Profile: Claude
You can call me… Claude
I identify as… an asexual, aromantic, neutrois person.
As far as third-person pronouns go, … I prefer gender neutral ones.
I’m attracted to… no one. At least if we’re talking about sexual or romantic attractions. I have experienced aesthetic attraction, and I’ve had squishes.
When people talk about me, I want them to… I’d prefer it if people didn’t talk about me when I’m not around. I don’t exactly know why, but it makes me uncomfortable. But I guess that’s impossible, so… I’d want them focus on my personality and what I do, instead of my appearance or gender.
I want people to understand… that I’m not female or male. And I also want them to understand that it hurts me when they tell me my sexual orientation isn’t real.
About Claude
I’m Claude. I used to be a fundamentalist Christian (Protestant). I used to be afraid of and disgusted by homosexuality. It was probably because I’d grown up watching Disney movies (so homosexuality was a very new thing to me when I first heard about it), and I had been to Church many times because I was in the Church choir. But then, when I was about 11-12 years old, everyone else started getting crushes and thinking about sex. I tried pretending I was like them, but it didn’t work. So I searched the internet for other people who didn’t want sex, and found AVEN. AVEN made me more accepting of sexual orientations and gender identities. Not sure how, but it did.
At first I identified as a heteroromantic, because I didn’t know aromanticism existed, but when I found a thread about it all just made sense.
I also identified as a girl. Sort of. I hadn’t quite reached puberty yet, so my body looked pretty androgynous when I wore clothes. But then my breasts started developing, and I just felt, “This is not me.” I didn’t know why I felt that, I hadn’t yet discovered other gender identities than “female” and “male,” but it made me very miserable. Then I found a thread (on AVEN :D) about being neutrois and I just knew.
Somewhere along the line I started becoming less and less religious, and I fully stopped believing in God when my cat died. I prayed for months for God to make her come alive again, and I got no response.
(This probably turned out too long, but whatever)
» Define yourself. «
Category: profiles 6 comments »
June 30th, 2012 at 12:28 pm |
Hi Claude! :-)*
I ‘get’ the aesthetic attraction and ‘squishes’ thing (being mostly asexual myself)!!! :-) :-) :-)
I’m sorry about your cat…somehow I think we’ll even be reunighted with our furry loved ones in eternity….it just seems like the sort of thing God would do: love is never wasted or in vain, but its extravagant effects reach the horizon, blurry and indistinct, and only the part closest to us is clear, but we may not grasp its greater meaning… Someday, God will make this clear and we will gasp in awe and joy!!!
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Brett Blatchley replied:
June 30th, 2012 at 12:33 pm
Oops! Forgot to sign it!
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June 30th, 2012 at 3:10 pm |
Cheers from a fellow neutrois person! Happy trails, wherever life takes you :)
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July 1st, 2012 at 9:43 am |
Thanks for sharing, Claude! I’ve been trying to become a better ally to asexual, aromantic, and demi folk, so thanks for standing up to be a visible member of the community. I’m regularly humbled here on GF when marginalized and less-represented folk make the brave move to share experiences, and then others find it and are able to say, “Hey, I’m less alone than I thought.”
Brett – thanks also for sharing your experiences, thoughts, and support. Please forgive me for singling you out, since your post represents just one in a large handful of posts that have been floating around lately that have been falling into a similar category.
With that caveat: I think most of us can agree that belief (and non-belief) can be a touchy subject in most societies. We at Genderfork understand that belief/non-belief is part of identity for many folks and therefore an important part of how they interact with the world. We want to foster a community where all are treated with equal respect. To achieve this, we advocate for the use of qualifiers such as “It’s my experience that…” or “I firmly believe…” in order to maintain an atmosphere of mutual understanding that one’s own experience may not match the experience of others.
Thanks and keep up the good work!
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Brett Blatchley replied:
July 1st, 2012 at 11:34 am
Anyone? Everyone? Please forgive me if I’ve offended you…that’s never my intention {very small voice}
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Gib replied:
July 4th, 2012 at 2:14 pm
I don’t share your beliefs, but I’ll never be offended by them unless you expect me to think and act as you do. ^^ Genderfork has taught me, a hard-set and sometimes bitter atheist, that religion and spirituality can be beautiful; that they don’t have to be exclusive of non-binary people . I don’t think it was your intention to hurt or offend anyone, and frankly, I find your idea pleasant and inspiring.
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