- Date posted
- 2y
HOCD and asexuality
Hi - looking for advice. I’m diagnosed OCD (HOCD/ROCD theme). TLDR - HOCD sufferer that is wondering about asexuality. Is this ocd/anxiety/medication or am I asexual? I’m currently struggling with HOCD and have been for a few years. Before this hit, I was 25yo male who identified as straight. Today I had a random thought that maybe I’m asexual - and I’m looking for advice or a better understanding of what that means. Growing up, I naturally fantasised about girls and from around the age of 15/16 would self pleasure fantasising about being intimate with girls I knew. I was an anxious kid that never really was driven by women per-say. I liked the thought of being with them, but I think I got my needs met by watching adult stuff and self pleasure. I would say that I’ve always enjoyed watching intimacy in movies etc. like I have no doubt that appeals to me. At uni I was much the same I guess. Did I have crushes? I guess so? I had certain girls I was attracted to, but again - I got my needs met with self pleasure and fantasising about them. To be clear - I never had a second thought about my sexuality at all growing up. Sometimes I felt like I wasn’t driven by sex as much as my mates were, but figured I was shy and self pleasured to meet my needs. I met my first long term partner at uni. We were essentially best friends for 6 months before one night just being intimate. At the time (and for like 6 months after), I had the butterflies and loving life, wanted to be intimate all the time etc. After that time, I only really wanted to be intimate when I drank or hadn’t seen her for a couple of days. Then as the years went on, I just kind of lost the drive to be intimate with her at all. I’d say I continued to find girls attractive and would still fantasise with them in mind. We split after 7 years and I went through a period of personal growth. I was just super happy and confident in life. But I wanted a gf and felt the need to want one. Met someone who I straight away felt physical attraction to. Not “I want to have sex” but that I thought she was pretty. We hit it off, I got butterflies, happiness etc. we tried to be intimate but I had performance issues, and then literally out of the blue one day I had a thought - “you feel nothing for her”. This starting my OCD journey at around the age of 25 to where I am today (34). I met my wife in this period but since that time at 25, I’ve never felt the full blown attraction or drive for women. It’s like I’ve been asexual since that moment. I love my wife dearly and I’m hoping to spend the rest of my life with her. I went through two years of where ocd didn’t really impact me. I’d say I was content/happy and enjoying life. But I’ve never felt that full sexual drive again. I think deep down I believe I’m straight with just a really low sex drive. I’ve always kind of described myself as someone who wants to be with women but they had to be the right one. That I couldn’t do a one night stand and I’d not enjoy it. But does that make me asexual? Or - once my OCD is back under control, does all of this just float away and I’ll find labido once again? Any thoughts?