Devs only - question

[em]

This may be a weird question, I know we are all here as devs (female and some male) attracted to men with disabilities. I am also attracted to men, and have a male partner. However, I was wondering if any of you ever find yourselves fantasising/making up stories about/noticing on the streets - women with disabilities? For example, would you read a story where there is a man and a woman, but the woman is the one with your preferred disability? 
I feel that it's a bit like the pretending many of us admitted to in our childhood. I have a female body and so any pretending I did would be of a female with a disability. In my fantasies it doesn't actually matter who is the one with a disability, in stories other people write it's a bit different because the dynamics might be different, but I still may be interested. I was wondering in general what your thoughts are on this and whether I'm the only one without this kind of preference?

[messybun]

I don't feel the same about hetero, disabled women as I do for hetero, disabled men. I am interested in disabled females purely on a friendly or platonic level, not in a romantic or erotic way. If I read a book with a disabled female, it would simply be just a story with a disabled female, nothing else.
Out and about, I do notice any disabled person, female or male but a female does not trigger the same emotions as the male.
I could be attracted to a disabled lesbian if her features are appealing to me and more male than female. But a straight, disabled female doesn't trigger any dev emotions.

[myrrh]

This is something I've written about before because it's such a strange quirk in my sexuality. I've known myself to be bi forever, but it's really different for ABs and PWDs. I'm attracted to many types of AB men with all manner of body types, but I'm very picky with AB women. My attraction there is pretty focused on women who are muscular and butch, or at least very GNC. This lead me to think that I was only a little bit bi until I discovered my dev side in my early 20's.

With PWD men, I'm very picky about disability. I don't just want CP or limb difference, I want the right kind of CP or limb difference. I'm so picky, it's annoying. But for PWD women, anything goes. I can think of a handful of amp guys I've seen who I thought were smokin hot, but I've swooned over almost every amp woman I've seen. One of my most memorable experiences discovering my devness was driving by a bus stop and catching a glimpse of a woman with arthrogryposis and thinking I'd never seen a more attractive human in all of my days. I'm happily in a relationship with a guy now and mostly talk about PWD men on here because that's what's relevant to the site, but I've been very interested in PWD women elsewhere when single.

[bluefox]

This is actually something I've been thinking about quite a bit recently. I'm at least heteroflexible, probably bisexual, and while I'm generally very picky with who I can even fall in love with at all, I find absolutely nothing in PWD women that I don't find in AB women. I'm just not a dev at all when it comes to women. It leaves me cold entirely. Yet concerning men, I can find some AB guys relatively hot but I will not really be attracted to them, hetero-wise I'm a die-hard devotee. It's two entirely different worlds for me.
I theorise that it might be because disability /can/ bring out traits in some people that AB women can already openly display due to gender roles (I think this is equivalent to the way some mean mentioning the "wounded warrior trope" on here!), so there isn't any kick to it. It could also be that in quite a couple cases I look for the opposite qualities in women compared to what I look for in men and so be a me-thing in this way.

Edit to clarify: with those traits I mean empathy, accepting help, partly perspective, etc. - things like these!

[myrrh]

Funny that we're almost complete opposites, bluefox. With PWD men, do you find yourself picky about disability? It sounds as if you're almost primarily in their emotional development, so I wonder if that means you're attracted to a wider range of physical attributes.

[bluefox]

Jul 10, 2021 20:50:14 GMT -5 myrrh said:

Funny that we're almost complete opposites, bluefox. With PWD men, do you find yourself picky about disability? It sounds as if you're almost primarily in their emotional development, so I wonder if that means you're attracted to a wider range of physical attributes.

Funny indeed. I'm actually unsure. I thought I was really picky, my thing has been very primarily blindness or even moderate visual impairment or muteness for a long while, then through a character in an anime, single side hand amputations (or paralysis) came into the picture.
Again by exposure I had a brief phase where I was a little into paras, and now rather recently I started being REALLY into guys with a specific kind of limp after I briefly dated someone.
It seems it lasts too, and it has sort of spread to include single side leg amputees too bcs of a video game character who has a similar limp too.

I think I react a lot to exposure here, never ever thought about that - I might not be that picky after all! This gives hope, hahah.

However, I also research a lot and am quite interested in the medical side. I'm just still losing my weird sort of developmental asexuality I had for my teens? No idea what's up with that, and I find myself more and more into the looks of those disabilities too. Also how PWDs move their body differently, an example apart from obviously amputees would be blind people using the sense of touch differently and more, has always been a huge, huge thing for me and really fascinates me. So it's definitely not only the emotional development for me!

Damn, that was quite the exploration of my devness, learnt a thing or two about myself pretty quickly here. ^^"

[devogirl]

I'm bi, mostly into very feminine, girly type women. But women with disabilities usually don't interest me at all. When it comes to PWDs, I'm pretty much only into guys.

But you're not at all the only one, em. There seems to be a very wide range of preferences here, with members at all points along the spectrum:
paradevo.proboards.com/thread/6881/devs-any-girls

As for being picky about disability preference, personally I find that in fantasy and fiction, I'm very picky and specific, but in real life, I'm not at all picky, almost anything can trigger my dev feelings. But the reverse is also true, things I enjoy in fantasy don't always translate. My dev interests also change somewhat over time.

[em]

Ah interesting, thanks for your inputs.
I don't think I'd consider myself bisexual, and in real life I'm not very interested in women, women with disabilities don't trigger the same feelings (as far as I can tell, thinking back), and I certainly don't think I could fall in love with a woman (although I do sometimes notice if a woman is attractive, so don't know). But that's why I'm confsed - I wouldn't tell nayone else that I fantasise about women because I'm not interested in pursuing a relationship with a woman, so I don't want to give that impression.
Maybe just because in fantasy world thinking about the same things over and over gets boring, and I find myself attracted (as in fascinated more than sexually attracted) to strong female characters, so then adding a small disability and letting them deal with it is equally fulfilling as when it happens with a male character.
In real life I haven't had many close encounters with PwD so it's hard to tell how picky I'd be but I am very specific in what I like both in real life and in fiction

Thanks for the link devogirl, it's reassuring to know I'm not the only one pondering this!

messybun out of curiosity, what do you mean when you say you'd be attracted to a lesbian? Isn't it possible that you'd be attracted to a woman before knowing her sexual orientation? What if you find someone attractive and later find out she's straight, does that change how you feel?

[tori]

Jul 11, 2021 10:09:56 GMT -5 em said:

Maybe just because in fantasy world thinking about the same things over and over gets boring, and I find myself attracted (as in fascinated more than sexually attracted) to strong female characters, so then adding a small disability and letting them deal with it is equally fulfilling as when it happens with a male character.

In my consumption of fiction (television or reading) I completely get this 100%. I can read, watch and write females with disabilities. I'm equally as fascinated with it even though I don't consider myself bisexual. More like bi-curious and sexually open. Would I fool around with another woman under the right circumstances? Possibly. But could I be in a relationship with a woman? Probably not. 

And like you, I'm drawn to really strong female leads. That goes for both PWD's and AB characters. I like girls with some grit to them. 

[messybun]

Jul 11, 2021 10:09:56 GMT -5 em said:

messybun out of curiosity, what do you mean when you say you'd be attracted to a lesbian? Isn't it possible that you'd be attracted to a woman before knowing her sexual orientation? What if you find someone attractive and later find out she's straight, does that change how you feel?

I can find straight disabled women interesting and attractive but not in an erotic way. They don't trigger any dev feelings for me. 
With a disabled lesbian, there's the 
erotic component and the possibility of being involved erotically. She would have to have more male features and be attractive to me. I can't completely explain.

[ContingentlyComposite]

Interesting topic. I don't consider myself bisexual. I find AB women attractive in real life but generally not in a way that makes me want to pursue something romantic or sexual with them. But I feel much more attracted to women who are PWDs, and in a purely sexual way I feel equally aroused by women and men if they are PWDs. When I've had more involved romantic fantasy stories going in my mind I've just imagined men who are PWDs though.

[Inkdevil]

I had to login and comment on this one, because it’s a side to my devness I’ve wondered about for years.

I’m definitely, 100% heterosexual. Only ever dated men. Only ever wanted to date men. Para men exclusively, since I ‘came out’ of the dev closet.

I’ve always refuted the fact my devness is a fetish, because in terms of my attraction to disabled men, it would be pushing it to say even 10% of my attraction to them is sexual. It’s all about the lifestyle, the everyday stuff. Immersing myself in that life. I love it.

But what is my sexual fantasy? Amputee women. Specifically arm amps. Very, very rarely men. I have no interest in pursuing this in reality. It’s a pure sexual fantasy, that’s all.

Two polar opposites of attraction, each having a very defined space in my dev make up - and with no real crossover. Why?? I have no idea. I’d love to know the answer!

Does anyone else have similar attractions?

[bluefox]

Regarding my previous post in here, idk if maybe you simply have nothing to reply, but myrrh I'm a smol 🤏 bit sad the convo kind of ended abruptly, idk - I just wanna say in case you maybe just forgot replying, I'm still up for the topic ^^" (view this as me being a little embarrassed I just pounded out so much info into the void, haha)

[myrrh]

Not at all bluefox, I just didn't want to dominate the thread! Everyone has had really interesting contributions. I'll hit you back after work 🙂

[em]

Jul 12, 2021 2:31:18 GMT -5 messybun said:

Jul 11, 2021 10:09:56 GMT -5 em said:

messybun out of curiosity, what do you mean when you say you'd be attracted to a lesbian? Isn't it possible that you'd be attracted to a woman before knowing her sexual orientation? What if you find someone attractive and later find out she's straight, does that change how you feel?

I can find straight disabled women interesting and attractive but not in an erotic way. They don't trigger any dev feelings for me. 
With a disabled lesbian, there's the 
erotic component and the possibility of being involved erotically. She would have to have more male features and be attractive to me. I can't completely explain.

Ah ok so it's the specific type of women that you could possibly be attracted to, makes sense I think