#questioning grayromantic

[sanyu-thewitch05]

I’m sorry, but the bisexual to asexual(or aroace) train is wild.

More talk in the tags

[thatnerdyqueer]

my contribution to aro week - I hope some of yall feel seen reading this

shoutout to the aros who outwardly hate romance. Who take pride in dismantling societies dumb values. Who find kissing gross and celebrate their queerness and aroness LOUDLY.

but who quietly, in the comfort of their saved edits, ao3 history, and tumblr dash, let themselves Yearn. Queerplatonically, platonically, or even if you feel neither and just sometimes wish you were In On It. because it looks so nice, yknow?

To find comfort in another person?

And you're a little bit scared that maybe you'll never find that.

But you know, well, you Know (kind of) that of course you will, you have a wonderful community and at the end of the day of course you're not *ashamed* of your identity!

But just... yknow... sometimes the system wins out and makes you feel lonely

That's ok <3. You're ok. We will be, together (and/or alone).

[moo9395]

If you’re aroace spec

or you think you’re aroace spec

or even if you’re not

and you have questions

please

put them in my asks

or private message me

I would love to answer them

[amr2002amr]

romanctic attraction is thinking someone is cool, pretty, amazing, etc. and passionately desiring romantic things with said person and having this warm spark in you or butterflies in the stomach when you think about them or hang with them and desiring entering a romantic relationship with them. These feelings persist regardless of comfort level or compatibility. I am grayromantic and I have only experienced romantic attraction a couple times so I know what it feels like.

If you don't know, ask yourself, do you passionately want to do romantic acts with said person you're interested in, would that bring you fluffy joy and wonderous thrill or does simply being friends with them (or somewhere in between or any other tertiary attraction level) feel way better of an end goal to your passionate desires?

[will drop the term qpr, queer platonic partner/relationship here for your use if you don't know it already]

[our-arospec-experience]

I'm allo, but I do have a question so i can better understand this friend of mine, if that's cool! Is there a difference between being grayromantic and being a romance-indifferent aromantic? If so, what's the difference?

I’m glad you’re making an effort to understand your friend! romance-indifferent means that the person has no strong feelings regarding the concept of romance. grayromantic on the other hand, means that the individual can fall in love, but does so infrequently, possibly due to certain conditions. in short, romance indifferent is an attitude towards romance, while grayromantic is an identity describing people who infrequently fall in love.

[gray-ace-space]

Do you find a lot of people in the ace community who are allo for one gender & grey aroace for another 1+?

hi. not a lot, it's a pretty rare occurence, but it does totally happen and is completely valid. look into 'varioriented'!

[questioning-aspec-culture-is]

questioning aspec culture is not knowing whether or not if you're fully aro or somewhere on the spectrum because you don't quite understand what romantic attraction is and so you can't judge whether or not you felt it before, either because its been a while ago that you actually had a "crush" or if your "crush" was actually just tertiary attraction. also bonus points if your feelings towards "crush" is less intense version of romantic attraction most allos seem to describe as, so you really can't tell. (am i aro? quoiro? cupio?? greyro??)

.

[aroaceconfessions]

uhm... so ive been questioning my sexual and romantic attraction for a while now, as i am aware that i do not experience them the same amount as most others do, but at the same time i couldn't quite pinpoint where i was on the spectrum. im certain that im somewhere in the ace spec, but as for romantic im still not sure... i mean, i kinda like fictional charas? to a degree? but not often tbh, so it didn't feel right to say im biromantic. so then i took a bunch of quizzes about where i am on the aroace spec and if i even am part of the arospec, and i would mostly get a mix of recipro, demi and bellus. would it be better to say im in the gray area instead? or rather, is it valid for me to identify as part of the aroace spectrum or no? sorry if this is a bothersome question, im still questioning myself and i don't rlly know who or which blogs this would be appropriate to say this to ^^;

Submitted May 2, 2023

[nikothebookdragon]

...serious question...

how often do alloromantics feel romantic attraction?? I thought it was normal to only ever have romantic feelings every few years???? Like I'm 17 and have had 1 maybe 2 romantic crushes, is that not the standard experience??????

also when people say "celebrity crush" they do just mean finding them attractive right, and not actually wishing/fantasising about being in a relationship with them? right????

[aretheextrovertsokay]

OH MY GOD FUCK YOU ROMANTIC REPULSION

[adamsapplepie]

a post: i like using the words greysexual and greyromantic because of how broad they are; they cover my complexities while addressing the fact that my capability for attraction is different than the norm. i am in between allo- and a- and that is a wonderful thing. there are a million grey experiences and there's no 1:1 match between experiences, which is the most beautiful thing about these labels.

me: YES LITERALLY!!

another post: here is my experience of greysexuality/greyromanticism that is not a 1:1 match with yours

me: sobbing shitting i am invalid and horrible

[howmuchlonger2be]

Introduction Post :

I just post little vents and reblog things I relate to

- Name(s): Seph, (September, Sepho, Seth)

- Age: 18

- Pronouns: She/They/He

- OmniBiflux Dark-GrayAroAce

- Demigirl/Demifluid or Demiboyflux (gender is complicated 😭) (or maybe even girlflux or agender or idk) Implagender/WTF-gender

I post potentially triggering things:

Self Harm

Sui thoughts

Health worries

Other things I post about:

Lgbtqia+

Gender crisis

Sexuality crisis

[unlabeled-culture-is]

as someone who jumps between straight and unlabed, because god thought it would be funny, instead of understanding myself better, all i do is just end up feeling like a huge fraud, because it feels like im the only person who's having this problem.

im worried that im actually just a straight girl, who's trying to feel special, but at the same time if i had a chance to hang out with a girl and start dating her, i wouldn't say no.

tbh, im someone who feels neutral 90% of my life, dating a guy and dating a girl makes me feel similar level of neutral.

(i have questioned if i might be aro, but i feel too romantic for that and well known aro experiences dont really apply for me. also i think im simply have worries about getting into relationships and not find the one :b)

I feel you anon, I myself am in a lot of “in-betweens.” You are definitely not alone and you’re not a fraud.

Based on what you wrote I don’t think you’re “looking for attention,” and honestly that’s a much rarer phenomenon than we’re led to believe. I’ve heard people use that as an excuse to gatekeep like 10x more than I’ve heard actual cases of that happening.

If you want to identify as unlabeled, go for it! The only criteria to meet is if you feel comfortable with it :3

[aro-but-not-ace]

hii please can u help me? I’ve been calling myself aro yet I’m in a relationship and like doing romantic things with the person (to an extent) but I identify with aro bc of other reasons but I’m unsure if I should identify wirh aro and I’m wondering if u could help explain what it feels like to be aro spectrum (Demi grayaro aro in general) compared to being allo bc I feel scared to say I’m aro and tell others that and idk I need someone to help put experiences into words if that’s okay

Hello there!

First of all, your experience is valid. A lot of people have gone through experiences like yours that made them question if they were really aro or not (myself included).

I’m greyromantic, so I generally have felt romantic attraction before, but I rarely feel it otherwise. When I felt it, it was how everyone described it, surprisingly—butterflies in your chest, wanting to spend all your time with them, everything reminds you of them, etc.

But I had never felt any of these things before. In fact, I had to ask a lot of my alloro or greyro friends before I determined that what I was feeling was, in fact, romantic attraction.

Everyone will experience being greyro or demiro in a different way. But the main thing is that they connect with the label, and feel like they relate to being aromantic in some way.

In terms of what being aromantic feels like, it’s a bit harder to explain (surprisingly)—I usually tell alloro people to think of someone they know they would never feel attracted to romantically, and then to imagine that’s how they feel about everyone. But the thing is, this is extremely simplified and doesn’t explain it very well for someone who’s romance favorable.

A few questions I would say to ask yourself are:

Is this the only person I feel this way with?

Have I felt this before, and if so, was it intense or quite often? (usually greyromantic can be interpreted as feeling romantic attraction not as intensely, not as frequently, or both)

Do I just like doing romance-coded things, or is it because I feel different with this person?

I hope this has been helpful! I’ve only really applied my experience to your situation, so it may not encapsulate what you’re feeling, but that’s all I really feel I can do. Honestly, if you feel comforted with the aro label (or demiro label, or greyro label… you get it), use it! If anyone gives you shit for that, that’s their problem. If it feels like it fits, or you feel a connection with it, that’s fine!

[gray-ace-space]

what are some ways people can explore gray identities? i mean i’m “trying on the label(s)” but i don’t know if it’s doing anything for me…. or how i am supposed to feel while thinking of myself as aro or ace or a combination or or or. i don’t really have any aspec friends i can talk to about it, so i’m looking for ways i can self-reflect i guess. thank you :)

hi! i have come up with 6 ways. i hope at least one is useful to you.

1. talk to aces/aros about it. i know you said you don't have any aspec friends, but there's plenty of aspecs online who would love to talk to you and could with time become your friends. the benefits of this should be obvious - you'll know how other people dealt with what you're dealing with, you can bond over shared experiences and come to understand yourself better.

2. talk to allos about it. this one is scarier, because there's a chance they'll be shitty about it, but it's weirdly effective. i think the reason this works is it gives you a 'standard' to compare yourself to. a huge amount of my confidence in my gray ace identity comes from realizing how little i relate to allos.

3. talk to your therapist about it. this one really only works if you're in therapy, but it's still worth a mention. i have been unpacking some of my gender questioning with my therapist and she's been very helpful, so it could definitely work here.

4. journal. if you can't or don't want to talk to anyone, talk to yourself. this could come in the form of tumblr posts or a regular ass physical diary. try tracking how you experience (or don't experience) attraction, how you feel about that, how it impacts the way you interact with the world and other people, and any related thoughts you have. you can even make art or write poetry if you're into that.

5. engage with ace/aro content online. if you sent me this ask, i guess you're already doing this! but yeah, follow some related blogs and tags, read informational, venty, or funny posts, and you might find some nuggets of wisdom that will help you in your journey. not even just on tumblr, basically any social media/blogging platform will have an aspec community on it somewhere.

6. wear visual signifiers. this mostly entails merch, but you can diy stuff too. for example, i have a gray ace flag pin on my messenger bag that i carry around everywhere, and it makes me happy to express myself that way. i also wear an ace ring sometimes. this way, anyone familiar with the flags/symbols will automatically perceive you as aspec, and you can proceed from there.

good luck!

[questioning-aspec-culture-is]

questioning arospec culture is not knowing if you're greyromantic and actually don't experience romantic attraction often or if you just don't understand the difference between platonic and romantic attraction

<2