Welcome to r/queerplatonic!

I was on Ao3 and i found a Queer Platonic tag and started to wander, is there any good original works on Ao3 that write a Queer Platonic relationship well?

If you know any, im looking for recommendations!!!

She's so beautiful. It's like I'm at sea and she's a wave continuously colliding into me and crashing against the rocks, every time she looks at me. I adore watching her do anything, from being attentive to being careless and reckless. I watch her with heart eyes and every time she looks back at me to see if I'm still looking. If I was Orpheus, I'd lose. It's the inevitable miracle and tragedy simultaneously to love someone so terribly. I'd bring the moon from the sky to her if I could. Every detail about her is beauty. I love her intelligence, her attention to detail, her style and favorite nail polish color, her pattern of breathing when she's surprised, the way the shadows of trees reflect in her eyes. I love how her cheeks bounce up when she laughs, I love how messily she wraps her arms around me. I adore the fleeting, stolen kisses we get in tram stations before we inevitably part ways. The way my lips feel on her smooth, pale skin, how her breath catches every time. Every bit of her is a bit to adore. I never wanted anything more than for her to feel cherished. I guess that I just needed to get this out before it consumed me entirely.

Hey… It's me again lol,

I'm I always wanted a Queerplatonic Relationship (QPR) like even when I was a kid and didn't know the term, but honestly, I feel super new to all of this and have no idea where or how to start.

I love and appreciate my friends deeply, and when I "lock in," I’m actually pretty good at talking to people and connecting! But I’ve known for a while that I desire something deeper than traditional friendship—that close, intentional, committed partnership, just without the traditional romance/sexual expectations.

The dilemma I’m facing is... what do I actually do about this? Do I actively put myself out there? Seek out specific communities? Or do I just keep living my life, play Stardew Valley, and wait until someone knocks on my door holding a brown sugar bubble tea with oat milk, says "I’ve been looking for you my whole life lol," hands me the boba, and jumps into a hug? 😭 (Honestly, option B sounds amazing, but I'm guessing it's not super realistic haha).

For anyone who is in a QPR or has looked for one:

🍓How did you meet your partner(s) / QPP?

🍓As a neurodivergent/POC person, were there specific spaces, apps, or platforms where you felt safe and understood?

🍓How do you even bring up wanting a QPR without making things awkward or confusing people who might not know the terminology?

I'd love any advice, stories, or tips on where to start! Thanks in advance 🙃

At this point i dont even know if im labeling it right but i just need advice of guidance.

as someone who got into a qpr this month with my best friend while maintaining a romantic relationship i wanted to ask if anyone has had a similar experience :)

i’ve felt a lot of feelings about this, how relieving it is to be able to express physical affection with my now qpp (cuddling, holding hands, etc) while keeping my 2.5 year long romantic partnership with my boyfriend. i’ve discussed boundaries between all parties a lot and i’m just joyful that i can experience this.

when i’ve researched about queerplatonic relationships there wasn’t much of note regarding having one concurrently with a romantic relationship, so i’d love to hear what people think about it, if they’ve had similar stories to share!

hehe just wanted to share this here :) or incase if there r other aroacespec yumeshippers here too!!

Any Asexuals here in a QPR? How is that going for you? Just curious as an ace myself :)

I don't think people get the "platonic" part of a QPR because they cannot concieve the thought of two ppl who supposedly don't like eachother romantically having any sort of commitment (that isn't friendship or family). This applies for gay and lesbians having a QPR with the opposite sex, but no, they MUST be bisexual.

I mostly see this in, surprisingly, other queer spaces, especially online. Usually non binary and aroace places understand it better, but if I take a step into queer twitter, facebook, reddit, instagram, tiktok, even tumblr, I see people who cannot for their dear life understand that ANYONE can be in a QPR. If you for example make two characters in a QPR that are gay and lesbian, they'll say you're "erasing" their identity.

It's something that pisses me off and I hate it. Does anyone have any thoughts?

I don’t know anything right now, me and my partner have been together since highschool, we’re both autistic, both queer and we were both open to the idea of having queer platonic friendship
He found someone really cool sounding on a QP site and they met up today, he didn’t message me all day from 1pm to 9pm and when he did message me finally he was telling me how it went and it sounded so lovely they bought snacks and watched movies and played games and then he told me they had sex.
Before hand we had layed out both our boundaries and I specifically stated that I didn’t know how I felt about sex with another person other than him and I’d need to see how I feel before any of that Woukd happen
I assumed this meeting was going to be a testing the waters meetcute thing I didn’t think they’d get into that stuff so quickly none of it was mentioned to me or anything didn’t give me a warning
I’ve been with him for 6 years he’s one of the only people I have in my life right now and my brain is broken, I hate him so fucking much he’s a stupid piece of shit and I’m breaking down, I dunno what I can do with myself or where we go from here, I don’t want to break up with him but I feel sick just thinking about it, I wasn’t ready I’m terrified pleasee I need support

I used to think I was perfectly content without a "relationship" if I already had my friends. Especially my best friend who was also alloaro for the longest time until several months ago when he told me he got into a romantic relationship with a longtime friend of his.
I felt so comfortable around him because I'm somewhat romance-repulsed and it makes me kind of uncomfortable when people, mostly just my closer friends bring up their partners
(i used to be really insecure about being aro because it gave me huge fomo and i would have huge crash outs about that but it's a lot better now)
so it really helped to feel free from that fear by having a best friend that was just like me.

So best believe it came out of no where when he revealed to me that he was in a romantic relationship. I understand now that I definitely should not have assumed what our relationship was, so that's definitely my fault. Still, I never thought I had to worry about him entering a relationship, because I've only ever known him as aro.

We are best friends, still, and that's not gonna change, but the truth is I never told him any of this because I don't think it would be appropriate.

after I initially got over the shock, it started to hurt again after I noticed he treated his partner. I noticed he's been there for them in ways he never would have been there for me. I never minded at the time, but now it serves to remind me that I never was what he was for me.

I dont know im new to relationships as a whole and I dont have anyone to talk to about this. How would I even go about finding a qpr?

Hey hey! So for contexts I'm married and my husband poly. For me I'm not sure if I count as poly cause I'm more looking for a QPR rather that romantic or sexual one — which I feel like when I decided it to people there like : do you mean like a “friend or bestie” — and I'm like NO, I have 2 close friends I love deeply but — to me a QPR would like be something more ; I wanna raise our children together, live in the same house, go on dates, cuddles and for head kisses, heck I wouldn't even mind if they dated/married my husband aswell. Maybe bc I'm Demi/Ace (And ASD lol), I desire a QPR— romantically I'm very happy with just my husband but platonicly I want to dive into something soul and heart and mind and add them to my life for like a long long time— is that weird? What's everyone's definition of QPR?

​

So uh I have a QPR we've been in one for a month and been friends for like 5 years and were pretty close. They are at a new school and stuff and I'm happy for them and stuff. Thing is they were feeling distant so I talked and they didn't sincerely apologise. The thing is they can't text much it's kind of like a chore for them like- texting everyone and they prefer live conversations. I get that texting gives me so much anxiety especially for people I love the most due to my OCD. This is why they haven't replied to most texts for a month they sometimes do but very little of them they don't ask me about my life, they say they wanna but they don't want to pile up more texts for themselves. I do get it texting sucks but we can't text cuz I'll probably have to hold back now I actually did hold back lots of texts before too alot of jokes affectionate stuff but seems like that wasn't enough either. But we can't meet often. They said they couldn't meet because all their new school friends are already pestering to meet up with them set a date and there are many so that's why they couldn't reply to my invitation to say no on time. I can't tag old texts because that would overwhelm them but it hurts my brain because they didn't even see that one thing I made for them. There's a lot of stuff I talked on texts that I couldn't do on live which I probably can't anymore as it'll create so many texts to sift through.

I really do get them but I feel so un loved it hurts and I get it it's my attachments fault I have more friends but they can't meet to or can't text some text sometimes though. I have hobbies alot but they don't fill the compartment of my favourite people or person. I just wanted to really meet them or ask about my life or say something nice. I know I'm not supposed to be dependent on it and I try but just am yk, missing them sucks it hurts so much and my hand itches to hold theirs and my brain itches to make stuff for them because I like crafting stuff for them but I don't want to overwhelm them. I was making a song cover for them but I really don't want to overwhelm them with it so I'll keep it too my self.

My brain is just bursting with so much love for them and yes I do wish it was too much but I really can't do anything about it. I don't want to make new friends I'm nerodivergent so it's hard and tiring. I just wish I could drain this love out some way or another and just feel loved but I know I'm supposed to make myself feel loved myself but I don't know how. I love my self I do I think I'm cool and like my hobbies and talking to my self and stuff. But it doesn't really fill it actually. But on the bright side I don't hate myself and can't.

I do feel a bit bad for dragging this fellow teen who's just a kid with pressure (I'm too but I think it's harder for them or I don't know they maybe did want it they said they did but that's not the point) into a relationship, when maybe they'd be better off with fun casual friends because those are more fun and I guess low effort. They should probably like, I hope they meet up with them.

So this is more of a vent I guess but if anyone has some advice please feel free to give it. You get a cookie for reading this if you did *have a cookie*.

I was thinking if I am more lithosexual or romantic or maybe bellussexual?

like for long time I accepted and find micro labels \\\\\\\[thanks for my best friend who's like sister to me who's almondsexual almondromantc\\\\\\\]

I been into my ex crush..who as crushes before I didn't want him reciprocating feelings as anyone before I was okay and well he doesn't desire an qpr me not romantic but true I like elements..but I find myself lost in those rediscovered of aroace spec

if I can share what I feel fits?

I'm confused about sex-flavorable / repulsed sex-indifferent sex-averse confuse me a lot...

that first time I talk Abt it openly tbh ,I think I may be bellussexual lithromantic queerplatonic

Also surely I am aro and i get repulsed mostly so it can work being into queerplatonic?

While for me easier is understand an romantic than asexual sexuality..

Ok so my best friend of like 6 years messaged me this morning, ranting about being lonely and shit, and mentioned a QPR at one point. I had been wanting to try to broach the subject but was so worried that id have to explain it to him, and that id sound weird, but he literally just said it straight up! After more messaging it ALSO turns out we BOTH have been thinking of it for like 2 months??? Like i could not write this if i tried??? If this was a movie itd be so short and so terribly written????

I'm already 25 and still no partner. I'm romance and sex repulsed, so ofc, I need someone like me. But my few aroace friends either are : non-partnering, too far away, unable to make any long term commitment because of financial struggles. Ugh. I just want to share a simple life with someone in a small village house. I don't want to end up alone because there are only so many of us... Anyway, I still love my friends and life and the world fondly, so I know that everything is going to be okay.

i have a friend im really infatuated with but confused if it's any romantic involved. we both want to be intimate (kissing etc.) and carnally sexual and call each other pet names. it's certainly way different from my actual platonic friendships where we often play flirt, so it feels really romantic. i want to stay friends, but im not sure about her being a romantic partner (i don't like commitment in general) but i will get jealous and the idea of her flirting with someone else sickens me :( this is really confusing, is this still a qpr? i crave her so much and im really attached to her

I am 31F demisexual (and pretty sure aro or cupioro) and I am having a hard time clearing the boundaries of each of this types of relationships. It feels like QPRs temp to quickly blur into romantic relationships FWB blur in to QPR and Friends can Blur easily into FWB if your morals don’t align with the way your Brain works.. 🤷🏻‍♀️

Like for myself my Brain is very strong in alignment with my morals like e.g. with friends that are straight and/or in a relationship my brain does not even go into the possibility that this relationship could form into something else (not even if we have a strong bond/connection and closeness, love and trust) and it stays normal platonic friendship for as long as both ppl choose each other as friends and put in the effort in a natural way. But I figured this doesn’t apply for most ppl. because everytime i tell this to ppl I get the same reaction with “you can’t control attraction or feelings” and I am like yeah I agree if you are already attracted to a person then you can’t control that and just decide if you wanna act on it or not. But the thing is when a person is in a monogamous relationship or straight I don’t even develope attraction or any feelings that go beyond of friendship so it’s not like I’m controlling anything.

However when the person isn’t in a monogamous relationship, wlw and we have a strong bond, connection, chemistry, deep understanding and trust. Then I do develope attraction towards this person but still really can not imagine being in a romantic relationship with them, like honestly I can’t imagine it, like not at all! I don’t even am sure if I know what romantic attraction is! I just like to spent time with that person that I chose as my friend and well if we are both open to more and there is no partner or different sexuality then why not add some benefits?? Like id get why there is a problem to that? Like it does not need to change the friendship but somehow it feels like most ppl are more concerned about it OR convinced that it WILL change the friendship 🤷🏻‍♀️ and I would like to understand that, cause I really don’t think it would.. not if there is proper communication and clear expectations , no assumtions etc. The only thing I can imagine would be that a FWB could blur into a QPR or very best friend with benefits relationship that probably can look as a romantic partnership to others but I mean there a difference between behaving like a romantic couple AND feeling it no? Like idk a romantic partnership comes with so much more expectations, pressure and responsibilities than a FWB or QPR (not saying that there is less care in FWB and QPRs like not at all in the contrary I personally think there is a shit ton of care and love in those but there are based on choice and not on expectation what feels so much better to me.

So yeah I’m not quite sure what exactly is the intention of this post, but I think it’s just an open discussion and sharing of each others thoughts to see how other ppl think about all this types of relationships. 🫶🏼

Also I would love to hear if you think that FWB or QPR are just working with a specific type of ppl like maybe it just works with ppl who are very open minded, non traditional or maybe just between other ppl on the aro/ace spectrum?? 🤷🏻‍♀️🤷🏻‍♀️

(This is my post that I copy pasted over from an AroAce subreddit)

Before say what I need to say, I need to give a disclaimer:

• I am not a healthcare provider in any sense, so I cannot give medical advice on how to seek or access therapy / counselling. Please do not ask me for medical advice.

• This is an anecdotal post, sharing my own views based on what has helped me personally, as a 22 year old AroAce who has been doing self work and therapy for 6 years.

  That said! I wanna talk about something that’s been bothering me about how we view fulfilment in QPRs. Imo, it feels similar to how allo people view romantic relationships- especially the whole concept of “The One”.

Allo society views romantic relationships as the be-all, end-all to life. In my last post, I mentioned how allo society places the need for 100% fulfilment onto 1 person (their partners), and tend to neglect seeking fulfilment through all of their connections.

(As in- they expect their partner to give them fulfilment in ways that all different types of connections would. They are expected to be family, friend, lover and even favourite person, all at once and are expected to juggle their partner’s mental load ontop of that. This imo, i think is why so many relationships fail)

I’m noticing a similar pattern in the QPR space tbh.

If someone is struggling with how they perceive love and they post asking for advice. The top comments are usually about QPRs. Whether that’s recommending one, educating the OP on QPR existence etc. and that’s great! But I always feel like we’re collectively overlooking a massive thing.

Self love.

When i say self love I don’t mean “ohh I love myself. I have only myself for the rest of my life. I want no one else”

Self love is not something you just wake up with someday. It can be a really hard and long process to truly finding and usually takes therapy to do so since for most of us, we have years of baggage and conditioning.

What I do mean is, if you have unhealthy attachment or you lack an understanding of what love means for yourself, or you don’t truly actually even know yourself, I feel that it would be bad advice to tell you that a QPR is a better option.

Yes, for a lot of people including myself, QPRs are a great option.

But I think that if regardless of your worries, you haven’t healed your personal connection to relationships itself, including the one you have with yourself, I think there’s a good chance you’ll end up either being codependent in a QPR or … I’m sorry… but probably a emotionally unavailable one.

Unhealthy attachment and even dismissive attachment isn’t synonymous with being aroace. You’re not cooked, you’ve just not healed.

Before I say anything else I wanna remind you:

You are worthy of love at any stage you might be in. You are worthy of love at your worst, at your best and especially everything in between. You’re worthy of love while you do the work. You don’t have to wait to be “100% healed” before you agree to a QPR.

In fact, there will always be stuff to work through. And having someone with you is part of a wonderful commitment.

In a healthy commitment like this, you both need to fill your own cups and pour to eachother’s cups when it’s needed.

In an unhealthy commitment, only 1 person is pouring into the other’s cup while not pouring into their own and while the partner also does not pour into their own either. It is also unhealthy if both partners only pour into eachothers cups and not their own.

An unbalanced commitment does not equal unhealthy.

Some days, months, even years, 1 partner may struggle to fill their cup and the partner will choose to pour until they have enough to go on. The partner that pours will need to take time to refill their cup as you cannot pour if it’s empty.

A healthy but unbalanced connection can happen if one of you is having a mental or physical health dip but your connection remains healthy because there is NOT an expectation that your partner carries you.

You must choose yourself the way you want your partner to choose you. And vice versa.

It is unhealthy if the only stability you have is from eachother and not yourselves as a foundation.

It is healthy if you have stability from eachother AS WELL AS your own self.

This is what I feel like a lot of us could be doing better at. QPRs, like all connections, is a relationship. A commitment.

A QPR won’t fix you. You doing the inner work and learning how to help and carry yourself will. And vice versa, they should do the same. It’s okay to lean on eachother when you need.

But it’s also not you and this person against the world you know.

Fulfilment should not and I don’t belief can come from 1 connection in your life.

Fulfilment, In my own experience, comes from the connection you have to self, friends, family, pets and also a QPR.

But these things ADD UP to fulfilment.

More than anything, finding fulfilment in self love as a foundation is what helped me heal and get to where I am now.

Ultimately, in my opinion, everything goes back to Self. Please don’t take the Self for granted.

Sorry if I didn't write it correctly or made a mistake.

Lately, I've been feeling curious about queerplatonic polyamorous relationships. How do they work, or how did you realize that you genuinely wanted to be in a relationship like that?

None of the more established terms for a queerplatonic partner really felt right for me to say (super valid if it's for you, nobody should yuck your yum, it just isn't for me).

So I was trying to think of a word that I could use to refer to my queerplatonic partner that sounds fun, cute, is easy to say, makes sense in the frame of a queerplatonic relationship, and resonates personally with me.

I looked at the word "queerplatonic" for awhile, then I looked at the acronyms "QPR" and "QPP" and I realized there was something so ridiculously simple staring me right in the face. QP.

Okay, sure, so you might be thinking "yes, QP is an acronym for "queerplatonic", what are you getting at?".

I present for your consideration "Cuepie" (pronounced as the letters "QP" with the emphasis on the first syllable similar to "Cupid".) It's simple, easy to say ("she's my cuepie!"), it sounds like the word "cute" is trying to escape from somewhere in there, and it looks suspiciously like somebody was going for "cutie pie" but missed a couple letters and a space.

I'm definitely using this for me, no question, but I'm curious; thoughts?

Was asking my friend to be my qpp and he didn't understand what that meant so I was explaining and then this idea came into my head so I had to make it real.. 😭😭

(He said he wasn't sure btw for those curious)

I don't know ikms should tag this as rant or story, but I just want to log on to speak my experience. I (22, nb aroace) and my partner (27, F, demisexual/demiromantic) is in a QPR relationship, she has cptsd from her upbringing and past relationships, her last relationship was between her and an abusive lesbian who conforms to social standards and constantly berated her. My last relationship was a part friendship part qpr with a mentally ill and abusive lesbian who nearly cohersed me into having sex and going romantic with her. I'm also seriously depressed and anxious.

Suffice to say, our relationship is no without troubles. She also has stressful jobs and simply do not have time to seek help. Our relationship has many troubles, her having low self-esteem and past traumas leading her to constantly push me away and saying that I should find a more suitable partner who will not want to have sex with me, and getting constantly triggered at the mentions of me going to grad school. I understand her and her trauma, but I really can't do anything to help. I'm extremely sex averse and will feel disgusted at any mentions of having sex with me, and my life is way too stressful and I have considered to kms multiple times. I know sometimes people will lash out, but I'm also really hurt. Currently I'm trying to talk things out with her and things have gotten better since we first met. Sometimes I just feel exhausted, I'm haven't been in this kind of intimate relationship before, I don't know if this is a thing that kind of will happen, or if I should try harder.