Rough by Rachel Thompson

Author:Rachel Thompson [Thompson, Rachel]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781473588035
Publisher: Random House

CHAPTER 12

‘Sex wasn’t for people like me’

My sexuality was robbed from me before I even entered womanhood,’ writes Cathy Reay, who’s known online as @thatsinglemum, in an Instagram post. Reay has dwarfism and often writes posts about disability and parenting. ‘I was desexualised from day dot, told to cover up because “nobody wants to see those” on a Disabled body, ordered to suppress my desires because they were deemed so unrealistic.’

Reay goes on to say that she has long been excluded from conversations about sex. ‘People like me didn’t appear in any media about sex, dating, or romance except fetish porn; when men showed an interest it was only ever because they wanted to try something new, like they were trialling a different washing powder.’1

When I chat to Reay about how ableism manifests itself in our sexual culture, she tells me, ‘I feel like conversation around sex and sexual experience, at least when we’re first getting to know a sexual partner, is often centred on what we are willing to do in the bedroom. Heterosexual men often enjoy interactions with women that push boundaries of what we might consider a “standard” sexual experience.’ She adds that there is an implicit – and indeed sometimes explicit – pressure for heterosexual women to be happy with whatever men throw at them, for fear of guys tiring of them and being driven into the arms of other women.

‘It’s a little tricky when you’re Disabled because there’s usually one or more things that we have to do differently in the bedroom,’ says Reay. ‘Whether that’s because we can’t reach something, don’t have the required strength to do something in a particular way, are fatigued or overwhelmed by certain things. To a new non-Disabled sex partner our boundaries are completely unknown, and I have found that our mysteriousness is often quite a turn-on for men who are actively seeking a different kind of thrill.’

This element of the unknown can lead to assumptions being made by non-Disabled people, particularly if communication is limited. ‘Sexual partners, and again this typically applies to men because there’s also the element of flexing your misogynistic control muscles, will just decide what we can and can’t do, without checking. They might avoid talking to us because they’re scared, or they might think we can’t really advocate for ourselves so they need to do it for us!’

Reay says it can be very overwhelming entering new sexual situations with a non-Disabled partner for many reasons. ‘When we are naked, people often feel very vulnerable, and with a partner we don’t know, we’re exposing ourselves at this time of peak vulnerability to the chance of ridicule, judgement, disempowerment and/or fetishisation.’

Disabled people experience microaggressions during sex that feel infantilising and demeaning. Some Disabled women report being ‘guided’ or lifted by men they don’t know without their consent, and put in invasive positions. Then there’s the comments, like ‘you’re too pretty to be Disabled’, where misogyny and ableism combine. Disabled people also report receiving intrusive questions

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