Demisexual Downsides: Experiences I’d Rather Not Experience
How being this type of aspec is emotionally draining
In my slow process of coming out to friends, family, and others, I’ve broadly received positive comments. On learning what being a demisexual means, most comments include stuff like “it must be really nice to be that way.”
Yes, on the face of it it’s hugely romantic to fall in love with a person after knowing them for a while and not experience any sexual desire until you already have that emotional bond.
But there are downsides.
I don’t notice flirting
Because I do not experience primary sexual attraction, I cannot identify when I’m being given “the sign”. As a result, I’ve gone through my life thinking women generally don’t and won’t find me attractive. This has almost certainly affected both my self-esteem (and fuelled so much of some areas of my mental health) and ability to form relationships.
On those occasions when others have said “she clearly fancies you” I’ve struggled to understand how they know and what they mean; I’ve felt naive and emotionally stunted.
Consequently, I have likely missed out on some wonderful women who had feelings for me but who thought those feelings were not reciprocated because I didn’t act in the way they might have expected me to act.
I don’t know how to flirt
In a previous post I mentioned that during my two years as separated/divorcee, there were a handful of dates I was really into. I mentioned the first before, now it’s time to look at another.
Our second date went well, I thought, and we spent the whole day together. But after asking her out again by text a couple of days after our second date, she replied that she wasn’t feeling it. She didn’t really explain herself well and after some complicated back and forth we agreed to talk over the phone.
During that conversation she said that not only was she not feeling it, but she was genuinely surprised to learn that I was.
That kind of hit me in the face as I thought things were going well. From her perspective, I gave her no signs and she didn’t feel her interest stoked. And that was that. I wished her luck, and we said our goodbyes.
Oddly, she sent me a text the next day — something that was both surprising and (I felt) unnecessary. She thanked me for meeting her and said she’d genuinely enjoyed our day together — something she had already said over the phone.
I left the door open by saying that if she wanted to stay in touch, I’d be open to it. If not, no hard feelings and I wished her luck (or something very much like it).
And I never heard from her again.
Developing feelings for friends I know aren’t / won’t be interested is emotionally exhausting
All my crushes have been on women with whom I already have an emotional bond. In most cases, these were long-standing friendships.
And it just happens out of nowhere with no explanation or reason. One day, right out of the blue, I notice her in that way. Maybe it’s her smile. Maybe it’s the way she makes me laugh. Maybe it’s a conversation we have. Maybe it’s opening up about a personal experience. Maybe it’s a platonic display of affection like a friendly hug. Sometimes there is no cause.
It doesn’t matter. It just happens.
Like any other crush, they pop into my head at random times, and I do my best to pour cold water on it. What’s most mentally and emotionally draining though is wondering whether this one will just pass in a couple of weeks or months, or develop into a years-long harrowing experience being madly, hopelessly in love and quite literally feeling emotionally crushed by a crush.
Crushes can be enjoyable, purely innocent and delightful flights of fancy that disappear after a while — part of the human experience. But the longer they go on, the deeper the feelings get and the more emotionally exhausting they become, especially when directed at someone I know does not and will never feel the same way.
I just want those feelings to go away at that point.
But there is another level to this…
The fear of being seen as deceitful
I like to think that should I ever again experience such a crush, and to do so if I am ever single again (because I’d only confess to having those feelings if single), that even if they weren’t reciprocated, it would be taken with something resembling flattery.
But what if it isn’t?
Maybe I’ve taken this too much to heart, but some female friends have said that they have felt disappointed when a man they thought was their friend suddenly confesses to harbouring secret feelings for months or years.
I know I’m catastrophising, but what if that friend gets angry? What if she thinks the only reason I became her friend was in the hope of being more than that some day? What if she breaks the friendship off thinking I’ve deliberately deceived her all this time?
I know it’s not what motivates me, but the incel discourse over the so-called “friendzone” and how it’s something men are *condemned to* by women’s shallowness and cruelty (which I do not and have never believed) is pervasive.
I have always had valuable platonic friendships with women. I have not developed feelings for every last one of them, but the fear of it happening, and it eventually damaging the friendship, is a constant one.
That too is emotionally exhausting.
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