I'll be turning 15 in a few months. I currently identify as asexual, because that's just what feels right. But now I don't know. When I was 12, some kids around me stated that they felt sexual attraction to people. By the time I was 14, everyone around me seemed to wanna do the dance. But I didn't feel this way. And I still don't. My opinion is no longer 'ew gross' anymore. it just seems like sex is a thing people do, and i dont care that it exists. And I used to pretend to be attracted to people in that way because I thought that if i faked it, it might happen. But I just can't view anyone through that lense. Am I too young to call myself asexual?
I think that if you have passed through puberty you can probably know. There is though the possibility that you might be demisexual and just have not met and gotten to know the right person. Or even a slight possibility that you are just a really late bloomer. Mostly though I think that labels are for communicating things to people. If telling people that you are asexual gets across what you are trying to say e.g. "I am not interested in having sex" then go ahead and use that label to say that.
It is highly unlikely you are asexual, at least using the widely accepted definition. A lot more likely that you are still relatively early in adolescence and things have just not kicked in for you yet. Asexuality (again, using the real, not the crowdsourced, made up definition) is rare. Very often, people who don't have sexual attraction either have not hormonally developed, or have had trauma or attachment failures in their lives that make it feel uncomfortable or unsafe to feel attraction. That's a psychological issue, not a hardwired sexual orientation. The downside to identifying with that label at this point is losing out on the possibility of feeling a strong loving connection with another person. We've had many here on EC who identified with that label and later figured out that they got suckered, and were unhappy at the time lost in their lives. But at the end of the day, only you can know for sure. Honestly, this isn't something you need to make a decision on at this point, and a lot can change between 15 and 25, which is the official end of adolescence from a brain development perspective.
You might be Ace, or you might be (as others have said) either a late bloomer or somewhere on the demisexual spectrum. You don't have to answer, but I guess something to consider is whether you experience arousal at all or not. It's one thing to not be sexually attracted to someone, and another to not experience arousal at all. Admittedly though, my understanding of how asexuality works is somewhat limited, because I'm not sure how far along the spectrum it goes before it ceases to be a matter of asexuality and simply comes down to being selective in one's attractions. ^^;
From a life perspective, yes, I would have never suspected the things that changed in this time span when I was 15 So my advice here would be... keep an open mind. In the sexuality aspect but also in other aspects. I would have never suspected how my career path evolved, for example.
You're clearly too young to adopt that label. Thanks to the awful crowdsourced definition of the internet and the influence of my dad, I wasted a lot of time thinking I was asexual back in the days, instead of letting things develop naturally. It made me as much of a disservice as the discordant romantic/sexual attraction bs. I was physiologically very late to the party (my first nocturnal emission was at 15-16 and I didn't masturbate until I was 16-17) and then I also had to deal with a lot of denial and inner conflicts that didn't allow me to accept or process the attractions I did feel, which anyway weren't many. Adopting the asexual label in your teens (or even 20s) would act as a self-fulfilling prophecy, at least for some time, and make your self-discoveries come later and with more difficulty. Even if you were asexual, there's no way you can know now. So relax and enjoy the journey! It's totally okay not to have figured yourself out at your age. The less you stress about labels, the sooner you'll reach clarity!
I feel the exact same way at times, we're basically the same age lol. I never felt any/or had any sexual attraction to anyone when I was younger, and currently I still don't as of now.
