All Episodes
Episodes
268 - Long Distance: Is It Worth It?
Why Look Further Away
Many people feel they can’t find anyone locally. Surprisingly, many live in big cities, though the struggle makes sense in small towns and rural areas. For people with disabilities, staying put...
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267 - Is He Worthy?
A divorce about four and a half years ago pulled Dave into a long custody battle. His two children were moved 90 miles away without his knowledge, and he won them back only a month before the interview. Devastated...
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266 - Real Photos, Real Boundaries: Dating Confidently at Any Size
Weight concerns are common and tend to grow with age, especially for women going through hormonal changes. For people with disabilities, weight is often shaped by things outside their control, such as medications,...
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265 - The Profile as a Filter: Disclosing Disability to Attract the Right People
When to Disclose
There's no single right answer, so do what feels comfortable. Kathy's disability is visible, so she recommends naming it in the profile. That filters out people who wouldn't be interested and saves...
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264 - What Relationship Looks Like Four Years In
As part of working on my upcoming book about sexual ableism and dating with a disability, I interview Marco and his partner Dana as a follow up to my interview in episode 77. Marco is legally blind from premature...
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263 - Trauma-Informed Dating: Healing, Red Flags, and Reclaiming Desire
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Trauma-Informed Dating for People with Disabilities
This week Kathy takes on a heavier topic: trauma-informed care, and how trauma shows up in dating for people with...
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262 - Roommates, Weddings, and Everything Between: The Friendship Series with Camille
In this episode of Kathy O'Connell's Friendship Series, Kathy talks with Camille, a close friend of nearly four decades, about their friendship and the role disability has played in it. They met in college, shared a...
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261 - Your Playbook for Dating is Here
The Playbook Is Here
The Five Stages of Dating Success Playbook launched today. Today's episode covers the two stages we hadn't unpacked yet: active dating and mastery — the payoff for everything built so far.
Stage...
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260 - From Confidence to Strategy: Building Your Dating Toolkit
Internal self-worth work and external dating skill are different muscles. Believing you deserve a good relationship doesn't automatically teach you how to handle logistics or anxiety-inducing moments in real time —...
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259 - Why Dating Doesn't Have to Feel So Hard
Dating Confidence Is a Skill, Not a Trait
Dating and relationship success is skill-based — not a personality trait, not luck. It's a set of capacities (self-awareness, resilience, strategy, consistent action) that can...
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258 - The Real Work of Dating with a Disability
Dating requires skills — and disability adds complexity. But disability services are built around health, safety, and independence, not romantic fulfillment. Sexuality remains taboo, no structured framework exists for...
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257 - Relationships Decoded: Teaching Consent, Connection, and Self-Advocacy
We're talking with researcher Dr. Kathryn Pedgrift, focused on relationship and sexuality education for people with intellectual and developmental disabilities (IDD). The conversation covers Pedgrift's academic...
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