Aged 43, Melanie decided to book an escort and experience sex for the first time.
While Melanie was in social isolation in her Australian home due to Covid-19, she made a promise to herself. Once she was allowed out again she was going to hire a sex worker, lose her virginity and put a halt to those anxieties she had developed around love and intimacy as a disabled person. Chayse was the man she booked.
Melanie has used a wheelchair since the age of three having been diagnosed with inflammation of the spinal chord - a condition known as transverse myelitis. It has given her paralysis in her legs and limited movement in her arms. As an adult, she uses support workers to help with daily tasks. "I asked a million questions," Melanie says: "Have you ever used a hoist before? Is your apartment wheelchair accessible? How often does the lift in your place break down?"For Melanie, Chayse's answers were good enough to book a session at his apartment. And far from nervous, she brought the appointment forward, too excited to wait as he had been so warm and reassuring.
"That was the whole reason I booked Chayse," she says. "I didn't want to go home with a guy from a bar and find out these things and be awkward, vulnerable and unsafe." But it's not just the physical power imbalance where the vulnerability lies. Disability can sometimes infantilise people and make them feel unworthy of certain experiences that other people think of as just normal - some disabled people call this internalised ableism.
Justifying the cost, he says: "What a lot of people don't understand is when you're seeing someone for 48 hours, as rewarding as it can be, you're not doing anything else you want to do in your life."want to help people explore different things? Why can't I be there for other people that need that and want and deserve to feel beautiful?"
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