Hi everyone. I once again haven’t been active on the blog much. I’ve been listening to a lot of podcasts lately, mostly true crime. Today though, I decided to check out the podcast The Ace Couple. In their most recent episode, which came out today and which I’m currently listening to, the podcast hosts said that it’s disabled ace day today. Ace, for those not aware, is short for “asexual”.
Like I shared when writing my post for coming out day, I’m for the most part asexual. I’m still figuring out where exactly I fit on the asexual spectrum. For those who don’t know, since sexuality isn’t an all-or-nothing thing, asexuality is a spectrum describing anyone who experiences significantly less sexual attraction to other people compared to the general population. People who are not asexual, are commonly called allosexual (“allo” being Greek for “other”). This also clarifies that people on the asexual spectrum, even people who are altogether ace, may experience sexual desire and pleasure.
I do not claim to be an authority on asexuality. Had I been able to be open about my queerness all this time, I might’ve been able to gather more information without feeling guilty. Like I said, I’m still figuring things out.
This is also where disability comes in. Commonly, it’s thought that disabled people, particularly those with intellectual or developmental disabilities, don’t experience the same sexual feelings as non-disabled people do. This is simply not true, although disabled people are more often taught to suppress our sexual feelings. After all, particularly those with intellectual and developmental disabilities are too often seen as “children in adult bodies”. I myself have used these analogies when describing emotional development. Because it finally enabled me to get sort of okay care, this analogy appeals to me even though it’s inherently ableist.
When a disabled person identifies as asexual or somewhere on the ace spectrum, it is then too easily thought that this is because of the way the person was raised or educated. This is the counterstereotype I so often used to talk about in my early days on WordPress (oh my, I need to bring some of those old posts back): if we want to defeat the idea that disabled people can’t have sex, asexual disabled people could be seen as harming the cause, similarly to how I’m seen as harming the cause for community-based support by living in an institution. In reality though, prejudice and oppression are systemic, not individual. Besides, it’s not our job as marginalized people to fit ourselves into society’s neat boxes, whether these are stereotypes or counterstereotypes or other ways of telling us who we are and how we should live our lives.
This doesn’t mean I’m not influenced by prejudice. Regularly, I think I’m too disabled for a relationship and that’s why I’m ace. I’m pretty sure that’s not true, as I do have many years of being in a relationship with my wife before either of us clarified our authentic needs and wants to the other. I remember writing a post back in 2008, which I’m not going to bring back here (don’t worry, wife!), in which I described not knowing whether I was actually attracted to her and thinking I certainly wasn’t interested in sex. If that doesn’t tell me I’m ace, what does?
The more I write, the more memories confirming that I’m indeed asexual, come to mind. I was quite repulsed as a teen, purposefully skipping the biology chapter on reproduction and refusing to read the sex ed material that my parents brought me at around age nine. Then again, I’m pretty sure my refusing to read it was because I hated reading Braille at the time and my parents made quite a big deal of me reading this book.
However, what if my asexuality is in fact related to my being multiply-disabled, including autistic? Does that mean I’m doing the disabled or autistic communities a disservice? I don’t think so, because like I said before there’s no value in dictating who I am. Besides, as someone who lived for twenty years not knowing she’s autistic and yet who was autistic all along, chances are we’ll never know for sure.
I’m joining in with #WWWhimsy.
A Multitude of Musings 
So much for you to figure out!
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True, but in the end it doesn’t really matter what label best describes me. I’m still me, after all.
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Exactly!
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Hi Astrid, thanks for the info on ‘asexual’. I must live under a rock as I hadn’t really heard of it before. I never have thought that disabled people would not be interested in sex and am kind of shocked that people might think that! Life is a continual path of learning isn’t it? Thanks for sharing with us at #WWWhimsy xo
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Thanks for your kind comment. I think most heterosexual people haven’t heard of asexual, because there’s hardly any media coverage on it and at least back in my day we were lucky to be taught about homosexuality in school. Now there’s more attention in schools to other groups under the LGBTQ+ umbrella, but asexuality still isn’t being discussed.
Re the assumption that disabled people aren’t sexual, this assumption is widespread particularly where it comes to people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. I mean, back when it was first recognized that autism is genetic in the late 1990s, I watched a documentary on it and the presenter explained that autistics don’t get married so they won’t have kids, then went on to say something about those with autistic traits but not full-on autism passing their autism on. Well guess what? I’m definitely autistic (and would’ve been diagnosed in the 1990s had my parents not been actively in denial) and I’m married.
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This was interesting
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Thank you!
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I read a book a while ago that my grandson was reading, can’t remember if it was for school or pleasure. “Radio Silence” by Alice Oseman and one of the characters was ACE. That was really the first time I’d met such a character. I thought the book was well written and liked it at the time, but now I can’t remember anything else about it.
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Thank you for sharing. I have that book downloaded off Bookshare, though I haven’t started reading it yet.
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I wonder if some of the assumptions that disabled people don’t have sex is related to the common side effects of many drugs creating a lower libido? I am somewhat familiar with asexuality as a family member has said she was under that label. I will say too that she is autistic as well and suffers from depression and anxiety disorders. But I really don’t think that is related to her desire for sex. Really since childhood has had an aversion to hugs even. She just wants her own personal space not to be invaded. I appreciate your openness and honesty with these posts. We are who we are… we should not try to fight to fit into anyone’s idea of “norm.”
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Thanks for sharing your thoughts. I doubt that the idea that disabled people don’t have sex has anything to do with psychiatric or other drugs and their side effects. Besides, like I said, asexuality is a lack of sexual attraction, not sexual desire. As such, many aces masturbate, watch porn, etc.
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You’re welcome.
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Remember that many disabled people were once able bodied. I wonder, did the event that caused the disability also cause them to change their sexual preference?
For me, the answer is “yes”. Before my stroke I was hetero, but lost interest afterwards to the point where I have considered myself asexual for a long while.
But there was also an anomaly. A few years ago I met a woman who stirred all those old feelings of falling for someone, something which I never expected to happen. I can only assume that the original orientation was still there, only well hidden.
Of course, trying to make a relationship work as a disabled person is another matter!
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Very good points indeed. Thank you for sharing your perspective.
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