Not that I don't still need a solid connection to be interested in getting sexual with someone - that part is quite accurate - but the part that's starting to feel inaccurate is how there isn't really a well-defined place or progression for sex in my relationships. I used to feel that once a particular kind of connection is in place, that I would then be much like a "normal" sexual person in that relationship (whatever that is?). But really, it's more like sex is just something that happens or doesn't happen in particular relationships, if it makes sense with that particular person or not. It doesn't define the relationship.
I think relationship anarchy might have affected how I look at all of this too. I've become quite used to the idea of "customised commitments", and generally taking each relationship for what it is - free from cultural and social norms that dictate which features that general social category of relationship should contain. I think this has helped me see that sex can have a different place in different relationships (both mine and others'), and that it can be quite a subjective thing what it means to people.
Maybe it's a bit flaky and misleading to talk about being on the asexual spectrum and being a relationship anarchist in the same breath - given that one is talking about inherent internal tendencies and the other is a set of values that can be taken up voluntarily and consciously, but I think this can be the name of the game a bit when you're discussing relationships. In fact, I'd say conventional relationship norms themselves often go with tendencies and orientations which are on the thick parts of bell curves of what people want to do with their lives, so I think quite a lot of this actually goes on anyway, even in "mainstream" relationship dialogue.
Not much has ultimately changed here. I guess I just find it more accurate to identify as a broadly "asexual spectrum person" than as explicitly demisexual, for what these labels are worth anyway.
What precipitated all this? A few online discussions I've taken part in lately, which were about the merits and drawbacks of labels. My current school of thought is that labels are far more useful when they're descriptive than when they're prescriptive - and this is where this little muse (and minor label adjustment) is coming from. I might have demisexual tendencies, but a more broad "on the asexual spectrum" label fits better, and it's more descriptive and general than "demisexual".
As I always say however - I think labels should be used sparingly and on a need-to-know basis. Overuse and overidentification is what seems to give them too much of a life of their own, and often make them too prescriptive and limiting.
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