Resolving Gray

Murderbot in an “aromantic asexual agender” pride shirt, aka. the AAA battery joke!

Paul Atreides. You are your father’s son. You are my son.

i just—

https://www.epinsight.com/post/staying

Gotta take advantage of the chilly weather!

- You think sexual thoughts about the person out of nowhere

- You feel aroused upon seeing the person outside of a sexual setting

- You find yourself wondering what the person is like in bed and what their genitals look like 

- You want to have sex with that person because your body is screaming for sex with that one person in particular.

- Seriously though if you’re already horny and that person is there you will feel all hot and sexually aroused and might drool a bit and fantasies of doing X-rated things to that person will fly through your mind and your body will literally be screaming for that person to take you or for you to take that person. Even just thinking about that person while horny can do this to you.

- TMI but if you get off while fantasizing about you having sex with that person, the orgasms can be absolutely mind-blowing and may even give you leg cramps.

- You really do “just know.”

You might not be sexually attracted to that person if…

- You make a conscious effort to fantasize about sex with that person, mainly to see if you actually want to

- You feel aroused during a sexual situation, but that arousal has more to do with the activities instead of the specific person. Alternatively, you just don’t feel aroused at all.

- You feel aroused at random, but it’s directed towards no one

- You want to have sex with that person because you want to make them happy or are just horny and want to get off with a partner or want babies or want money or literally any other reason aside from your body screaming for sex with that one person in particular.

- TMI but if you try to get off while fantasizing about you having sex with that person, you may get bored and start thinking of other things. Or, you may start fantasizing about that person doing sexual things that don’t involve you in which case aegosexual might be worth looking into.

- You just don’t know.

If the “you might be sexually attracted” list boggles your mind, you are possibly asexual.

If the “you might not be sexually attracted” list boggles your mind, you are possibly not asexual.

If you can relate to the “might not be sexually attracted” list, but also feel like you’ve experienced some of the things on the “might be sexually attracted” list, it may be worth checking out some acespec identities.

A big one too, I think is, you may fantasize, but the people in your fantasies are never YOU. They’re fictional characters or your OCs but they’re never you specifically. And if they are it’s an idealized version of you.

If you’ve ever had the thought “masturbation is better than sex because it is more efficient and skips the boring bits,” you might not experience sexual attraction.

If you find someone attractive, but the thought of seeing them with their clothes off isn’t more attractive, it probably isn’t sexual attraction. (A naked body is just a naked body. But people are so lovely when in a look they’ve picked out to express themselves.)

If you occasionally notice body parts considered sexual and think they look nice, but do not want to do anything sexual related to those parts, it might not be sexual attraction. (I will occasionally think someone has nice boobs or a nice butt, and I assumed that was sexual attraction for a long time. But I’ve learned that for allo people, thinking those things leads to them having a response of “therefore I want to tap that” which is absolutely baffling to me. Also, again, those thoughts don’t lead to “and therefore I want to see them without clothing.”

It’s almost like I don’t have a-… wait                         

me, appalled: so ace people don’t exist ig

the same person: but,,, they’re not ace

me, still appalled: nah they’re just ethereal and demonic beings with no form of gender or sexual expression

I’ve just recently realized my personal experience of gender falls partially into the category of nonbinary so I spent some time delving into nonbinary gender identities and learning about them to see if any of them felt right. However, none of the pre-existing terms felt like a good fit for me. “Gender neutral,” “neutrois,” and “agender” all felt kiiinda close, and while I could technically kinda use them to express what I feel about myelf, I thought I’d rather have something a bit clearer and more specific to my experience of gender, that feels truly right to use.

After trying to sort out and define exactly how I experience gender, I realized that it felt a lot like how I experience my graysexuality and grayromanticism - that is, I feel like I experience gender, but I naturally have a lot less investment in it and motivation to participate in it compared to most people. So, thinking about the difference between “asexuality” and “graysexuality”, my mind came up with the term “graygender” which could have that same relationship to “agender”, and it felt really surprisingly right for me almost immediately. (note: I know agender doesn’t necessarily mean you don’t have or experience gender at all, but it can very easily be taken that way, which is why it doesn’t quite work for me.)  

Below I’ll explain graygender and what it feels like more: ———-

Graygender / Greygender:

a person who identifies as (at least partially) outside the gender binary and has a strong natural ambivalence about their gender identity or gender expression. They feel they have a gender(s), as well as a natural inclination or desire to express it, but it’s weak and/or somewhat indeterminate/indefinable, or they don’t feel it most of the time, or they’re just not that invested in it. They’re not entirely without a gender or gender expression, but they’re not entirely “with” it either, so to speak. So using the word “graygender” can express: the state of being kinda close to agender but not quite (just greysexuality is kinda close to asexuality but not quite), having a nonbinary gender that falls in a hazy grey area and can be hard to define or pinpoint, being gender neutral-ish more because of ambivalence and lack of participation in gender rather than active participation in nonbinary gender expression, and/or feeling gender and an inclination to participate in gendered thinking/expression less than most seem to.

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