Growing up, I started to realize that I wasn’t ever sexually attracted to someone unless there was some kind of emotional connection. I was a virgin for much longer than most of my peers because of it. If anyone ever found out I was still a virgin, I constantly heard things like “Why are you still a virgin? That’s weird.” Then, even after explaining why, I’d hear “But… why? Sex is great!” At the time, all I knew how to say was “I don’t know. Why aren’t you?” The constant questions made me feel alienated and very “other”. Later on, I started realizing that I truly was a minority in that sense, but that it was something I very much didn’t choose for myself – I had just always been that way, for as long as I could remember.
Some people (usually religious people) would commend me if they found out, which I also found highly irritating, because I wasn’t abstaining. It had absolutely nothing to do with morality or religion. Some people would even find out and get offended, as if I was somehow attacking their lifestyle – even when they were the ones who approached me and would start asking personal questions. They assumed it meant I didn’t like sex, or that I somehow looked down on them.
In ways, I struggled to understand why, exactly, I was the way I was. It would prompt curiosity at times, especially because there was no fast, easy way to explain it to people, and I got tired of it. I don’t mind when people are curious if they’re polite about it, and so I desired an easy way to explain. Then, years later, I started seeing “demisexual” here and there. At first I had no idea what it was and completely disregarded it, until one day I looked further into it – and realized that there, finally, was something to explain my sexuality.