I'd heard other autistics explaining how they kind of lack object permanence when it comes to people. Not that they literally don't think that someone doesn't exist when they don't see them, but that they don't think of them. This mirrors my own experience with friends. I don't think of them that often. And if I do and realise that I haven't spoken or seen them in a while, then actually contacting them for catch up takes a lot of energy and mental prep before hand. Phoning people makes me anxious, even for people I talk to all the time and know that I can talk to easily. It's a huge mental effort to go 'I'm going to call Sally today'. Even then I'll probably tidy my bedroom first, do the laundry, vacuum etc., then decide it's too late and put off calling her for another week.

Recently I came across the term 'relationship degradation mechanics' by twitter user Khoshtistic. They described it in terms of their ADHD, but it also describes my own experience perfectly. The term comes about from video games which have a friendship meter for NPCs which either fills up over time, or empties, depending on how often you interact with an NPC. I frequently forget about my friends (that faulty object permanence), I don't message them, call, or organise meet ups. There have been times when I've decided to message someone and then realised that the last time I interacted with them was a year ago. In those instances I often feel so guilty about it that I decide against messaging them completely. Why draw attention to it? When I do happen to catch up with a friend, months or years after I last saw them, I'm often surprised that our friendship bar has degraded. I expect things to be the same as when we last met up, but they aren't.

My partner is always messaging his friends. He is the polar opposite of me in many ways, but especially in this. If he hasn't seen his friends for a while he gets sad and upset about it. When I ask him how long it's been, he'll tell me that it's been ages. But how long is that? A couple weeks, he says. For him those couple of weeks span a millennia, for me that feels like yesterday.

This type of conversation is not uncommon for us:

Him: We haven't seen Sally and John in ages

Me: But we just saw them. Remember? we played board games

Him: That was 2 weeks ago!

Me: Exactly. Only 2 weeks ago.

We both have a very different understanding of time.

His relationship with friendships is informed by his ADHD in a very different way to mine. He worries that if he doesn't stay in contact with people constantly, then they'll think he hates them and subsequently decide that they hate him too. Rejection Sensitivity Disorder (RSD) is a bitch. I'm glad I don't have that, but sometimes I wish I cared a little more than I do.

He cares so much for his friends and what they think of him. Sometimes I feel like I'm not really friends with anyone, and that I'm only preforming friendship. Sometimes I feel like an unfeeling robot, and the ace/aro community often (unintentionally) amplifies that feeling. The uncaring aro or ace person is a common trope that the aspec community rails against, usually by saying that one can still have strong and intimate platonic relationships. However this is something that I don't have either. I'm ace, aro, and at the very least bad at friends. So what does that make me?

[bronftw]