 Well, hello there, my beautiful, lovely internet friends. Welcome back to my channel. Real quick, if your name is my father, please don't watch this video. For anyone else, let's dive in. My dad is super sweet in that he watches all of the videos that I make and he always has. He's been a huge supporter and I love that, but this one topic, you'll understand. So I woke up to a comment this morning saying this. How does the obvious affect my love life? Today, I wanted to talk about s**t and disability and I do have to censor that word because YouTube doesn't like you just coming out and saying it. So I am a 32-year-old woman. I was married for seven years. I've been in more than one long-term committed relationship and short-term not committed relationships. And I still feel very odd talking publicly about sex because of the background that I came from. But I've actually gotten a lot of feedback over the years, especially from people in person who have recently gone through limb loss and are really concerned about how it's gonna affect their love life, their sex life. And I just get a lot of comments, like not the creepy kind, the genuinely interested kind, because the vast majority of humans are s**tual creatures, s**tual beings. So to wonder only makes sense. And no, you little creeps out there, I'm not gonna be going into any gory details, okay? So go ahead and head off if that's what you were here for. What did you think I was gonna get graphic with puppy children present? No, we stay classy here. Also, quick side note, this is not a sponsored message except kind of because I am advertising myself. I recently started a podcast all about dating, romance, relationships, modern issues, how we are approaching interactions between genders and more. It's something I'm super excited about. It's called the TurboDude podcast. We are streaming live on my channel. Check the link in the description. New episode is going live tonight, but you can always watch the replay. And also I figured out how to get us on Spotify, big brain stuff. So if you're interested in the topic of today's video and want to hear us talk about all of this and more not related disability, check it out. Let me know what you think. So I want to start off by acknowledging a couple things. I realized that I fall into what I've always said is like the socially, I don't think I'm like a bombshell right, but I think I fit enough of society's like expectations of what women are supposed to look like. I say that with all of the sarcasm because I think that's bullshit, but I also do recognize that I have a smaller frame, a more athletic build. I'm white, I have blonde hair. Some people say it's brown. I think it's blonde and driver's license says it's blonde. So that is going to have an impact on how I have experienced all of this. Additionally, I was not visibly disabled for the first 28 years of my life. I think that I thought, and a lot of society thinks that there must be some major impact on your sex life if you are disabled in someone. And on the one hand, absolutely, because you have different physical limitations or mental ones. Maybe your body moves a little bit differently than an average person. However, I have found that the same basic tenants, the fact that if you are engaging in like sexual activity, the same ingredients are still necessary, right? When I first lost my leg, I was in a committed relationship. I was married. What I will say about that is that the insecurities that I had about the physical change in my body had way more of an effect than my partner's perception of like my leg being gone and me looking different in that context. This is something that we did, you know, talk through. And for me personally, after the first couple of times we were together in that way after losing my leg, the vast majority of any insecurity or weirdness I felt around that dissipated, but getting divorced and then re-entering the dating scene. Yeah, those insecurities reared their little heads again. I didn't know how I would be perceived by other people. And I've talked about this in other videos that this specific kind of disability, missing a leg, I am very clear about the fact that it is gone if I am, you know, like on a dating app or profile or if you meet me in real life, it's not going to come as a surprise or secret. And in my experience, everybody that I've gone out with has been genuinely super cool about it. In some ways, I don't feel like it's all that much different than finding a partner no matter who you are and engaging in sex with them. Across the board, there should be communication, you know, clear boundaries, enthusiastically being into it, you know, all parties involved, discussion of what you like and what you don't like. That is the same for disabled bodies as it is for able bodies. Hi there friends, it's editing Joe. I realized editing this video that I focused largely on the point that I think that a lot of society thinks that disability has more of an effect on sexuality and sexual relationships than it actually does. However, what I definitely failed to mention because disability is such a wide spectrum, everyone's experience is different is a couple things. Number one, finding a partner, whether that's a committed relationship or a casual thing is definitely more difficult, can be more difficult for people. Specifically, if you have a physical disability, there are a lot of people who will not think of you as sexual, will automatically write you off for that. It's one of the reasons why I am like really clear when I'm dating that like, Hey, my leg is missing before we even meet, because if that's like a deal breaker for someone, I'm not interested in wasting my time or wasting theirs, right? For me, sex is hugely about connection. Like the way that you can get to know someone at that level, I have discovered in the last year and a half is something that's really important to me. I didn't really think of myself as that like physical or sexual of a person for the vast majority of my life for so many reasons, but getting to, you know, just personally explore what that means to me and what I care about feeling safe in those situations and having the ability to just like explore with someone or, you know, someone's me personally, I like the one on one thing, but whatever you are into, as long as everybody's into it, go for it. Me missing a leg doesn't change the fact that like, let's communicate, let's set boundaries, let's talk about what we like and what we don't like, and beyond the amputation, like the chronic pain, fibromyalgia, migraine stuff that I deal with, again, it's kind of the same as like anybody else. Some days you're feeling it, some days you're not feeling so great, some days you are up to and you know, want to engage sexually with your partner and other times the situation isn't right or you're not feeling it. Also, this is me perhaps thinking overly positively, but I think in some ways having a physical disability when it comes to sexual intimacy is like a gift in a curse kind of thing, right? Because there are going to be things that are different, there are going to be changes that might need to be made, but it does allow for a lot more communication and also for getting creative, right? Because there's troubleshooting, which is a bonding experience for people. You might have to get creative and I don't see those things as necessarily bad in this context as long as you are with someone who you trust and feel safe with, which you deserve to always be the case. I think one of the biggest things that I have really worked on developing is not so much like being super confident in how my body looks and loving every, you know, I don't really relate to that. It's more like accepting the fact that, hey, I have a body, that's cool, grateful to be alive. Most days, at least that's what I'm supposed to say, some days are rough, okay, but I am grateful to be alive and like knowing that I am going to accept the person that I am engaging in an intimate situation with for exactly who they are and like the body that they have and like loving and respecting them for that and expecting the same in return and just like showing up as who I am. Like I'm missing a leg. One of the weirdest things to me is that like my abdomen is like floppy, right? Like there's a lot of extra skin because over the years a lot of that muscle has broken down. So it looks, it looks, it's floppy. It's weird. Okay. I don't, I don't love the way it looks, but also I'm not going to allow that to get in the way of me being able to connect with someone on such like a deep personal intimate level. If I'm feeling weird about it, let me bring that up with my partner. Let's talk about it. With that being said, fetishes are a very real thing. We all know this, we all love this and maybe we all have them. I don't know, but fetishes around disability in particular can be really concerning. It is something that I have had to watch out for in the world of dating and really pay attention to like any gut feelings or anything like that because you will be objectified. Like there are people who are attracted to me specifically because my leg is missing for sexual reasons and like that doesn't do it for me. I'm not interested in being objectified for that. And there's definitely a community of people that have fetishes for different sorts of disabilities. So you have to be careful. Also, let's talk about safety vulnerability and risks. The safety risks for people with disabilities are a lot higher. The statistics are very depressing when it comes to like abuse, assault, things like that. So the emphasis on safety that you like that mindset that you have to have really goes up. That is something I try to be very cautious about. Like always extra importantly listening to my gut. If something doesn't feel right, if a message feels off, if I just don't get a good vibe from a person, because people do see you as more vulnerable, sexual crimes are perpetrated against people with disabilities at a much higher rate. So like safety first always for everybody, but especially if you are a person with a disability dating. In my personal opinion, please feel free to disagree in the comments. Sex with a disability is exactly like sex without a disability. It's figuring out how to connect, have that experience with another person in a way that's like awesome and fantastic and beautiful for the both of you because every person is so unique and individual. Like how one person receives love or receives pleasure is not going to be the same for any other person. And that's always going to be deeply individual and deeply personal no matter how many people you've slept with or not. It's still about the person you know that you're with in that moment and really getting to know them. And so partner to really get to know me. This is going to be a part of the package, you know, understanding that certain parts don't feel good. Like if they are touched or grabbed or like, you know, moved a certain way, communicating that understanding that like I get fan and pain quite often throughout the day, I'm going to like, you know, like yelp or jump a little bit. Like that's going to be a part of my experience and also that, you know, pain is so bad sometimes that I'm not going to be up for anything other than laying completely still on the couch of all of the things that have impacted my sex life. I would say that this is like top 10, but honestly, being raised in the evangelical Christian church in purity culture, I'll put a link down below if you don't know what that is, but being extremely indoctrinated with shame around the topic of sex that has impacted how I view myself sexually and how I've been able to engage with people to such a deep and dark extent like that has messed me up. And it's something that I am, I feel like I'm just now kind of coming out of and being like, it's okay to enjoy pleasure. Like it's okay to want sex. It's okay that I have sexuality that I'm a sexual being. I don't have to like apologize for that or hide that like that, that previous mindset that I grew up with that impacted sex for me so heavily. I love the fact that sexuality is a part of who I am and I have never been able to say that literally any other point in my life because I have been so deeply ashamed to be a sexual creature, to be a sexual being because I was raised in purity culture in the evangelical christian church where that shit was shamed so hard. And after spending years working through that to like really love and appreciate my sexuality is such a cool experience. I think generally as a society we tend to think that things that we can see are the things that must have most impact on a person. In my personal experience, it's that's never been the case. Other types of experiences and traumas that I have gone through in my life have impacted who I am as a person and my experience in the world so much more than losing my leg and that is the case for how I experience and see sex as well. Also I want to talk for a moment about if you are someone whose partner has a disability and you guys have a sexual relationship or you want a sexual relationship, how to talk about it or bring it up, I cannot encourage you enough to just open up that conversation. Not talking about things like not asking questions is just never gonna be good like that's gonna lead to misunderstanding and hurt. If you have questions about how that disability affects how that person sees themselves sexually they enjoy what they don't enjoy all of that. When you guys are you know at a level to have that conversation appropriately ask your partner if you can have that conversation if you can ask those things if you can hear about you know their experience and their perception and what they're looking for and just all of that talk about it. I do not speak for everybody with a disability even a little bit but I will say that I have so appreciated the moments when in general but talking in this video in a sexual context someone has been like hey I was wondering how you know blank affects you or how blank feels or or what you'd be most comfortable about this or that. Having someone just like hear me right about an experience that I am the expert on builds that trust builds that connection makes me more comfortable with them. So if you're ever even kind of in doubt have the conversation ask the questions and rule of them all the time respect what the other person has to say. So long story short sex and disability it's about communication it's about getting comfortable with your partner and disabled or able-bodied everyone has stuff that is specific to them that if they're allowing you to engage in that intimate setting with them you learn you listen you understand your respect same for disability. I didn't even run them this morning but they are tuckered babies. Thank you so much for listening to me chatter here for a bit about sex and disability and my own experience. If you have any specific questions leave them in the comment section down below I would love to answer them maybe in a short form video for you. Also if you want to do me a favor if you want to check out that link down below to my podcast podcast channel all of the information is right down there below in the description. If you even kind of enjoyed this video I'm pretty sure you'd be interested in what we're talking about over there and this is perfect timing because my neighbor is currently started up his riding lawn mower so it's gonna get loud. Thank you so much for spending a few minutes out of your day here with me today and Sophie and Leo you could be anywhere else in the world doing anything else but you chose to hang out with me for a few minutes and I really appreciate that. I love you guys I'm thinking about you and I will see you in the next video. Bye guys. I'm just gonna come out and say it Phantom Pain is a real bitch.