Rachael Kirkconnell has found herself relating to demisexuality following her split from Matt James.
“Have you heard of demisexuality?” Kirkconnell, 29, said to host Hallie Batchelder on the Thursday, October 16, episode of the “Extra Dirty” podcast. “I think that’s what it’s called … demisexual. I don’t know if that’s the right term, but look it up for me.”
After doing a quick search, Batchelder read the definition aloud: “Demisexuality is a sexual orientation where a person experiences sexual attraction only after forming a strong emotional bond with another person.”
“I think that’s me,” Kirkconnell reflected, and Batchelder shared that “everyone should be demisexual” since it “seems like a healthy thing to do.”
Batchelder asked Kirkconnell if she felt an attraction to women as well, but the Bachelor alum was “confused” about the difference between demisexual and pansexual. (Pansexual is a sexual orientation where people are attracted to any gender, regardless of their sex or gender identity.)
“I don’t think so. I don’t know,” Kirkconnell said of not feeling attraction to women in the past. “It’s all a spectrum isn’t it?”
Kirkconnell explained that while she’s not sure about her gender preferences, she does relate to demisexuality’s philosophy of “having an emotional connection” with a person before being intimate.
“I just don’t think I could go home with anyone,” she said. “I have to feel safe and comfortable with them and be emotionally invested at least in a way that I could see us dating or I at least have a crush on them … It’s not a physical attraction, I guess.”
Kirkconnell added that while she can acknowledge if a person is attractive, she needs a little more substance in a relationship.
“I can say, ‘Wow, that person is really attractive.’ I obviously find them really attractive, I think they’re really hot, but I don’t care after that, cause they could still be like a terrible person or have the worst personality ever and that would make me not want to sleep with them because that totally turns me off,” she admitted. “I guess their attraction can only get so far for me. Maybe that’s my problem, I don’t know.”
Earlier this year, Kirkconnell and James, 33, called it quits after four years of dating. The pair met during season 25 of The Bachelor, which aired in 2021.
“Father God, give Rachael and I strength to mend our broken hearts. Give us peace about this decision to end our relationship that transcends worldly understanding,” James wrote via Instagram in January alongside a photo of him and Kirkconnell on Bachelor season 25. “Shower our friends and family with kindness and love to comfort us. And remind us that our Joy comes from you, Lord 💔.”
Days after news broke of their split, Kirkconnell shared her side of the story on Alex Cooper’s “Call Her Daddy” podcast. In her sitdown, Kirkconnell revealed that James made the post three hours after he broke up with her while they were on vacation in Tokyo.
“I think that I have come to the realization that a lot of it wasn’t me, or my fault or my problem. And I do think it helped that I had that conversation with him and I heard those things from him,” Kirkconnell said at the time. “But even if I hadn’t, I think that is so important to acknowledge it for yourself, like, ‘It wasn’t fully me. It wasn’t 1,000 percent completely my fault.’”
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