JOY BLOG

21 Feb 2022

Stories of JOY – Alicea for Aromantic Awareness Week

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Alicea (she/her) – Aromantic Asexual

This week we’re celebrating Aromantic Awareness Week. We’ve spoken with members of the community to raise awareness of what this week and their identity means to them. Alicea (she/her) is an aromantic asexual woman with Chinese and Australian background. She works as a consultant and in her spare time she loves to bake, spend time with family and cuddle with her cat! Alicea is passionate about raising awareness of asexual and aromantic identities, and how different cultural backgrounds can impact LGBTQIA+ people.

She shared this with JOY:

“Embracing my identity as an aromantic asexual woman has brought me so much connection to the queer community. Being open about my experiences has made me feel empowered to share my story and be a voice of education for queer folks and allies who are not familiar with aspec identities. At the same time, it can be very difficult and alienating living in a world where romantic, sexual relationships are put on a pedestal and seen as necessary to live a fulfilling life.

My experience is also through the lens of having Chinese and Australian cultural background. I’ve identified as asexual for many years but only realised I was also aromantic a couple of years ago. I struggled to come to terms with being aro a lot more because I felt that I would let my family down and not be able to complete those big life milestones (marriage etc etc). Now that I have accepted and embraced who I am, it’s given me a lot more freedom to realistically envision my future and focus on the family and friend relationships that matter most to me!”