Posted on: Mon, Oct 8 2007 7:03 AM
Posted by: Lawrence
Posts: 19
Link:;
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/uk_news/story/0,,2185322,00.html
Meet
Tyran and Leanne - they learnt of love and sex in a school for the
disabled
A pioneering policy is breaking an old taboo by encouraging disabled
teenagers to form sexual relationships, with help from carers if
necessary
Anushka
Asthana, education correspondent
Sunday October 7, 2007
The Observer
Observer
Jan Symes remembered
every detail of the scene. A 17-year-old girl with straight brown hair
pulled back into a ponytail, heavy purple boots and clothes ill-suited for
her age sat opposite her in a small office at Treloar's College, near
Alton in Hampshire.
The teenager had cerebral
palsy and was sitting in a wheelchair, using a machine to speak. She
lifted her head, looked across at Jan and asked: 'Do you think it is all
right for me, as a very disabled person, to fancy someone?' Symes was
horrified. 'Will society think it is disgusting?' the girl went
on.
Today the college for
physically disabled teenagers over 16 goes public about a ground-breaking
'sexuality policy' that began to take shape that day two years ago, when a
young woman shocked her counsellor by asking whether she had the right to
fall in love.
A policy was designed
that aimed to break down one of society's most enduring taboos: that of
disability and sex. And now, for the first time, staff are ready to speak
out about the controversy, legal wrangling and heated debates involved in
producing a three-page document that fundamentally changed the ethos of
the college. Students, it stated, not only had the right to pursue sexual
relationships, but would be assisted physically and emotionally by
specially trained staff.
Now other colleges for
the disabled are looking to make a similar change. Like Treloar's, they
have young people whose disabilities are so severe that even to hold
hands, cuddle or kiss is impossible without help.
'Before, if any student
was caught in a sexually compromising position, they would be expelled,'
said Symes. Two pupils were kicked out when they were found getting close
in the swimming pool changing rooms. Another girl became pregnant, but
admitted that she had gone to a churchyard, outside the grounds of the
residential college, to have sex.
Physical relationships,
argued Symes, were a basic human right for every individual, able-bodied
or not: 'At least now at Treloar's there is someone to talk to if a
student wants to say "I know I am going to die in a couple of years
and I would like a relationship before that", "I fancy someone
of the same sex", or "I have erections because I am a
17-year-old boy but I have no hand control".'
The shift was not easy.
At the start some staff were so vehemently opposed to it that they refused
to put posters up in their departments asking for people's opinions.
Barristers had to be brought in to scrutinise the wording. In some cases,
helping pupils with learning disabilities to have sex would be against the
law.
Safeguards were needed to
prevent students being 'coerced, exploited or manipulated' by their peers,
and the constant challenge was finding the borderline between 'assisting'
pupils and becoming a participant. What was meant to take three months
took close to two years.
When the Safe (sexuality
and further education) policy finally came into being, one female member
of staff was so upset that she left the school. She felt that staff were
setting up pupils for failure, putting too much emphasis on sex and moving
away from the core focus of education. Most of the staff
disagreed.
Graham Jowett, who was
principal of the college as the policy was being implemented and is now
its director of education, said there was a drive to treat students as
adults. 'You cannot do that without at some point young people saying,
"Hang on, if we were not disabled and at a special college, we would
be able to have a relationship",' said Jowett. 'It would be dishonest
to say "we are going to treat you like adults, but this is one area
that is taboo".'
Sitting in a bright
office leading on to one of the corridors at Treloar's, Jowett argued
that, before the policy came in, many students rarely experienced touch
other than with carers. He remembered watching some students take part in
a dance recital where able-bodied peers draped themselves over their
wheelchairs. 'I thought that perhaps that was their only experience of
sensuality with other people,' he said.
From day one, Jowett was
'uncritically positive' about the new policy. The document itself focused
on dignity and respect, providing information on safe sex and making it
possible for the teenagers to experience what millions of others took for
granted. One key paragraph read: 'Students may wish to have opportunities
for loving and being loved, and to be helped to achieve fulfilling
relationships: these will range from platonic friendships to partnerships
which include a mutually agreed sexual element.'
But it is not all about
sex. In one case a student was granted his wish of visiting a strip club
before he died; in another, sexy magazines and DVDs were purchased. 'My
guiding principle would be, are they over 18, is it legal, is it
licensed?' said Jowett. 'It is not for me to make a moral judgment about
the right or wrong of it.' His work is now being drawn on by the hospice
movement and other colleges.
Close to the main
building at Treloar's, is a set of flats designed to help pupils to learn
to live independently. Amid brightly coloured flowers, wooden doors
automatically swing open into typical student flats, with clothes strewn
over the furniture and posters on the walls. Only on closer inspection is
it clear that work surfaces move up and down, that the beds have buzzers
attached to them and that there are tracks on the ceilings to help pupils
move around.
In one such room, Leanne
Tasker and her boyfriend, Tyran Hawthorn - 20-year-olds who both use
electric wheelchairs - were helped to take their relationship further with
the assistance of support worker Teresa Capes. Until Leanne left the
college last July, they needed her to help them touch, hug and kiss. 'I
did not feel embarrassed because I knew we needed help,' said Tyran, who
has Duchenne muscular dystrophy (DMD), a rare condition that causes
progressive muscle weakness as cells break down and are lost, giving
sufferers a life expectancy in the mid-twenties.
Even with the policy, the
couple found their love life frustrating. If they wanted to hug, they had
to book in time with Capes, wait for her and a mattress to be brought up,
be assisted into position and finally left alone. 'Not many people realise
that people in wheelchairs want to do normal things,' said Leanne, who has
just started at Southampton University, 'like having relationships and
taking them to the next level. The most frustrating thing is that we have
to rely on other people.'
Leanne, who has
arthrogryposis - a condition that affects the joints - said she tried not
to think about the fact that she and her boyfriend would never grow old:
'If we thought about it, we would not be able to live or do
anything.'
Tomorrow a remarkable
documentary on Channel 5, part of the Extraordinary People series, will
tell the story of another pupil at Treloar's who suffers with DMD. In it,
Stuart Wickison, 19, talks candidly about his sexual desires: 'We all have
this desire to lose our virginity. We feel we need to experience this
ultimate pleasure to balance out the pain we have - not just physical
pain; it's psychological pain as well. It is as if we feel the only way to
make worth of ourselves is to have sex. It sounds so crude, but I feel
that to experience that is to live life to the full, to know the whole of
life. We don't have much time left. We have to live our 77 years in 20.'
People like Capes help to make that possible. 'If an able-bodied teenager
was falling in love, they would find somewhere to have a kiss and a cuddle
and take that relationship further,' she said. 'If you are not an
able-bodied person, that may not be possible, but the emotional needs are
still there - why should people not have sexual relationships?'
It is an attitude shared
by staff across Treloar's. Many emphasise the differences for students who
have severe physical disabilities. 'Most people learn gradually about sex,
from playground banter on,' said Helen Goodenough, an assistant principal.
She pointed out that it would not be illegal for a student to hire a
prostitute, provided that staff did not make the call for them. In January
Nick Wallis, a DMD sufferer, made the headlines when he persuaded nuns and
nurses at his hospice in Oxford to help him find a prostitute so that he
could experience sex before he died.
'For most of us, flirting
at the school disco, having a dance and a smooch is normal,' said
Goodenough. 'But if you are an electric wheelchair user and cannot get out
yourself, it is difficult.'
That was the case for the
17-year-old girl who felt it was wrong to fancy someone and feared society
would sneer. Thanks to people like Jan Symes, her life has been
transformed. Not only did she find a boyfriend and fall in love, but she
is now engaged to be married.
Guardian Unlimited
Every cripple has his own way of walking. - Brendan Behan, Author
