I am a mental health social worker, disability advocate, group facilitator and queer person from Brighton. I have completed two master's degrees in sociological and anthropological fields, and I have begun training in psychodynamic relationship therapy.

My Fellowship focuses on empowering adults with intellectual disabilities to realise their right to meaningful sexual and romantic relationships. The intersection between disability and sexuality is couched in risk-mitigation and safeguarding narratives and seen as a problem to be solved or pathologized. Adults with intellectual disabilities are often infantilised as having no capacity to consent to safe sex practices and as a result are left to navigate experiences of intimacy with little to no support. These adults are entitled to access empowering education about their body and the opportunities for pleasure that it can provide.

I hope to learn from the progressive attempts to tackle this stigma in Australasia and Scandinavia with a view to ultimately developing a sex positive, disability-inclusive education service where talking about sex is about pleasure and wellness, not a source of shame and fear.