I think I'm aro and don't know how to tell my partner
I've been in this relationship for a year, we were friends before this and our younger brothers are friends too. I'm pretty sure I'm aro but I don't know if I want to change our relationship.
Before we got together we would cuddle and they would fall asleep on my lap. Not much has changed since then but I don't know if It was ever actually romantic feelings or just a need to be wanted.
I do want to get a house with them and adopt cats and teenagers, but this feeling could be directed at anyone of my close friends. I want to lead a domestic life but I don't want it to be labeled as romantic.
I think we could continue our relationship as a qpr, but I don't know how to bring that up without messing with my partner's emotional state. I resently mentioned in passing that I might be aro and they kinda started crying. I feel like I might be conveying that I don't love them anymore but that's not it, it's mostly society's standards of that sort of relationships.
I just want help talking it through with them without damaging our relationship.
I realize that this is not the topic usually covered here but I thought it might be close enough for people to relate to and give advice.
Thanks in advance, Spoon.๐๐ฟ๏ธ๐
@Iamspoons
I mean... unfortunately that's probably not the sort of thing you can tell a partner without them being emotionally affected by it. :/
I know for me, the thought of my romantic partner not returning my romantic feelings sends me into tears and I've only known him for a few months...
I think the best and most fair thing is to be honest with them. Try to explain as best and as honestly as you can what you feel and what you want. And then give them space to process and to decide whether that's something they can deal with.
And just to add to this... I think not telling them is unfair. They have a right to know what their partner can offer in a relationship and whether that's in line with what they want or is something they're willing or able to accommodate. It's better that you are honest now than for them to find out at a later date. Which they probably will... truth has a tendency to out.
Seeing this again kinda makes me cringe. We are broken up with lots of hard feelings between us. I feel like he messed up what could've been the best two years of my life, because I was afraid I would hurt him. Like the amount of emotional dependentness on me caused me to break under the pressure of maybe being the only thing keeping them alive, and now seeing them move on and make new friends like I never even *** mattered makes me really mad.
And we have a very shared friend group, who I was the one responsible for introducing him to. And he still talks and hangs out with all of them making me very uncomfortable in my irl support system, (yk lots of people instead of just the one person that I was)
And I know this is a unhealthy way to be taking this , seeing him make new friends should be a good thing, but I hold so much resentment. And it seems like I should just distance myself from them but that's complicated a little bit by the fact THAT WE GO TO THE SAME SCHOOL AND THREE CLASSES IN A *** ROW TOGETHER but anyway