Double-A Aros: Abbie's Experience

Abbie (she/they)

When I witness gentle sway of golden leaves and the slow crawl of mushrooms emerging after a rainy evening- I’m reminded that nature is filled with beauty. Even as an amateur artist and writer, I wish to share its loveliness with others. The mundane can be so utterly filled with drama! How could I not describe myself as a romantic?

Other children were just as captivated as I was about the world’s marvels; such is the nature of youth! What better way to explore the world than through fiction? Media was, is still, how children learn how to navigate their environment. Thus, the tiresome topic of romance enraptured my peers as they learned about new types of human relationships. This often culminated in heated interrogations among friends, starting with that notorious line, “Do you have a crush on somebody?”
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This dreaded question seemed to haunt my childhood. It was deemed unacceptable that I did not have a romantic interest in anybody. No classmate. No neighbor. Not even a celebrity! Even though the Disney channel insisted it was a quintessential part of the teenage experience- yet another instance where Disney sitcoms misled little me’s expectations about the reality of preteens. With trial and error, though, I learned to make up an answer that would satisfy my peers. So, I always gave them the same reply with a sly smile to sell it:

“Well, you wouldn’t know him since we met at summer camp, and he’s going to a different middle school. But we talk allllllll the time!”

We did not talk allllllll the time. 

I had never even met with him outside camp. In all truth, I didn’t even think about him when I returned to school. He only appeared when I needed to bust out my script for this seemingly endless performance.

It seemed harmless though; I knew my peers would likely not meet him. Especially since I gave them such barebones information about him. Still, I feel like I must apologize to this poor boy that I used to lie to my classmates. It was easier to pin all that onto him than to give others more ammunition to use to support my “weird girl” designation. It was just so… exhausting, repeatedly trying to explain to these people that I did not share their emotions or desires!

Eye rolls and exasperated scoffs told me all I needed to know. The people who did not take the time to understand me thought I was simply too naïve or immature to grasp concepts like dating or even intercourse *shudders* It seemed impossible for them to conceive that an emotional person could be satisfied without a romantic partner. After all, only “broken people” had no interest in love.

And I believed them.

After all, the most heartless villains in media often had no interest in love. Their callousness was often linked to their lack of romance. Even if these characters were not villains, they were often shown to be out-of-touch or uncaring of the world around them. This characterization was often apparent with career-oriented women, wherein the only way to save them from either working themselves to death or from living in ignorance was for a man to sweep her up into a relationship. I could have an entirely different conversation about that trope and the villainization of career-oriented women!

 Talking about crushes and dating was the new norm for kids. Anyone who did not immediately join in was either childish or thought to have something wrong with them. At best, some people just thought uninterested people were too studious for a relationship. My parents even reaffirmed these beliefs by stressing how important it was me to get married to a man and have that American-Dream-kind of family. That also seemed to be everyone else’s end goal in life, so the thought that something was wrong with me slowly took hold.

 This belief appeared to have a chokehold on most of my peers too, except for one. Later in my middle-school years, I met a friend who was a fellow romantic. We spent any moment we could engrossed in critiquing the media we consumed and trying to find ways to improve concepts we liked. From classical English literature to the shoddy YA dystopian novels that plagued the 2010’s, any genre was up to discussion between us. Debate was common and any opinion was validated as well. It was truly a safe space.

One day we were ranting about how unhealthy many of the romantic relationships were in the YA genre. And that dreaded question snuck its way into our conversation…

But I couldn’t lie to her. I hadn’t met anyone else before who was so genuine with their beliefs and personality. I never liked lying in the first place and was just tired of acting out the same scene over and over again. If I couldn’t be honest with my friends, then what was the point of all these little talks?

“No one.”

 Her lips curled into a small smile, and she said, 

“Ah, me too.”

I was absolutely dumbfounded.

My mind was racing, because I didn’t know how to respond to that! The confusion, the relief, and the hope that maybe I was never the weird one were all circulating around me. She witnessed how stupidly I kept opening and closing my mouth before explaining that she was aromantic. Now that was a word 14 year-old me had never heard of before! I listened in fascination as she explained what being aromantic meant to her. She finished by encouraging me to look into aromanticism and asexuality online to see if I resonated with those identities.

Coming from a conservative household that would find such ideas to be irrational, I began my research on the family computer deep into the night when my parents were asleep. The more blogs and YouTube videos I found on those topics, the more entrenched I became in those topics and their complexity. I was addicted, I couldn’t stop watching! I couldn’t stop smiling either; it was as if all those online personalities wrapped me in a warm blanket and said, “You’re valid for feeling this way”.

I’m happy to say that this was my first step into the LGBTQ+ community. It took me a long time to unlearn the internalized homophobia and heteronormative standards that were deeply ingrained in me, and to accept myself for who I was. 

I identify as demiromantic, since I think I would like to be in a romantic relationship one day. It isn’t entirely necessary for me though. The idea of being emotionally intimate with someone beyond friendship is very appealing to me. I also think a lot of romantic traditions, like Valentine’s Day gifts and movie date nights are cute, and I wouldn’t mind participating in them. But I also feel complete without a partner. I’m not one to catch feelings for someone quickly; I need time to bond with them before I could even fathom getting into a relationship with them. Even then, I’m not entirely sure if I’ve ever even had a “crush” on someone. Aromanticism is a spectrum, some people may never be interested in romantic relationships while others may only have romantic feelings under specific circumstances. Isn’t the diversity of the human experience just beautiful?

I’m sighing since I can’t condense my entire being into this. As much as it pains me to write this, words cannot sum up what has always been as natural as breathing for me. All I know is that I’m going to keep holding on to this label with my teeth. Good luck trying to pry it away from me!