Aaaaaagh!

My summer is almost over and I am fretting a bit.

I started this summer with “homework”: three conversations I was supposed to have. They’re things that really need to be discussed, but I’m scared and I hate conflict, so I’ve been putting them off. My best friend said she would give me a lollipop for each one that I accomplished by the time I get back to school. So far, I’ve gotten one out of the way. Another one was coming out to my parents. And now we’re nearing the end of the summer and I keep coming up with reasons to put it off.

My end-of-the-summer deadline feels artificial. There’s no reason for it, except that if I don’t have a deadline, I won’t do it. I’ll keep putting it off forever. But I feel like I’m rushing it. I’ve only known I’m ace for about six months. It seems like everyone else in the online ace community struggled silently with their asexuality for years before they finally worked up the courage to come out to somebody. Which doesn’t make sense as a reason for me not to come out, because comparing my experiences to the experiences of other people is not a good way to make decisions. But now I’m second-guessing myself, thinking that I’m rushing things, telling myself to wait and not force myself, to not make my asexuality into a Big Deal, as I am apt to do. When I hit upon a new idea that I like, I want to share it with everybody, and I feel like I should wait until the New Idea Energy dies down and being ace is just a thing instead of my latest fixation.

(I don’t mean to suggest that being ace is just a phase; I simply mean that in a few years, I will probably stop combing the internet for ace blogs to read for several hours a day.)

Sometimes I think that I just want to come out to everyone so that they’ll know what a special snowflake I am. In that case, I shouldn’t because I try very hard not to be annoying and attention-seeking. And then I think that maybe I’m using that as an excuse not to talk about it because I’m scared, in which case I should conquer my fears by coming out. And then I think that sexuality should be normal and unremarkable no matter what, and there’s no reason for me to be making a big deal about it at all, and I should just stop thinking about it, except I can’t.

I feel like whatever I decide to do, I’m doing it for the wrong reasons, but I don’t know what the right reasons are, and I’m about to tear my hair out in anxiety.