being a straight-passing ace guy can be uniquely isolating
NOT a sob story I promise
As the title would suggest I'm an ace guy, though only a handful of people in my life actually know that's how I identify. I've been in a straight-passing relationship in the past. Unsurprisingly most people assume I'm straight. Why wouldn't they? That's the default.
Not that I owe anyone an explanation, but inevitably things are going to come up that are a little awkward. Like, why is it I've gone so long without a partner as a guy in college who is not (i hope) unattractive? (maybe because it's absurdly rare to meet other ace people and I don't care for hookups!) Obviously it's an important part of my identity, but for most people life is inherently sexual and most have never heard of asexuality and can't understand how it "works."
So here I am in limbo. I pass as straight but I'm obviously different from my straight friends and always feel like I'm hiding something from them about how I fundamentally see the world differently. The LGBT+ community is mostly accepting, but within it, asexuality holds a weird spot for me and others who aren't "visibly queer," mostly because queer identity tends to focus on differing sexual preferences and not the lack thereof... so I've never felt wholly comfortable in that space. On top of that, I'm a guy, and guys just don't usually have the same social support that women create for each other.
So it can be a bit lonely, for the reasons above and also because it's a bit of a numbers game, there are simply so few of us relative to the rest of the population. Curious to know if anyone feels similar to me or what anyone thinks of this. <3