Broken Isn’t a Sexuality
Learning about Asexuality Later in Life is a Bizarre Journey
The Evidence
First, I didn’t know about it; then I didn’t permit myself to claim it.
I was born in the early ’70s. Growing up in the ’80s came with expectations for one’s life, benchmarks to reach.
It looked like marriage, children, and a career. That was it.
Not getting married, as a female, meant you were an “old maid” or a “spinster. For a male, you were a “confirmed bachelor.” Translation for the younger readers is that the women were undesirable, and nobody would have them, and the men were gay.
That was how I understood it. Those were the options. There were only three.
- Married
- Gay
- Repulsive
At twenty-one, I was a teacher with a full-time teaching position. I owned a duplex where I lived on one side and rented out the other to pay the mortgage. I should have been proud. I should have felt accomplished.
Paths that included children but not a marriage entered into my mind but were quickly swept away because they were not acceptable. Not acceptable to family. Not acceptable in my small New England community.
