I Am Ace: Advice on Living Your Best Asexual Life

by Cody Daigle-Orians

At some point, we both have asked ourselves, “Am I asexual?”

brought me a truckload of other questions, a lot of surprising answers, new relationships, new ways of seeing myself, new communities to find myself in, new ways of advocating for those communities, opportunities to educate, opportunities to learn, a lot of joy, and a tiny sliver of internet popularity.

confused about what I was feeling without the words to properly express it, knowing I was different but feeling lost in understanding it.

not understanding why sex and intimacy were so difficult for me, not understanding why I felt completely broken.

hitting roadblocks in our relationship, feeling as though sometimes we couldn’t fundamentally understand each other,

when, in my early forties, I discovered I was asexual, wanting a resource that simply answered my pressing questions and was an encouraging friend saying, “You’ve got this! You can do it!

Asexuality is not a simple experience.

It was a secret language I hadn’t learned how to speak, an exclusive club I wasn’t invited to join.

I didn’t want to have sex with them, though. That never really crossed my mind.

it was crossing the minds of everyone else I knew, so I assumed it should be crossing mine as well—it just seemed like a weird thing to do.

couldn’t make the mental leap from that safe, inviting cud...

wasn’t something I felt a strong desire...

It was easy for me to develop crushes on girls in my classes, easy to develop close friendships with them.

There would be one or two who would really get those warm, squishy feelings going in me, and those feelings would flood my brain the more I’d spend time with them.

want to plan dates with them, be their boyfriend, perform romantic gestures for them, and live out every romantic movie trope I could think of.

wanted to love them, as much as I knew what that meant. And I wanted ...

I didn’t want to have sex with t...

very nervous any time the possibility of physical intimacy would come up ...

never thought about it or my brain would get stuck and not be able to take the leap to even imagine what p...

wanted some kinds of closeness, but I didn’t want sex.

I was experiencing confusion and anxiety and a low-grade, persistent feeling that something was really, really wrong with me.

There was a word for the chaos I was experiencing: asexuality.

Sex might seem confusing and incomprehensible.

might be the source of a lot of anxiety or fear.

Asexuality is a sexual orientation that includes any person who does not experience or rarely experiences sexual attraction.

It’s part of how we’re built.

They’re feeling their orientation, not thinking about it.

Show yourself compassion. Give yourself grace.

We can get comfortable in the uncertainty. And we can keep being curious, keep exploring, keep learning.

allosexuality and asexuality.

It’s assumed that everyone is born allosexual, and any deviations from that norm are the result of some brokenness or incompleteness in a person.

approximately one percent of the world’s population identifies somewhere on the asexual spectrum.

Asexuality is a sexual orientation. It is a natural, authentic way of experiencing the world. It is a whole experience in and of itself.

It’s okay to be confused, to feel like you don’t fit in anywhere, to feel like you don’t know yourself at all.

We can reconnect the dots. We can find new words. We can grow out of one place and grow into another.

Being close to him, touching him, sharing his space was something I wanted, something I maybe craved.

I couldn’t find sex in all the things I wanted with him, and I didn’t understand why.

I’d find people I liked and who liked me back. We wanted each other, but why didn’t I want in the same way they did? Wasn’t

Wasn’t this feeling, this craving—to be close, to be intimate, to be body to body—the want that led to sex? What was wrong with me? Why couldn’t I just be normal like them?

didn’t understand attraction.

libido is a desire or want to have sex.

Arousal is the feeling of your body and your mind being stimulated, awakened, “on.”

Arousal is a “right now” experience. It’s happening in your body and in your mind at this moment, and

So if I’m asexual, can I experience any attraction at all? In short: absolutely.

You can think someone’s cute but not be sexually attracted to them.

You can have deep romantic feelings about someone but not be sexually attracted to them.

Romantic attraction is an attraction to a person or a kind of person that makes you want to pursue romantic relationships with them.

Emotional attraction is an attraction to a person or a kind of person that makes you want to establish deep connections or emotional bonds with them.

Sensual attraction is an attraction to a person or a kind of person that makes you want to share physical closeness or non-sexual physical intimacy with them. Things like cuddling, kissing, holding hands, and hugging can be ways to express sensual attraction.

Intellectual attraction is an attraction to the way a person thinks or the way they engage with ideas.