The date was going well – then he asked the question disabled people dread

On a first date in a pub many years ago, my date, Simon*, turned to me and asked: ‘Can you have sex?’ 

He said it so bluntly that it took me by surprise and I almost choked on the room-temperature rum and coke I’d been nursing.

It was 2009, I was 18, and I had never been asked that question before (since then, however, it’s become the most common question I’ve been asked by potential partners).

My stomach rolled as I realised just how hard dating and being disabled was going to be. It was almost like something physically shifted inside of me.

It was the first time I really thought, ‘Oh, dating and being disabled is going to be hard.’    

When people ask me that question now, I have a strong word with them, but back then I was so unprepared for it, and still dealing with my own negative feelings about being disabled, that I just changed the subject. 

The rest of the evening was awkward. Though I hadn’t said anything to him, I left knowing that Simon had crossed a line. I never saw him again. 

I expected my friends and family to be outraged when I told them what had happened, but they just repeated the same old adage: ‘stay positive’. 

As advice goes, it’s frustrating and upsetting – and I’ve been hearing it for a decade. 

It implies the problem is me and my attitude, not the fact that disabled people find it hard to date because there’s still so much stigma around us.

My parents raised me to believe that my disability (cerebral palsy, after I had a stroke at birth) doesn’t matter. That I should just ignore people who make comments. That if I smile through it, that will fix it.

That just isn’t realistic.  

I realised early on that there were differences between me and other children, and that those differences meant that my disability did matter. It mattered to me, and it mattered how others reacted to it.  

So when it came to dating, I instinctively knew that my experience would be a little varied from the ‘normal’ way of things. 

I didn’t get much advice about how to navigate romance – pre-teen and teen magazine pages in the early 2000s weren’t exactly filled with advice about dating and being disabled. 

I had to rely on the only tip I did get from friends, family, and even strangers with unsolicited advice, which was that I needed to have a ‘positive attitude’. 

For years I believed that if I tried hard enough, if I was positive enough, it would all work out. So, when I matched with Simon on Tinder and we arranged that date, I believed it was all that patience and positive thinking paying off. 

I was filled with sweet, foolish naivety – so much so that I was convinced that this man could actually be ‘the one’. After all, this was my first ‘official’ date.

When I look back, I remember everything about getting ready for that date, from my carefully chosen clinging dress to how my hands were clammy with nerves, despite my confidence that it would go well. 

The night felt alive with possibility – that is, until he asked that question. 

Over the years I’ve been called a ‘s**z’ on a first date, had strangers on dating apps say that they want to ‘f**k me better’ or confess that they have always wanted to ‘try’ a disabled woman (my introduction to sex with a disabled person as a fetish), and – of course – I’ve been asked whether I can have sex in the first place. 

Not once did anyone tell me this was abusive. Instead, I was often told that it was just ‘ignorance’ or to ‘ignore it’, which put the responsibility and weight on me.  

In an attempt to make me feel better about my dating life, friends (and even acquaintances) would say to me, ‘It’ll happen, you just have to meet the right person, someone willing to ‘overlook’ your disability’. 

I’ve grown to love and respect my disability so much over the years, so it’s always disappointing when people make ignorant and ableist comments – or when my friends and family try to make me feel better with their well-intentioned words of ‘advice’.

And even though I’ve become comfortable in my own skin, there are still moments when it gets to me as a human being. 

I’ve developed a bit of a ‘hard stare’ approach when anyone gives me advice now, because I don’t even want to acknowledge the words or take them on – so much of being disabled is picking your emotional battles to protect your wellbeing. 

Optimism is helpful, of course, but so is honesty: Telling someone to have a ‘positive attitude,’ as if that is all it takes, ignores the brutal reality that you can’t ‘positive attitude’ your way out of generations of ignorance, discrimination and bias. It minimises and underestimates so many disabled people’s experiences.

These days, when it comes to the platitudes of friends and family and strangers, I’m a little older and wiser. 

I know that advice is unhelpful, and that a positive attitude can’t fix people’s ignorance or the stigma that comes with disability. I’ve learned that the hard way through my experiences. 

I also have a much healthier relationship with dating now. I always make sure I’m comfortable, and when I’m in toxic situations on dates, I’m able to advocate for myself. 

I understand that it’s not my responsibility to accept them or educate them. I wouldn’t have been able to do that a decade ago. 

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As for other disabled people new to the dating scene, let me give you the advice I wish my younger self had. 

Don’t use dating apps if you don’t want to – I’ve been called several slurs and I think they desensitise people, allowing a certain freedom in terms of what people can say.

Don’t accept people’s dating advice when it makes you feel like you have to harm yourself to do so. Optimism is great, but it isn’t going to ‘fix’ the ignorance and hostility you will face in dating. 

Date, and do everything else, on your own terms. 

*Name has been changed

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