Enabling Romance is a book meant for anyone who has a disability or loves someone with a disability and wants a thoughtful, open discussion of sexuality and love.
The Inside Perspective on Disability in Relationships
Ken Kroll and Erica Levy Klein, who are husband and wife, share their experiences and their interviews with more than 75 people and couples in which at least one partner has a disability. The result is a survey of the joys and challenges of developing and maintaining healthy romantic and sexual relationships.
Enabling Romance bills itself as “an illustrated guide to intimacy and sexual expression for the more than 56 million Americans with disabilities.” This is true in a sense, but don’t expect a step-by-step instruction manual—the ten sketches of men and women with various disabilities pursuing sexual satisfaction together and alone are inspirational and possibly eye-opening but don’t constitute anything like a lesson in how to go about the process.
Couples with Disabilities Share Sexual Experiences
The candid interviews are more helpful. Couples and individuals relate the most intimate details of their sexual relationships in an effort to do away with the taboo that people with disabilities are necessarily celibate, but also to give some hope and guidance to people wanting to build their own relationships. Most couples share what works, but some discuss what hasn’t worked—failed relationships, partners who couldn’t accept their disability, and other challenges to their sexual self-esteem.
Special Disability Considerations
Besides mechanics and the chemistry of attraction, Kroll and Klein address contraception and reproduction, masturbation, and the pros and cons of involving personal care attendants in sexual preparations. Each of these issues is dealt with sensitively and honestly. This is where Enabling Romance stands out from guides written for a general audience. The emphasis is on adaptive technology and adapting behaviors to make sex as natural and pleasurable as possible for both partners.
Separate chapters focus on individual disabilities, including polio and postpolio syndrome, multiple sclerosis, spinal cord injuries, and cerebral palsy. The authors have also included several helpful appendices on sexuality, family planning, useful organizations, independent living catalogs, and links to related articles and videos.
This is a book for couples to share and discuss together. Almost every reader who is interested in sexuality will find something illuminating or affirming inside.
Book Information:
Ken Kroll and Erica Levy Klein. Enabling Romance: A Guide to Love, Sex, and Relationships for People with Disabilities (And the People who Care About Them). No Limits Communications, 2001.
See Related Articles
Discover why dating another person with a disability is so appealing, in Dating Others with a Disability: When It’s Desirable.
For more tips on achieving sexual pleasure with a disability, see Disability and Orgasm: Your Orgasmic Potential.
