I Love You
Love truly is a miracle. For all my life, I know I have felt a lot of love for the people that have been close to me and important to me, and I know that some of them have truly loved me too, still do to this day, or have once loved me but no longer do. The funny thing about love, though, is that there are many different kinds, many different flavors of love out there, but we don't talk about all of them as much as we should. Maybe that's how you get confused oblivious idiots like myself, someone who does not see that they way they feel about the gender society tells them to be attracted is love, yes, but it's a different kind of love. Someone whose entire family have all known that their child is gay, while they are none the wiser. Someone who gets jealous of a dear friend of theirs when they tell them they have a partner of some kind, even though the two have never met in person.
You Don’t Have To Be Ashamed
It's taken a very long time for me to be comfortable with the act of sexual intimacy. I'm on the asexual spectrum, and sex has never been at the forefront of what I value the most in a relationship. It has never been a dealbreaker for me in any way, and lack of sex to me does not signify a failing relationship. But not all of that disregard is rooted in me being ace. A small part of it is due to learned – or taught to be more precise – patterns of thinking.
Girls?!
When I was eleven years old, I got my very first professional sketchbook. It was marketed to be specifically for artists that were looking for that authentic manga feel to their art – it even had a silly image of some anime boy on the cover. I was so excited to start drawing like a professional, to have a legit sketchbook with legit manga lineart pens, just for drawing all those pretty anime girls.
"They're Just Jealous"
“Why else would they say those kinds of things? It's all just envy, don't worry about it! You're way ahead of them, that's why they comment on your body like that. Just don't pay them any mind, they don't deserve your attention anyway.”
Taking Advantage
When I go back to those years, those days, those moments, a paralyzing sensation of dread sets over me. It makes me feel violated all over again, and in a lot of ways, I think I am just now truly experiencing the horrible emotions those events caused within me, because I just wasn't aware of any of it. I just didn't know what it even was that I was facing, and why years and years after, I felt uncomfortable and scared around other girls.
Is That Really Normal?
Gym dressing rooms. They were probably the single place in the entire school building that I was the most scared of. I remember entering the hallway on the basement floor that led to the dressing rooms, and the soul-crushing dread and fear that settled deep into my being. It wasn't just in my gut, it was everywhere; in my head, in my heart, arms, legs. Every inch of my body was screaming at me to not go there, but I knew I had no other choice.
I Didn't Know
Dissociation has taken a lot of things away from me. I have massive gaps in my memory, both long-term and short-term, seemingly for no reason. But it has also shielded me from a lot of things; things that were too hard for my child brain to comprehend. It's fascinating how you can go for years without knowing a single thing about it, and then one day, the memory is right there, crystal clear in your mind, as if it was planted there. You question it – how is this even possible? – and think you must have just made it up and it was probably nothing. But the memory persists, it will not leave you alone, and every time it comes back to you, there is a pit in your stomach, and you feel it in your bones.
Life Update: Looking For A Bro
I think men are amazing. Some of the most important people in my life have been men, and only a few of my abusers have been male. It has usually been other girls and women who have hurt me the most, which is why I have this general feeling of fear and distrust around them. In my eyes, men are more trustworthy than women, so I've naturally gravitated towards them.