This is not the be-all-end-all guide to sex and disability because a) it’s not, and b) there just can’t ever be such a thing with any guide to sex. This series, much like your entire sexual life, is a work in progress and an endless, ongoing conversation. We hope this can be a good place for you to get started, and something that starts you on the path of good feelings about sex and your disability.
Sex and disability aren’t often heard in the same sentence, and when they are, there tends to be a lot of sideways glancing and nervous giggling. After all, disabled people aren’t sexual, right?
Wrongity wrong wrong! (Except for the ones who aren’t, but that’s not because they’re disabled.)
Disabled people have bodies, and many people with bodies enjoy being sexual with them, because it feels good, it’s fun, it allows them to get closer to other humans, or they just want to give it a whirl and see what all the fuss is about. Like other people with bodies, you have autonomy, which includes the right to decide if, when, and how you have sex and engage in other activities.
One of the things I hear most frequently from disabled youth is that they’re super interested in sex, but have no idea where to go. They feel like everyone’s going to make fun of them for wanting to explore their sexuality. I call bull on that — wanting to get sexual isn’t weird or gross just because you have a disability, and you can totally have a rewarding, rich, awesome sex life if you’re disabled – no matter what sex looks like to you and how many people are involved. We’re going to explore sex and disability in this ongoing series, because when people do admit that maybe disabled people might like to have sex, they often don’t provide any information about how this whole thing is supposed to work, and that’s no good at all.
