#aro things

[aromanticduck]

"Oh you're alloromantic? But what if you meet someone one day who puts you off romance forever? I think you should put your life on hold just in case that happens."

[gender-luster]

"love is in the air" wrong! that's the buildup of static electricity before the discharge of lightning. you'll want to seek cover. quickly

[merely-a-caricature]

Society: *teenagers are crazed, horny, and lovesick animals*

Me: “Romance? Sex?! Such desires mystify me…….”

ƪ( ᐛ )ʃ

[unromancesyourromance]

.That guy gets no bitches. .Slash positive. .In parentheses: Good for him. .Hashtag Aromantic.

[thearoacemoon]

Romance is not mandatory to have a good plot!

Let's repeat it until society understand.

[theneighborhoodcryptid]

“what if we kissed” what if we didn’t kiss and instead became such close friends that you realize that romance is unnecessary because it’s impossible for us to grow any closer than we currently are and that we’re already soulmates just not in that way

[rave-qai]

I am watching HeyRowanElis’ video “The ‘unbearable loneliness’ of aromanticism” and she quoted something from “Romantic Love is Killing us” by Caleb Luna— “It’s difficult to see it as anything other than a choice. To put it another way: those around me deprioritize our relationship for the sake of prioritizing their romantic and sexual one.” And it just has me really thinking.

Firstly in that amatonormatism is just so wide spread and expected of others. When I assumed I was alloromantic, and saw other alloromantic get into relationships, there was this pressure that you Had to prioritize your romantic relationship over every other relationship in your life EVER. All of your friends, all of your family, your children, co-workers, every single person in your life (oftentimes including yourself) MUST take a back seat to your romantic and sexual partner. And it’s ridiculous because I am also sure that most people don’t actually want that.

When I was in my toxic relationship, I was essentially expected to stop talking to all of my friends. Most of that was just due to the controlling nature of my ex but it was also the expectation from everyone else in my life too. People who weren’t negatively effect by the harmful nature of that relationship distanced, people who didn’t even know what he did to me and didn’t experience my negative outlash from being in that position still left and distanced. Everyone assumes you’re prioritizing them now and they react accordingly. I hated this, and so did many of my friends. But it was just the assumption.

I’m loosing track of my thoughts but my other thought is just that— it’s so expected yet literally no one I know actually wants that. So many people have expressed to me sadness and anger and lonliness when their other important friends got in a relationship and stopped talking to them, I’ve felt and seen other people experience the pain of the pressure to have to stop being as close to their friends as they once were— stop talking, stop engaging, no more touching ever, no more sleeping over, no more intimate private conversations. You seemingly have to forfeit the depth of love for everyone else you have.

I have also had potential partners + people I’ve engaged in more-than-platonic behavior with get visibly weirded out when I prioritize my relationship with my friends. They see it as weird when I tell them there are things I will only tell and do with my friends, that I will never tell them. They get weird when I prioritize my friends over them. They get weird when they see that romance isn’t my priority. This goes even with relationships that it’s been made clear it’s only sexual/platonic but engaging in more actions that are seen as romantic.

Idk. Being aromantic is weird. And it sucks sometimes.