Taelor Doesn't Want to Have Sex

Summary

Proxy with Yowei Shaw

Episode Summary: "Taelor Doesn't Want to Have Sex"

Date: June 30, 2026

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Overview

This episode of Proxy dives into the deeply personal and often misunderstood experience of being asexual (or "ace"), through the story of Taylor, a young woman longing for romantic connection without sex. Yowei Shaw, the host, connects Taylor with Courtney Lane, an asexual woman who’s been in a long-term ace/ace marriage, to explore questions of love, boundaries, identity, and finding community as an ace. Through their frank, funny, and sometimes painful conversation, the episode shines a light on the unique obstacles faced by people who don’t experience sexual attraction, and explores whether fulfilling intimacy—romantic or otherwise—is possible without sex.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Taylor’s Story: Feeling Alone in an Allosexual World

• Taylor’s Dilemma:
  Taylor, 29, is attractive and in many ways socially successful, but experiences no sexual attraction. She wants a romantic relationship, but not sex—a position that makes her feel isolated and at odds with societal norms.
  • “I've never had that experience in my life.” (Taylor, 04:56)
• Dating Challenges:
  Has tried dating (and having sex) due to pressure from friends and the desire not to feel ‘broken’ or ‘unlovable,’ but ends up forcing herself, hiding her ace identity from partners.
  • “I should have never opened Pandora's box. But on the other hand, it's too late.” (Taylor, 06:57)
• Past Relationships:
  Faces constant disbelief and fetishization from men, often being treated as a “fixer upper” or a “challenge,” leading to exhaustion and the tendency to hide her asexuality.
  • “A lot of people would want to have sex with Taylor. She's hot. But Taylor does not want to have sex with them. Any of them. Because Taylor is asexual.” (Yowei, 03:53)
• Isolation and Stigma:
  Research cited: asexuals are not just misunderstood but often rated “less human” and subject to dehumanizing attitudes (Yowei, 08:09).
  • “Being ACE put a target on her back.” (Yowei, 08:09)
• Failed Solutions:
  Tried dating other aces (rare/unavailable), open relationships (partners uninterested), and considered dating women (conflicts with conservative background).

The ACE Proxy: Courtney Lane

• Introducing Courtney:
  A prominent ace advocate, historian, and artist, married to another ace (Royce) for 12 years, and co-host of "The Ace Couple" podcast.
  • “I also am asexual. Also very much on the sex repulsed side of the spectrum.” (Courtney, 17:42)
• Ace Community Diversity:
  Yowei emphasizes there is no single ace experience; some aces do enjoy aspects of sex or kink, some are indifferent, and some—like Taylor and Courtney—are “sex repulsed.”
  • “Being ACE is not a monolith…” (Yowei, 16:05)
• Courtney’s Relationship:
  Both partners are ace, with honest communication and clear boundaries being key.
  • “If our life was an Ace sitcom… then we’re just playing video games on the pod.” (Courtney, joking, 18:41)
• Finding Love & Making Peace:
  Courtney acknowledges luck in finding her partner (“just sort of fell into my lap”) but stresses the importance of knowing and maintaining boundaries.

The Cost of Compromise and Societal Pressures

• Compulsory Sexuality:
  Courtney introduces the idea that society assumes everyone wants and should want sex, leading aces to question themselves or feel broken.
  • “Underlying that is a blanket societal notion that everyone is or should be sexual.” (Courtney, 22:53)
  • “Maybe things will be different this time. And that's another part of the reason why I'm like, maybe I just shouldn't date because I haven't been able to do it in a way that feels good to me.” (Taylor, 22:53)
• Boundary Erosion:
  Both Taylor and Courtney share experiences of boundary-pushing, coercion, and even trauma when trying to “fake” being allosexual (experiencing sexual attraction).
  • “It seems like if you don't bend your own boundaries, someone else will break them for you.” (Courtney, 30:11)
• Consent Complexities for Aces:
  ACEs often feel pressure to provide sexual access as an “act of service” or “duty,” which can be harmful and inauthentic.
  • “I started viewing sex as like an act of service—it’s something I can do for my partner even though I don’t really get anything out of it. And maybe that'll make it bearable. And to some extent that worked until it didn't.” (Taylor, 32:20)
  • “Sex, even amongst two aloes, should be more than just putting a date on the calendar... you should not assume by default that you are the one who has to make all of the compromises.” (Courtney, 47:00)

Seeking Fulfillment: Romance, QPRs, and Friendship

• Courtney’s Path to Contentment:
  Before meeting Royce, Courtney embraced being single, reframing her needs for intimacy to prioritize deep friendship (sometimes called "queer platonic relationships" or QPRs).
  • “Once I was able to sort of identify what I want is not necessarily this type of relationship, what I want is to not be lonely and I want to have deep interpersonal relationships, then I was able to sort of reframe my way of thinking.” (Courtney, 35:29)
• QPRs as a Model:
  QPRs offered intense, committed, non-romantic partnership, and fulfilled much of what she sought from romance.
• Taylor’s Take:
  Taylor doesn’t struggle with loneliness due to strong friendships, but worries about friends’ availability as they pair off. She expresses a longing for friends as invested in friendship as she is.

Community, Visibility & Advocacy

• Finding Community:
  Both guests discuss the difficulty of finding ace people ("1% of the population") and the lack of active local ace spaces. Courtney advises being out and open as ace to naturally attract community, both online and “in the wild.”
  • “Being openly ourselves... sometimes in very unexpected ways.” (Courtney, 51:00)
• “No Horny Bards at Our Table:”
  Fun note: Courtney and Royce’s D&D group originated online but turned into deep offline friendships, illustrating the creative ways aces can form community.
  • “There are no horny bards allowed at our table, and it's fabulous.” (Courtney, 53:24)

Tackling Disbelief and Microaggressions

• Negative Reactions:
  Taylor shares stories of people (including friends) reacting with incredulity or disgust at the idea of asexuality. She wants to develop “thicker skin” and learn how to handle hurtful or dismissive comments.
  • “I'd rather die than be asexual.” (Taylor quoting a friend, 54:00)
• Courtney's Advice:
  Respond with analogies: “Tell them to take what you just said about asexuality and substitute literally any other queer orientation... Does that still sound like an okay thing to say?” (Courtney, 57:03)
  • “It takes practice, that's for sure.” (Courtney, 55:24)

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Memorable Quotes & Moments

• Taylor on Dating:
  “I kind of go back and forth sometimes though, because on one hand I'm like, I should have never opened Pandora's box. But on the other hand, it's too late.” (06:57)

• Courtney on ACE Challenges:
  “It seems like if you don't bend your own boundaries, someone else will break them for you.” (30:11)

• Taylor’s Frustration:
  “Maybe I just shouldn't date because I haven't been able to do it in a way that feels good to me.” (22:53)

• Courtney on Relationships:
  “You should not assume by default that you are the one who has to make all of the compromises. Since we are further away from the societal norm, it's so much easier for us to say, well, we're the weird ones. And some people even get apologetic about it. And you shouldn't.” (47:00)

• Taylor’s Hope and Guardedness:
  “It gives me a little hope. And then the following thought was like, actually, no, don't get too excited, because that sort of happy coincidence might not necessarily happen for me. So I'm not trying to extrapolate anything beyond that.” (43:55)

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Important Timestamps

• 03:53 — Taylor’s introduction, asexual identity explained
• 04:56 — Taylor describes her lack of sexual attraction
• 07:26 – 08:09 — Taylor hides her asexuality, describing exhaustion and fear
• 09:18 — Taylor’s metaphor: “I don’t want to put my hand in there [dating] because I will get hurt.”
• 12:15 — Taylor’s big question: “Is it possible to have love without sexual [connection]?”
• 17:42 — Introduction of Courtney Lane, ace and sex-repulsed, married to another ace
• 22:53 — Compulsory sexuality and internalized societal pressure
• 27:38 – 30:11 — Both Taylor and Courtney share boundary-crossing and traumatic experiences with allosexual men
• 32:20 — Taylor views sex as an act of service
• 35:29 — Courtney on reframing needs around loneliness and connection
• 36:37 — QPR (queer platonic relationships) as fulfilling alternatives
• 40:11 – 43:26 — The romantic story of Courtney meeting and moving in with Royce
• 47:00 — The necessity of allosexual partners “showing up and unpacking” in mixed-orientation relationships
• 53:24 — How building ace community can happen through openness (e.g., D&D groups)
• 54:00 — Taylor recounts a friend’s dismissiveness: “I’d rather die than be asexual”
• 57:03 — Courtney’s analogy for addressing acephobia

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Episode Takeaways

• You’re Not Alone:
  While Taylor’s feelings of isolation are common for aces, connections—romantic, platonic, or community-based—are possible, but often require extra effort and resilience.
• Boundaries Are Non-negotiable:
  Aces, especially women, are more likely to have boundaries ignored, making assertiveness and self-protection essential.
• Community Matters:
  Openness about ace identity, seeking out online and IRL spaces, and creative approaches (like niche hobbies) are key to finding support and “your people.”
• Hope, with Realism:
  Fulfillment is possible, but there’s no one-size-fits-all answer. For some, it’s romance with another ace; for others, QPRs or deep friendship suffice.
• Advocacy & Education:
  Responding to confusion or bigotry can be an ongoing challenge; telling one’s story, and using comparisons to other queer identities, helps educate and shift norms.

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Follow-up & Updates

• Taylor’s Progress:
  Soon after the conversation, Taylor disclosed her asexuality on a date and, for the first time, made an in-person ace friend—offering a hopeful hint that connection is possible.

• Courtney’s Resources:
  Courtney Lane co-hosts The Ace Couple podcast, and more links and ace resources are available via Proxy’s newsletters and show notes.

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Final Thoughts

Proxy’s format—intimate, searching conversations between people with rarely platformed experiences—offers rare, validating insight for listeners who may also feel alone with their “niche emotional conundrums.” This episode is a nuanced exploration of asexual identity, the challenges and possibilities for intimacy, and the ongoing project of finding and defending one’s place in the world.

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Notable Quotes (Speaker, Timestamp)

• “I've never had that experience in my life.” (Taylor, 04:56)
• “A lot of people would want to have sex with Taylor. She's hot. But Taylor does not want to have sex with them. Any of them. Because Taylor is asexual.” (Yowei, 03:53)
• “Underlying that is a blanket societal notion that everyone is or should be sexual.” (Courtney, 22:53)
• “It seems like if you don't bend your own boundaries, someone else will break them for you.” (Courtney, 30:11)
• “You should not assume by default that you are the one who has to make all of the compromises.” (Courtney, 47:00)
• “I'd rather die than be asexual.” (Taylor quoting a friend, 54:00)
• “Tell them to take what you just said about asexuality and substitute literally any other queer orientation... Does that still sound like an okay thing to say?” (Courtney, 57:03)

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For More

• The Ace Couple Podcast – Hosted by Courtney Lane
• Proxy Newsletter and ACE resources: proxyhq.org

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If you haven’t listened, this summary gives you all the essential themes, wisdom, and emotionally honest moments from Taylor and Courtney’s search for love, acceptance, and belonging—without compromise.

Transcript

[Yowei Shah]

Funding for today's story was provided by the University of California, Berkeley's Greater Good Science center as part of its Spreading Love through the Media initiative, supported by the John Templeton Foundation. I've always wanted to do the NPR funder voice some more Housekeeping as you might have guessed from the title, today's episode talks about sex, including some parts about sexual violence. So do without what you will and take care of yourselves. If you had to vocalize the sound of this niche emotional conundrum, what would it be?

[Taylor]

Um, I don't know. Maybe that was the sound, just like a sad groan.

[Yowei Shah]

Yo, yo, yo, I'm Yowei Shah on proxy. We believe no one is alone with their problem because statistically, somewhere out there is somebody who gets it. And through the powers of reporting, we find them. Today's case, the woman who wants a romantic relationship without having to have sex. Just how much should you compromise for love? That's after some ads.

[Taylor]

Foreign.

[Yowei Shah]

I'm Elizabeth Day, creator and host of

[Courtney Lane]

how to Fail, where we hear from

[Yowei Shah]

people like this for Schitt's Creek, for example. If I had a partner going into

[Courtney Lane]

that experience, I certainly would not have

[Yowei Shah]

had that partner coming out of that experience. It's a talent to be a mom, you know, it's a skill. And even we actually seen Miranda fail at a lot of things.

[Taylor]

That was the best thing that could

[Yowei Shah]

have happened to her. That's how to fail. Find it wherever you're listening to this. This episode is brought to you in part by Quints. Right now I am sweating in my recording booth because summer is here and this time I am equipped with a Quint swimsuit that I don't have to worry about fading or pilling like my other swimsuits. I just got the Italian V neck bikini in cherry, which is made with recycled materials and has removable pad, adjustable straps and a hook closure for a perfect fit. This is what you can count on Quints for high quality essentials for every season, like soft organic cotton sweaters for layering on cool summer nights and breathable 100% European linen pants, dresses and tops. Starting at $32, everything at Quint is priced 50 to 80% less than similar brands. They're able to do that because they work directly with ethical factories and cut out the middlemen. So you are paying quality, not brand markup. Quint doesn't just do clothing, they've become a destination for elevated essentials across the home, kitchen, bedding and beyond. Elevate your summer wardrobe. Go to quint.com proxy for free shipping on your order and 365 day returns. Now available in Canada too. That's Q U I n c e.com proxy this show is supported by Odoo.

[Courtney Lane]

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[Yowei Shah]

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[Courtney Lane]

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[Courtney Lane]

Check out Odoo at o d o

[Yowei Shah]

o.com that's o d o o.com. Earlier this year I got on a video call with a listener named Taylor. She's 29, works in marketing, has straight black hair and a full face of expertly applied makeup. And I don't typically say this because I respect Proxy guests, but it's relevant for the story. A lot of people would want to have sex with Taylor. She's hot. But Taylor does not want to have sex with them. Any of them. Because Taylor is asexual. Or as Taylor says is the shorthand. She's ace. She's never been sexually attracted to anyone. The way she put it, when she looks at other people, she might recognize physical features that are attractive, but it's only ever on a cerebral level.

[Taylor]

When I see someone who's very well built that is attractive to me, but less physically and more so because it communicates that that person has a disciplined lifestyle and they work really hard. But I never have looked at someone and been like I want to rip their clothes off or like anything. Like people say stuff like that and I'm like, I don't understand what you mean. Like I don't. I've never had that experience in my life.

[Yowei Shah]

For a long time, Taylor had no interest in dating, but by her mid-20s she got sick of everyone telling her, well, how do you know you're asexual if you've never had sex? And she decided to try. She dated a string of duds, had some weird experiences, but finally met a guy that she clicked with and they had sex, which she did not enjoy, but she liked everything else about being with him. And for the first time she fell in love.

[Taylor]

I remember walking outside one day and I was like listening to some music and there was like a song that came on, like a love song or something, and I realized I just never could relate. I actually made it a point to curate a playlist that was devoid of most Love songs because I just thought they were so, like, cliche and I couldn't relate to them. But I was listening to the song one day and I realized, like, huh. I just felt it. I connected to it in a way that I never had before. And I was like, ooh, that's different. That's weird.

[Yowei Shah]

The relationship didn't last long, but Taylor was now hooked on this feeling and the idea of sharing her life with someone.

[Taylor]

I kind of go back and forth sometimes though, because on one hand I'm like, I should have never opened Pandora's box. But on the other hand, it's too late.

[Yowei Shah]

This brings me to the dilemma that led Taylor to reach out to me in the first place. Her new boyfriend. They'd been together for a year and a half, and she loved him, but they were having troubles. Are you upfront about your asexuality in this relationship?

[Taylor]

No.

[Yowei Shah]

And are you doing things you don't want to do?

[Taylor]

Yeah.

[Yowei Shah]

Oh.

[Taylor]

So, yeah.

[Yowei Shah]

Oh, that breaks my heart.

[Taylor]

I know. I thought. Well, I thought it would be fine at first. I'm like, I can just psych myself out. Like, it's fine if I care enough, but I can't keep doing this.

[Yowei Shah]

I also wonder what he would think if he knew you were asexual and you're forcing yourself to do things you don't want to do. Essentially, yeah.

[Taylor]

He wouldn't be okay knowing that I am, like, forcing myself every single time. He's a good guy. He wouldn't want that.

[Yowei Shah]

Taylor told me she was hiding her asexuality because, well, she was exhausted from her past experience with guys who didn't believe her, who thought she was being a prude, a tease, or even worse, guys who saw her as a conquest, somebody to fix. And she's not alone. There's research showing that asexuality is often misunderstood, not treated as legitimate, even stigmatized. In one peer reviewed study, asexual people weren't just rated more negatively than heterosexual people and other sexual minorities. They were even seen as, quote, less human, which is a brutal thing to put in a study. But for Taylor, it matched something. She already felt that being ACE put a target on her back. So at a certain point, she decided to go full stealth mode and just hope she could make the sex work with allosexuals. That's a term popular in the ACE community for people who experience sexual attraction.

[Taylor]

I don't know how to describe it, but when alo people are like, really into it, it's like they're in a different State of mind. It's kind of like if you're hanging out with someone who's, like, high and you're talking to them and they're like, there, but they're not there. They're in just a different realm. And it's kind of scary. I don't know. It kind of feels like we're in the jungle and they're like, hunting prey and I'm the prey.

[Yowei Shah]

Oh, no. Thankfully, Taylor broke up with her boyfriend. She's relieved, but also sad. She misses him, and she now wonders, will she ever be able to thread this needle, have a romantic relationship with kissing and cuddling and holding hands beneath sex?

[Taylor]

I sometimes say, instead of it being like, trying to find the needle in the haystack, it's like the reverse. It's like trying to find the hay and the needle stack. And it's like, I don't want to put my hand in there because I will get hurt. The thought just is kind of exhausting, and I just don't want to go through that again.

[Yowei Shah]

It made me sad to see somebody so young, yet so jaded Already. I went into fixes mode. I asked Taylor, why not date another asexual person? Taylor says she's tried this, but even though she lives in a big city, she hasn't been able to find other asexual people, which tracks after all, the number you often hear is that only about 1% of people are asexual. So I asked her, why not open relationships? Taylor says she's also tried this. She's told guys they can hook up with other people, just don't tell her. But the people she's dated haven't been interested. They want Taylor to want to have sex with them, too. So then I asked Taylor, okay, well, if you've had so many bad experiences with men, why not date women or other genders? And Taylor tells me, well, she's extremely close with her parents, and they're very conservative Southern Baptist, and she doesn't want to jeopardize that relationship by dating women. So for now, Taylor is single and worried she'll be single forever.

[Taylor]

At the end of the day, I do still want some form of companionship or a relationship, and it makes me sad to think that maybe I can't have that.

[Yowei Shah]

She wants to know, is it possible to have love without sexual. And if not, how does she cope? We find Taylor a proxy after the break. You're listening to this podcast, so you've

[Courtney Lane]

got a curious mind.

[Yowei Shah]

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[Taylor]

When I went to working on the quilt, I said, now these people can speak out amongst what I'm doing.

[Yowei Shah]

The project is going to help us remember. It's always good to have a memorial.

[Courtney Lane]

You don't hide the past.

[Taylor]

It was something that we owned. It was something that we owned up

[Yowei Shah]

to and we went away with our history.

[Taylor]

Maybe we'll become a monument.

[Yowei Shah]

The Kitchen Sisters present sew their quilts as monuments. Wherever you get your podcasts.

[Taylor]

Hi.

[Yowei Shah]

It's been a while. How are you doing?

[Taylor]

I'm doing okay. Overall. It's been an interesting couple of. I don't know, a couple of weeks, I guess.

[Yowei Shah]

The day of the proxy conversation, Taylor is still healing from the breakup and still not interested in dating until she can figure out the sex stuff. But guys won't leave her alone. Since we last spoke, two dude friends have already made moves. One who's definitely not a match cause

[Taylor]

he's just kind of a whore.

[Courtney Lane]

Okay.

[Yowei Shah]

The other guy could be a fit. She's not sure.

[Taylor]

I told him. I was like, it's not a good time. Like, I don't know if I'm even gonna be here in a few months. Which is true. But also like, I also just didn't want to.

[Yowei Shah]

And you didn't want to tell him that?

[Taylor]

Well, I don't know, because the male

[Yowei Shah]

ego is too fragile.

[Taylor]

It's partially that, but also, I don't know. Part of me always is like, well, why don't I give it a try?

[Yowei Shah]

Okay. The proxy's here.

[Taylor]

Okay.

[Yowei Shah]

Are you ready?

[Taylor]

Yes.

[Yowei Shah]

So the proxy, Taylor wanted to talk to another asexual person who'd managed to find a long term romantic relationship without having to compromise on sex. Or if not, had found peace in giving up on romance altogether. So we looked in ACE chat rooms. We talked with ACE content creators, journalists, and webcomic and romance writers. We reached out to ACE support groups and ACE therapists in the first place. Thing I learned is that being ACE is not a monolith. There are aces who don't want romantic relationships. There are aces like Taylor who do. And then there's the sex stuff. Asexuality doesn't necessarily mean having no libido. Some aces don't feel sexually drawn to other people, but still enjoy parts of sex or kink or physical intimacy. Some aces are indifferent. And of course, some aces are on the, quote, sex repulsed end of the spectrum, like Taylor. All of which made what we were looking for, an even tinier needle to thread. And then two months later, we found her. An asexual woman named Courtney Lane.

[Taylor]

Hi, nice to meet you.

[Courtney Lane]

Good to meet you, Taylor.

[Yowei Shah]

On the screen, a woman with a head wrap pops up with black and white old timey portraits of a couple behind her. This is Courtney.

[Courtney Lane]

I also am asexual. Also very much on the sex repulsed side of the spectrum. I have been married to my spouse who is also asexual, although on a slightly different place on the spectrum. For gosh, next month will be 12 years.

[Yowei Shah]

Courtney has maybe the most niche day job I've ever come across.

[Courtney Lane]

I am a historian and an artist specializing in Victorian hair work. So I make artwork and jewelry out of human hair like they did in the Victorian era.

[Taylor]

That's awesome. I love that.

[Yowei Shah]

Unlike Taylor, Courtney is steeped in Ace community. She helped establish Disabled Ace Day during Ace Week and she's helped out at ACE conferences. But the thing that actually caught her attention is the very frank podcast she hosts with her partner Royce. It's called the Ace Couple.

[Courtney Lane]

If our life was an Ace sitcom,

[Taylor]

you could lead into it with the

[Yowei Shah]

uncorking of the bottle of wine and

[Courtney Lane]

the lighting of candles and then we're just playing video games on the pod.

[Yowei Shah]

They talk about all kinds of things with an ACE pov, from quote, weird Alo reality TV dating shows to asexual relationship drama on Reddit, to what it's like in their own relationship. As one of the few Ace couples

[Courtney Lane]

out there, I remember like the first time we ever, like, slept in the same bed together. You were like, I usually sleep naked, but I'm not going to for your sake. And I was like, thank you so much.

[Yowei Shah]

That was just a We haven't talked about what the expectation is for this

[Courtney Lane]

area of the relationship. I can do whatever. I just need to know what.

[Yowei Shah]

I need to know what the rules are. As Taylor heard about Courtney and Royce's life, she lit up.

[Taylor]

I don't know. You're kind of living my dream right now. That's so cool.

[Yowei Shah]

I asked Taylor to share her conundrum, and Taylor tells Courtney about her dating struggles.

[Taylor]

I've had some bad experiences about how

[Yowei Shah]

she's had a hard time telling people she's ace and setting boundaries in relationships,

[Taylor]

which puts me in more precarious situations.

[Yowei Shah]

And how she really wants a partner, but is starting to wonder if she should stop trying.

[Courtney Lane]

A lot of what you are saying and experiencing really sounds like how I felt 13 years ago. That feeling of, you know, wanting something, envisioning something for your life, but what you want is outside of societal norms in some way. And there is sort of a grief that comes with thinking you can't have something that you've pictured for yourself. I went through that. I did 13 years ago. And, I mean, at that time, if someone said, you know, you're going to meet the love of your life who is also asexual, and everything's gonna click and be perfect, and you'll be going strong for well over a decade, I wouldn't have known how I could have pursued it either. The way we met was such an unusual happenstance anyway, that I couldn't have tried for it. It sort of just fell into my lap. So there's unfortunately not a lot of advice I can give for how to seek and pursue it. But what I do think is important for all asexual people is to find those boundaries. And I'm sure you've sat and thought a lot about what you actually would want if you could craft your own relationship. Am I right in that assumption?

[Taylor]

Like, I know where my parameters lie. I'm very clear on that. But I've been bad about kind of enforcing it.

[Courtney Lane]

Why do you think that is?

[Taylor]

Like, I knew from the time I was very young that something was different. And even after I kind of pinpointed the term asexuality and identified with it to some degree, I was still just really in denial. I was like, well, maybe I'm not, though. Maybe I am, maybe I'm not. And I had a lot of people tell me that I just haven't found the right person yet, or I was just a late bloomer. And so I kind of, like, held onto that, thinking, you know what? Maybe they're Right. Just trying to have experience more, gain more experience, so I could see if anything changed at any point. And at this point, I don't think I can deny that I'm ace, but I. There's just a part of me, I guess, that just doesn't want to be. So that makes it harder for me to maintain boundaries because there's always the voice in the back of my head that's like, maybe things will be different this time. And that's another part of the reason why I'm like, maybe I just shouldn't date because I haven't been able to do it in a way that feels good to me.

[Courtney Lane]

There's a phrase that we often use in the asexual community. I'm wondering if you've heard of it. Compulsory sexuality. A lot of people have heard of compulsory heterosexuality, which is a very real phenomenon, but underlying that is a blanket societal notion that everyone is or should be sexual. And it sounds like you've had a lot of unfortunate conversations with people who have bought into this societal compulsory sexuality. And it sounds like there's something perhaps inside you a little bit that either has bought into it or wants to, perhaps because you think it would be easier. What are. What are your thoughts on that?

[Taylor]

That's pretty accurate. And, I mean, I. I definitely know I kind of have bought into this whole compulsory sexuality thing just because, for context, I was raised in a very, like, traditional Southern religious household. Even to this day, my parents are still kind of reiterating to me that I should be settling down and getting married. And they don't really believe in anything that deviates from the norm. And so I kind of am just like, well, if I could be more normal in that way, I wouldn't have to struggle to figure out how to interact with my family. But that's not the reality, and I'm starting to accept that. But it's hard. And I don't have an ACE community here. I've tried to search high and low, and it just seems like, I don't know, I can't find them because I have yet to meet another ACE person out in the wild. And the online communities that are based in my region are not super active. So, yeah, it's like all of the options available to me are allo people. And even people that have seemed on board and seem receptive to the idea of me being ace, that I've dated eventually have sort of done a little bit of a switcheroo, and it turns into a situation where they either thought they could like, change me, or they thought I was just being a tease and that eventually I would stop playing hard to get or something. And I had one experience back when I was going through a phase where I was like, I'm gonna be, like, openly ace now, and. And I'm gonna be proud about it. And I had a friend that I thought was a good, trustworthy, close friend. And we were hanging out one time. We were, like, either watching TV or playing video games or something, and he, like, got up and walked away for a little bit, and then he, like, came back and was naked and, like, doing obscene things. And I was like, what are you doing? And he was like, I'm trying to help you. And I'm like, what do you mean? And he's like, you're over. You're overreacting. Like, you're making this whole sex thing, like, a big deal. And it's really not that deep. Like, I'm trying to help you. You just need to be desensitized to it or something. And I'm like, I don't think so. Like, I was perfectly fine the way. The way I was. I don't. I don't think I need your help trying to change me. Like, this actually makes it worse, actually. Yeah. So it just makes me not want to try dating. And even people will be like, well, why are you wearing makeup? You don't look ace. Why are you dressed like that? And it's like, I just. I. This is just how I exist in the world, and if you don't appreciate it, that's kind of your problem. But I'm always made to feel like it's mine, so it's like, maybe I just didn't even date because I don't want to put myself or other people in a situation where everyone's uncomfortable and unhappy.

[Yowei Shah]

Courtney, do you relate to any of what Taylor is saying? I heard you. I heard some noises on your end, and a lot of nod. I saw a lot of nodding.

[Courtney Lane]

Yeah, there were probably a few oofs in there.

[Yowei Shah]

But in terms of experience, dating allosexual folks, yeah.

[Courtney Lane]

Yeah, absolutely.

[Yowei Shah]

Before Courtney met Royce, she'd also sworn off dating just like Taylor. After years of relationships with allosexuals and getting hurt, she first tried dating in middle school, then in high school, but anytime the other person wanted to do something intimate, she felt uncomfortable. Then she hit the jackpot.

[Courtney Lane]

I did, for a period of time, find what I thought was a lovely relationship for me. He was a born again Christian boy, and so he was very much no sex until marriage. I was like, perfect. Love that. Love that for me. Love that for us. Unfortunately, his youth pastor told him that he thought I was a witch who was trying to tempt him to, like, summon evil gnomes. I don't know where half of that came from.

[Yowei Shah]

After the Christian boy broke up with Courtney because she was trying to tempt him with gnomes, another boy entered the picture. She told her therapist about him.

[Courtney Lane]

The way I described it to my therapist, I said, he is pursuing me sexually and it makes me uncomfortable. And my therapist looked right at me and said, well, you should explore that because it's time to be a normal teenager.

[Taylor]

Oh, no.

[Courtney Lane]

And even though at the time I in my head had like, I guess I'll explore this relationship, but I still don't want to have sex, I'll go on dates with him if that's what you mean by exploring this. Because I. I have a. I have a medical professional here telling me, this is what's going to make you a normal teenager.

[Yowei Shah]

So Courtney went out with the guy, but it went terribly. One day, after she refused to give him oral sex, he and his friends threw her into the trunk of his car and drove out to a lake outside of town. Luckily, she was able to break out of the car and run away.

[Courtney Lane]

So I really resonate with what you said earlier about struggling with boundaries, because often as a young woman, someone people are often attracted to as an asexual person who society is telling you over and over again, you're the weird one, you're the one who's wrong. You're the one who should just conform if you want to make this work. It seems like if you don't bend your own boundaries, someone else will break them for you.

[Yowei Shah]

It was a real bummer to hear that both Courtney and Taylor have had such horrific experiences with allo men. But I have seen ACE community surveys where a lot of respondents report unwanted sexual contact, sexual coercion, and having sex because they felt pressured by a partner. While researching this topic, I read an excellent book called Ace by journalist Angela Chen, and she writes about why ACEs are especially vulnerable to this pressure. She made a point I never thought of before, that in a relationship, if you don't want to have sex, you can say that you're sick, you're stressed, you're tired, or you're mad at your partner, those are understood as good enough reasons. But simply not wanting to have sex, that can be seen as selfishness or being withholding or a problem with low desire that you need to Work on this can make consent feel especially slippery for aces because if the world keeps telling you that sex is part of what you owe someone in a relationship, it can be hard to hear your own.

[Courtney Lane]

No, people will tell it to you. Society will tell you you'll feel yourself at times that it's something you need to do, like a necessary chore to obtain a type of life or relationship you want. But it fundamentally is a dangerous situation to try to break what you're personally comfortable with.

[Taylor]

Yeah, for me, I have over the last few years just tried to, tried, tried to pretend to be aloe and just have a normal relationship and see if anything changed. Part of it is like I felt like it was easier for me to just not put those guardrails up rather than have them up and then have someone like snatch them away. Maybe if I go into this on my own volition, it will feel different than if it's like under duress or whatever. And so I started viewing sex as like an act of service. It's something that I can do for my partner even though I don't really get anything out of it. And maybe that'll make it bearable. And to some extent that worked until it didn't. And so, yeah, I was just wondering if you've ever gone through a period like that where you just try to rationalize it or see if, if you go into it as like an act of service or something and how that experience was for you.

[Courtney Lane]

Sure, yeah. I don't think my experience with this was exactly a one to one with yours because it sounds like there have been situations where you, you made the choice to try something before it got to that point. Yeah, for me there was never a decision that came from me to try to be in this way. But I mean, when I do say that there are unsafe situations where an allo partner might break your boundaries for you. There absolutely were situations where once the decision was no longer mine, someone else made that decision. There is something in the back of my head that was like, well, I guess since this already happened, I guess that boundary is gone. So I guess I'll just exist as if this boundary is now gone. And it was at that point where I was like, well, this is what a relationship is supposed to be. But once I had been in one too many relationships like that, that was the point in time where I told myself, I'm done. And at the time it felt like if I don't want to be in this situation again, then I must be single. I thought it was Very binary.

[Taylor]

Yeah.

[Courtney Lane]

So I tried really, really hard to get happy and comfortable with the idea of being single. And I think I did. I think I hit a moment where I thought, I can be happy this way.

[Taylor]

What were the steps that you took, I guess, to reach that point?

[Courtney Lane]

Stubbornness was definitely part of it. I was, before this period in time, profoundly afraid of loneliness. The kind of loneliness where if I'm in a dark spot, I don't know who I can call. And in my experience before that point, a lot of my friends treated friendships as very situational. They weren't necessarily willing to go to these deep, vulnerable emotional places that I was craving having with another person. So I thought that having this pedestalized relationship, I thought that was my best defense against this profound loneliness. And once I was able to sort of identify what I want is not necessarily this type of relationship, what I want is to not be lonely and I want to have deep interpersonal relationships, then I was able to sort of reframe my way of thinking and say, what are other ways I can achieve this?

[Yowei Shah]

One way, Courtney realized, was to have a queer platonic partner, or qpr. It's a term in the Ace community for an intense, committed, non romantic relationship. What happened was, unbeknownst to Courtney, she got set up on a date with a friend of a friend, and they hit it off. And when Courtney mentioned that she was Ace, the friend of the friend was like, oh, I thought we were on a date. This is platonic. Excellent. And it went from there. Courtney began going to her new friend's house after work. They'd cook dinner together and talk about their days. They'd cuddle up on the couch with wine and a comfy blanket and watch TV together. On Sundays, they'd go to their favorite brunch spot and bring a board game to play. When her friend hosted parties, Courtney would come over early to help set up and prep food and stay the night after everyone left. And when one of them was having a hard time, the other would plan a road trip to cheer them up.

[Courtney Lane]

So I think the lack of pressure from both sides of us, like we can just exist as humans and see where this relationship takes us, where this friendship grows, allowed us to access this deeper, complex layer. And this QPR friend, still very, very important part of life, still my best friend. I'm actually going to go see them tonight. Every Sunday night we hang out, and I do think in a theoretical scenario where I never met Royce, I do think I could be very happy long term with the right qpr. Structure. That's just not how my life ended up turning out.

[Taylor]

That makes sense in my case. I don't currently struggle and historically have not really struggled with strong feelings of loneliness. And I've always made an effort to prioritize my friendships and form those deeper connections. But I have worries about the future, like when my friends start to settle down and they're not as present in my life anymore. I guess I just need to seek out people who have the same investment in friendship as I do.

[Yowei Shah]

After the break, no horny bards allowed at our table. The Fastest Self Care Clean Hair K18 Air Wash Dry Shampoo is the first biotech powered dry shampoo. It instantly eliminates odor and reduces oil and sweat for fresh hair and scalp for up to three days and no white cast, starchy buildup or heavy fragrances. K18 studied the science of fresh hair so you never have to worry about wash day again. Shop at Sephora or get 10% off your first purchase at k18hair.com with code podcast. That's code podcast. Com the story of how Courtney got together with Royce is both the most expected and unexpected way you'd meet someone today. So at this point, Courtney had sworn off dating, but her close friend, her QPR, insisted on starting an OkCupid profile for her just to make friends. And one day, Courtney finally logged on to check out profiles herself.

[Courtney Lane]

Still thinking in my head, I'm only looking for friends, only looking for friends. I open up, okay, Cupid. And the very first profile I see is Royce's face from Kansas. And being who I am, I went, ooh, look at that long hair.

[Yowei Shah]

Here's the random part. Courtney lived in South Dakota, but had had one conversation with a guy from Kansas, someone her QPR had sent her. So the algorithm was like, oh, you like seeing people from Kansas? And showed Courtney Royce's profile. And as she's scrolling, she's liking what she's seeing. This seems like an interesting person. And then at the bottom, she sees the words I am asexual.

[Courtney Lane]

And I about fell out of my chair because I'd never met another asexual person.

[Yowei Shah]

Courtney messaged Royce.

[Courtney Lane]

We started talking and we never stopped talking.

[Yowei Shah]

At first, Courtney was worried that Royce might be lying about being okay with her being ace, not because of anything they did, but just because she'd been burned in the past. But when they met IRL for the first time in Kansas, the vibes were good. And on her second trip to Kansas, Courtney realized Royce was her person. After she got into a terrible Car crash.

[Courtney Lane]

My car rolled several times over the interstate, hit a concrete barrier, and rolled a few more times into the ditch. I had to climb out of the broken out passenger side window to get out of the car because my door would not open.

[Yowei Shah]

Courtney refused the ambulance ride to the hospital because we live in a country where ambulance rides are too expensive. Instead, she called Royce to pick her up at a truck stop.

[Courtney Lane]

And they just immediately relaxed when they saw me. They embraced me for a very long time and then broke away to start picking glass out of my hair. And we get back home, I fall asleep. And that was very much our, like, in sickness and in health moment, because Royce set an alarm to wake up as soon as the pharmacy opened. Didn't even wake me up. Just slipped out to get more gauze for my wounds, got my favorite breakfast cereal, which I had forgot even mentioning at one point. And so by the time I woke up, Royce had all these things ready for me and took wonderful care of me that weekend.

[Yowei Shah]

That weekend, Courtney decided to move to Kansas to live with Royce. She'd always known she wanted to get away from South Dakota, and Rice was a lovely reason to move.

[Courtney Lane]

And since we only gave ourselves a couple of weeks to make all this happen, I just bought the first secondhand car that I could find. So when Royce came up to help me pack all my things was the first time we opened the center console of this new used car. And right at the bottom of it, there was a single fortune from a fortune cookie that just said, traveling south will bring you great happiness. And that is still sitting on our dresser to this day.

[Taylor]

I love that. That's. That's. Well, I don't. I don't love the event that led up to that. I love how it ended.

[Courtney Lane]

It's fine. My. My flesh healed.

[Taylor]

It sounds like a movie.

[Yowei Shah]

Taylor, how does hearing such a romantic story about Courtney and Royce getting together and now it's been 12 years of marriage, how does that sit with you?

[Taylor]

Well, as I was hearing the story, I was like, wow, it sounds so nice. Like, it gives me a little hope. And then I. And then the following thought was like, actually, no, don't get too excited, because that sort of happy coincidence might not necessarily happen for me. So I'm not trying to extrapolate anything beyond that.

[Courtney Lane]

That's for the best. Because, I mean, there were so many unusual coincidences, and no one can replicate that.

[Taylor]

Right.

[Courtney Lane]

And so, you know, when people ask me, like, how do I meet other asexual people? How do I find a relationship? It's really just knowing other things that you want in order to look for it and identify where those options are. Because I knew I was perfectly willing to move somewhere else. I also knew for me, the reason why I decided, okay, maybe this can be more than a friendship in my experience is because Royce was also ace. And there are people who make mixed orientation relationships work. It has happened. I've seen it. But I am repulsed enough, and I have had enough unsafe situations with allo partners that I don't know if I would be able to find fully, fully relax and get to the place I would need to or want to with an allo partner. So that is also something that people can always consider, like, do I think I could make a mixed orientation relationship work, or would it need to be with another ace person for me to have my best relationship?

[Taylor]

Yeah, I've spent a lot of time trying to figure those things out for myself, because I know ideally I just prefer to be in a relationship where I don't have to have sex at all ever. But I've been willing to kind of, like, settle and compromise in the past.

[Yowei Shah]

I was curious. You said that you know people, Courtney, ACE folks who are in positive relationships with allosexuals. How have you heard that that works? When it works?

[Courtney Lane]

I would say the most important factor is that the allo partner has to be willing to show up and do the unpacking.

[Taylor]

Yeah.

[Courtney Lane]

If you do not have an allosexual partner who is willing to really sit with themselves and their partner and the situation and think really deeply about what does it mean for me to have an asexual partner, to really internalize what that means and that it is not any fault of their own that asexuality is in orientation and it's not personal. And they need to be okay with that, because really, even allosexual people have varying degrees of libido. Situations could happen where an allo partner who with a generally low libido can be very compatible with an ace person who's pretty sex neutral and isn't averse like we are. You know, if it's an occasional happenstance, maybe that works out great for both of them on paper. But if the allo partner does have these more deeply entrenched ideas about what they think sexual attraction should feel like or how it should manifest in the relationship, there can still be a barrier. I mean, sex, even amongst two aloes, should be more than just putting a date on the calendar. There are always complexities, and you should not assume by default that you are the one who has to make all of the compromises. Since we are further away from the societal norm, it's so much easier for us to say, well, we're the weird ones. And some people even get apologetic about it. And you shouldn't. It's your identity. This is how you are. You shouldn't make all of the compromises in any relationship.

[Taylor]

Yeah, like, the logic there, I'm following it. It makes complete sense. It's just hard to keep it in perspective because it feels like when I'm dating someone alo, they're compromising just by being with me, even though I'm like this. And so I feel like me going through the motions and trying to compromise in that way is the least I can do. And I know that's not a great way to frame it, but that's how it feels. Yeah. So I need to put more of an effort into meeting other ACE people and, like, create community somehow and get offline. I've been exclusively online ACE spaces, and it's nice to an extent just to have some form of community. But the online discourse, I don't know if you're familiar with the discourse.

[Courtney Lane]

Oh, I'm so familiar with the discourse.

[Taylor]

I can't do any more discoursing. I've discoursed enough. And for me in particular, it's just not very helpful because there's a very strong and loud coalition of ACE people who are very insistent on emphasizing that Aces can still have sex. And it's like, why do you care to emphasize that? It's like, yes, you can, but do you want to? Do you feel like you have to? And a lot of the time it's like. Like they're trying to be the most acceptable version of an ACE person. I just need to get out of that. It's not very protective. And I just feel like I just want to meet another ACE person in the wild. And we don't have to talk about being ACE all the time. We can just exist with low pressure and talk about everything under the sun. That's really what I want for myself. So I'm trying to seek out ACE community wherever I can find it. And I wanted to see where you were able to find community or if it didn't exist for you at the time. Like, how did you go about creating it?

[Courtney Lane]

Yeah, absolutely. Royce was the first other asexual person I ever met, which is so very, very unusual. But I did not know any other aces. So when I met them, I thought, oh, my gosh, is this possible? Could it be. And it just so happened that we were very romantically compatible. So I was just extremely lucky for me. But it was a little time, even after we met, even after we got married, before we properly started meeting other ACE people. And the best, easiest way to do that is to just be very openly asexual. And in our case, we did start gathering a community after starting our podcast, after volunteering with ACE Week and with the International Asexuality Conference, we started meeting people that way and working on projects together. But throughout all of this, just being openly ourselves, an in person community also started developing and sometimes in very unexpected ways. I mean, the number of just late night conversations we've had with people who have maybe been over to our home for like a board game night, just having a little party, a little get together, and someone who didn't know us very well yet finds out we're asexual and their eyes go wide and then they end up being the last one to leave that night because they have so many questions. They say, am I asexual for how hard it is for us to find community and to find these labels and to find just really how we identify. There are many out there who are also struggling, and sometimes it just takes an ACE person in front of them in a conversation like the one we're having to open their eyes to that option.

[Yowei Shah]

Courtney says another way she's been able to expand her IRL ACE group is by first finding people online. For instance, she and Royce found a group of friends who started out just as online connections in an ACE Dungeons and Dragons forum. And for the last three years, they've met every Monday night to play D

[Courtney Lane]

and D and there are no horny bards allowed at our table. And it's fabulous. Last year, finishing a campaign, doing a big finale, all of them flew to our home and stayed for a week so we could finish our game, so I could show them where we live, show them around the city, and we could just spend some real life time together. And that was so invaluable.

[Taylor]

I'm trying to, like, figure out how to have that for myself as well. But I think the one barrier is that I haven't been as out and loud about being asexual. And I've been working on that recently. And I think I just need to develop thicker skin maybe because when I get too much pushback, it just makes me kind of want to go back into my. In my little hiding place. And even recently I was out at a bar with a friend and we were in a part of town that there are lots of, like, frat bros and finance bros. And so we were looking around the bar and he was like, I wonder how many of these guys are like, DL. I was like, I wonder how many of these people are asexual. And he was like, what? And I was like, yeah, you know, there could be one. And he ended up just being like, yeah, like, basically, I'd rather die than be asexual. He's like, I don't understand those people. He was like, no shade to them, you know, but, like, I just don't get it. Like, I'd rather die. And I'm like, great. And that sort of thing kind of just wears me down. And I think I just need thicker skin. But I was wondering, how do you respond when you get that sort of response from someone, like, how do you handle it? Because for me, I kind of just go quiet and shut down.

[Courtney Lane]

Yeah, it takes practice, that's for sure. If it's like a stranger, it's always been very easy for me to be like, fine, you're not my people. Moving on. It's a lot harder when it's someone that you care about. I guess I was just very stubborn. I never dropped it. I never stopped talking about it. I sort of like, made them get used to it. Like, this isn't going away or changing about me. So eventually you either will come around or you will not. And I've been lucky enough that everyone in my life, be they family member, friends, they have either come around and some were very supportive right from the get go, or some people have, you know, self selected out of my life. I do wonder, with that experience with your friend, if you had been very firm at that time, do you think he would have gotten a little realization like, oh, wait a second, that was maybe not okay to say?

[Taylor]

Yeah.

[Courtney Lane]

Or do you not know?

[Taylor]

No, I definitely think if I had been a bit more firm in that moment, he would have thought about it. And I think he would have been apologetic because I don't think he would ever intentionally say something that's, like, offensive or hurtful to me. But I didn't want to say anything because I knew he would be super embarrassed. And I didn't want to embarrass him. But in that moment, I was kind of horrified. So I was like, okay, never mind. Sorry.

[Courtney Lane]

Yeah, I mean, that's really hard. And, you know, I am practiced enough at this point. I mean, I have well over a decade of experiences of having conversations with friends and strangers and family and on podcasts and in conferences that I have started figuring out what tools sort of work. And so some of it is just practice and navigating it. And I think there's a bit of an art to knowing when you need to try to make the other person feel comfortable and when you do need to embarrass them a little bit, because both of those have their uses and they can both be very effective in different situations. One of my favorite examples, I suppose to pull out, which often does make people feel a little embarrassed if they are a generally queer, affirming person, whether they're in the queer community themselves or if they're just straight but very much an ally. A lot of people have still not internalized that asexuality is its own queer sexual orientation. Some people even subconsciously are still thinking it's hormones or it doesn't exist. So one thing to really sort of give everyone a figurative slap upside the head, I suppose, is to tell them to take what you just said about asexuality and substitute literally any other queer orientation you can think of. Does that still sound like an okay thing to say? And that is something that, that, in my experience, has been one of the fastest ways to get someone to go, oh, oh, right. Oh, yeah, I'd never say that about this orientation.

[Taylor]

That makes sense, and I think I will use that in the future. I just need to get better at confronting people when we're having those conversations. But that's a good way to approach it, I think.

[Yowei Shah]

Taylor, any last questions for Courtney?

[Taylor]

I feel like most, pretty much all of my questions regarding sexuality have been answered. I'm very curious about the hair stuff, but,

[Courtney Lane]

well, that's a whole other two hour conversation.

[Taylor]

I think I let what people are saying to me influence me a bit too much. But this conversation has helped me sort of reorient myself back on the path that I think is healthier for me.

[Courtney Lane]

I'm excited to see what your future holds.

[Taylor]

Thanks. Me too.

[Yowei Shah]

Thank you to Taylor for being our guest today. Since the proxy conversation, Taylor has updates. Recently she went on a date and told the guy straight up that she was Ace. But more importantly, Taylor has made her first IRL Ace friend, someone she met online. And when they got together to play trivia, they realized they had a lot in common. They're making plans to hang again soon. Thank you also to Courtney Lane for being our proxy. Courtney is the host of the Ace Couple podcast and is a Victorian hair artist and historian. We'll put links to her work in our show. Notes and we'll have a bunch of ace resources in our newsletter. File under Feelings, which you can subscribe to for [e-mail] all right everyone, switching up the music queue to get your attention. This is our last episode of the spring season, but do not fear, we will be dropping a few treats in the feed over the summer while we work on new cases for the fall. Follow the show so you don't miss what's next. Speaking of new cases, if you have a niche emotional conundrum you'd like investigated by Proxy, get in touch at proxy the pod gmail.com I'm especially interested in cases that have to do with clothing, incarceration, design and the built world. But really, I love hearing about anything. Almost all our conundrums this season came from listeners, which was a personal goal of mine. So thank you. Thank you to everyone who's written in and thank you to everyone who's been tuning into this experiment. Proxy is a new show and we're still figuring out what exactly it is and whether we can make emotional investigative journalism a real sustainable thing. As of this recording, my parents are visiting and asking yowei, when, when are you gonna get another job? And the answer is, I don't know. I told them the show is growing, more people are finding it, but financially we're not there yet. Right now, ads and memberships are still not bringing in enough money to cover production costs. So here's the plan. This fall we're gonna do another membership drive to see if we can fund another year of Proxy. But if the show means something to you and you would like us to keep making it, you can beat us to the punch and become a paid member. Now. @proxyhq.org paid members get lots of stuff like ad free listening, bonus episodes and invites to life Proxy hangs, including a Proxy processing session we're doing on Wednesday, July 22nd second at 6pm Eastern Time. Again, that's July 22nd at 6pm Eastern time. We're going to talk about how the season went emotionally, creatively, financially, and we're going to share what we're planning for the fall and get feedback. We might also play a dumb game again. Just go to proxyhq.org hope you'll join us. A salute to everyone who's chipped in as a paid member. And if you can't swing a membership right now, I get it. Times are whack. I am just so grateful you are here. And if you want another way to help us, you can leave a review or Send an episode to someone you think will dig it. It really makes a difference. All right, no more money talk. This episode was edited by Tim Howard, mixed by Kyle Pooley and produced and scored by me, with reporting and production help from Rennie Sfornofsky. Music in this episode by Tim Howard and theme music by Brickmaster Cylinder. Special thanks to Angela Chen and Bauer. Proxy is a proud member of Radiotopia from prx, a network of independent, creator owned, listener supported podcasts. Audrey Martavic is the executive producer of Radiotopia. Yuri Lozzardo is the Director of Operations Discover Audio with visionadiotopia fm. Okay, we will be back soon. Until then, stay on the Emotions.

[Taylor]

Beef.

[Yowei Shah]

What'd you think of my new sign off, guys? If you have a better idea, you know where to find me. Okay, Bye

[Courtney Lane]

Taylor. Happy Early International Asexuality Day. This is the day before April 6th.

[Taylor]

Yes. Happy early International Asexuality Day to you too.

[Yowei Shah]

I did not plan that. Just so you know. That was not planned. I did not. I didn't know. That's great. Radiotopia

[Taylor]

from prx.

[Yowei Shah]

All right, I want to tell you about a podcast I think you will like. It's called what it's like to Be from author Dan Heath. In every episode, Dan interviews someone from a different profession. A long haul trucker, a brain surgeon, a professional Santa Claus. And he asks what it's like to do what they do. What it's like to be a funeral director. To do the hair and makeup for a dead person. Is a Secret Service agent supposed to pretend like they're not there when they're around the president? What is the scariest thing an airline pilot can hear in the cockpit? If you're curious about what other people do in their jobs, check it out. What it's like to be wherever you get your podcasts.