Love Stinks (And I Don't Get It)

CONTENT WARNING: This is a vent post

I am so freaking tired of this, dude. I don’t know if I can take it anymore. I ended up writing this short essay as a cry for help.

For my entire lifetime, I have yearned for the day that I could be romantically involved with someone. It especially does not help right now because my mom has a boyfriend, my sister’s engaged to her boyfriend, and multiple other family members & friends have romantic partners, so I feel like I’m missing out on something. When is it my turn??

Sure, I can handle friendships. I can be chatty when I’m allowed to. I can maintain platonic relationships for a long time. I can (usually) trust myself to be a good friend! But as soon as I so much as think about romantic feelings towards someone, I’ve probably set myself up for disappointment. And that disappointment can manifest for different reasons: maybe the person doesn’t have romantic feelings for me, they’re not looking to date me (or anyone for that matter), or WORSE…they already have a partner. That last point haunted me for years before I learned about how sexuality can extend beyond heterosexual relationships because I often (cynically) assumed that every girl I wanna date already has a boyfriend. Actually, it still haunts me to this day. It’s so frustrating!

I haven’t learned how to reach this romantic euphoria in my entire lifetime. I don’t understand how it works. I imagine it would have to start with a simple friendship, but then I wonder if I’m feeling romantic attraction with someone, or is it just infatuation? Is it all in my head?! Because if it is infatuation, which it most likely is, then I’m not getting anywhere. And honestly, the best-case scenario I could get out of this guessing game is that I could still be friends with someone I crushed on, which is perfectly fine. I would rather keep someone as a friend rather than burn bridges because I cannot date them.

Dare I say it, it feels like something within my social thought process is broken. Part of it is the social awkwardness that comes from my autism, but the other part of it is a failure to understand the difference between my friendly interactions and my romantic interactions. Worse yet, this failure to distinguish the two interaction types has made me desperate to attain a higher standard in social interactions.

I would foolishly imagine scenarios that I could do with someone in particular. Or I would unknowingly believe that if I try hard enough, then I can be more than a good friend to that person. But those fantasies in my head will all come crashing down as soon as I realize that the person I’m interested in doesn’t share the same feelings as I do, or they find that I’m ruining myself in the process. I remember feeling like I could be a bigger and better friend in a group of friends that I used to hang out with online, but because I was trying to chase this ambiguous higher standard, I was making life hard for myself and those friends around me. I was tearing myself apart over this.

Sometimes I feel like I should shut myself out and declare that I’m aromantic because this is all too complicated for me to understand, and I don’t know if I can take it anymore. But it doesn’t seem fair to think that way, right? I am a grey asexual for legitimate reasons that are rooted in personal choices and societal circumstances. I am perfectly fine with forgoing sexual relationships. But as for romantic relationships? It sounds lovely on paper, but I don’t know how I’m supposed to approach it. I’m too shy to even try it sometimes. It’s making me sad and frustrated that I keep trying and failing to chase after this stupid feeling. It hurts! Pain and jealousy in my heart, when will it go away?? I don’t know how to save myself from it. I don’t know who to talk to about this (aside from a therapist, which I will need anyway).

I think I’d rather wait until someone takes an interest in me instead of trying to chase people around to be my girlfriend or partner. I can try to forget this desire for romance because love can manifest platonically in many different ways through friends and family, which is beautiful in its own right. That can be something worth living for. But I want something more to life than this! I feel incomplete, somehow. It’s been eating me alive for so long. I can make all the friends that I want, but when will one of them become more than a friend to me?

When will it be my turn?

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