WHAT HAPPENED TO AASEXUALCAKEUNIVERSE??? Please read!!!
Hello those of you still paying attention to this blog! I’m pretty sure I actually have more followers here than ever, so I’m sure at least some of you will see this and take interest.
Since starting college about two years ago, I’ve gone on many hiatuses, all followed by lengthy explanations with apologies and promises to do better. I’m not going to feed you that crap again, to put it bluntly.
Here’s what I am going to say.
My name is Nat. I’m a nineteen year old heteroromantic asexual girl from Long Island. I’ve identified as asexual since I was roughly fourteen or fifteen years old. I started this blog shortly after with a friend of mine who had first introduced me to the term a few years prior (yeah it took me a little while to realize it applied to me too). That friend soon stopped doing things on this blog and we basically fell out of touch (we have always lived in different states so it was easy to lose contact) and I pretty much just took over this blog without officially discussing it (I’ve since learned that friend was okay with that).
I didn’t expect this blog to get as big as it did. Don’t get me wrong, I was ambitious and certainly hoped it would get big, but I didn't necessarily expect it to. It also hadn’t occurred to me that the bigger the following, the more stressful it would be.
I constantly received messages from people wondering if they were asexual, or simply looking for their identity to be validated. I was thrilled that people were coming to me for this, and I’d sit in class on my phone, doing research to answer the questions to the best of my ability. It felt so great to help others.
I eventually realized the amount of weight my words carried here, and not always in the best way. If I said something *slightly* wrong, people were quick to attack me. It didn't matter if I was quick to apologize and eager to learn. Let’s face it: Tumblr is toxic and there is no escaping that toxicity. So I would do my best to appease everyone, whether it was by making people laugh or offering some advice, but it became difficult.
The negative comments would become overwhelming at times, and I’d be afraid to log on here and see what vile things were being spat at me for what were usually bogus reasons. I’d try to shrug it off, but that’s easier said than done.
Then came college. I was in a new place with new people and a chance to reinvent myself. I decided to limit the number of people who knew about my asexuality rather than just be completely open about it. I tried to have a life outside of my sexual identity because I was frankly tired of having to think about my asexuality every single day of my life. It was exhausting and I wanted a semblance of “normality”, if that makes any sense.
To be perfectly honest, I didn’t feel the need to come onto this blog anymore. As much as it was a tool for other people to find comfort and support, it was also a tool for me to express myself and connect myself with the community. I did so much of what I did for you guys, but it was also for myself.
Responding to messages became less gratifying for me. Selfish, I know. But I’d spent years here doing that and it became more like stressful work than happily giving back to the community. Also, as someone as young and experienced as I am, I don’t have all the answers and I stopped feeling like someone that people should turn to for these things. Sure, I’d done a pretty good job helping people in the past, but I stopped feeling like I was in a position to lend that help.
All of that leads me to this: I do not expect myself to continue with this blog. I’m sorry if you’ve sent me messages that I never answered. I’m sorry if you had been hoping I would make a comeback here. I’m sorry for my selfish reasons that brought me to this point. I’m truly very sorry.
I really hope you guys can understand my reasons, though. I also hope that I was able to put a smile on your face at some point, or offer you advice/support when you needed it. I love helping people, and I always will. Which leads me to something else: I’m not completely going off the grid.
If you still want to be in contact with me, or if you ever need advice/support/someone to talk to, or if you simply want to see what’s going on in my life, you can follow my personal blog and message me there: @nat-the-ferret
If people actually do that, I’ll start posting there more regularly and offer more frequent glimpses into my life (even if it’s just the occasional selfie, haha). I don’t want to lose my connection with you all, and I hope you don’t want to lose your connection to me. These past several years have meant a lot to me, and I hope the feeling is mutual with a handful of you (or more, I just don’t know at this point).
I love you all. Take care, my lovely aces, and once again you can maintain contact with me by following @nat-the-ferret (probably going to change that URL if people start following me...).
With love, this is AAsexualCakeUniverse, signing off.
-Nat
