what is a squish?

squish

A squish is a platonic crush. The urgent, slightly nervous wish to be close to someone and to be picked by them, with no romantic or sexual component in it at all. It has every crush symptom. You think about them, you replay the conversation, a text from them lifts the whole day. What's missing is any wish for it to turn into romance. The word came out of the aromantic community and it is useful to absolutely everyone, because nearly everybody has had one, and most people, having no word for it, escalated it into a crush and lost the friend.

how to tell

you want to be their favourite, and you have never wanted to date them
you get nervous before seeing them in a way that makes no sense for a friend
the fantasy is being close, not being together

this one has a whole chapter under it. read: the friend crush & the 200 hours →

what to read on this

Loveless Alice Oseman a novel from inside the spectrum, about a girl finding out she is asexual and aromantic and that a friendship can be the great love of her life. the one i wish i had at nineteen.
The Other Significant Others Rhaina Cohen people who built their whole lives around a friendship instead of a marriage. the closest thing there is to a book length case for the queerplatonic life.

amazon affiliate links. buying through one costs you nothing extra and keeps this page free. every book i recommend →

also asked

is a squish the same as a crush?

It has the same shape and a different destination. A crush wants romance at the end of it. A squish wants closeness and nothing else, and it is complete the moment you have that. The confusion between the two is responsible for a lot of ruined friendships.

come think with me

one word a week.

this is one of about thirty words i have collected for feelings most people never got names for. i send one a week, with the reason it works that way.

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sits next to

← all the words