Swept Under The Carpet – Lets Talk About Sex, Period and Having Babies!

Working to understanding reproductive health priorities and justice for people with learning disabilities, led by people with learning disabilities.

Back in 2021, as Rachael ran around frantically organising the rooms for ReproFest at the GHS Enterprise Centre in Preston, Lancashire; Sandy Marshall, Denise Bowles and Kirsty Trimmings from Inclusion North were preparing to make their journey from The North East and Yorkshire and Humber. They arrived triumphantly with all the resources they needed for the workshop they were running about reproductive rights for people with learning disabilities. As they unpacked, out came a large rug and a broom!

Why? Because the Inclusion North team had identified how in reproductive health- things like sex, periods, having babies and parenting children- are always ‘swept under the carpet’ when it comes to supporting people with learning disabilities.

Inclusion North Collage from ReproFest Zine 2022

The silence around these topics formed the basis of their workshop at ReproFest. Along with input online from Gary Stark, Inclusion North shared their own experiences of having their reproductive health worries and needs overlooked and ignored. Participants were invited to physically brush cards with different examples of reproductive health topics written on, under the carpet. This helped us reflect on what it feels like to have fundamental human rights pushed out of our reach.   

Flash forward to 2025 and we are thrilled to still be working together. Funded by the National Institute of Health and Care Excellence (NIHR), we are part of a bigger ‘Swept Under The Carpet’ movement that is going to set priorities and build a bigger research project about reproductive health led by and for people with learning disabilities.

Alongside a team based in the South of England including folks from Ace Anglia, a people-led advocacy organisation working with people with learning disabilities and autistic people across Suffolk; Dr Alex Kaley at the University of East Anglia and Prof Ewen Speed from Essex University, our project will pay attention to any differences between Inclusion North and Ace Anglia as a way to start to think about how things may be more or less unfair depending on where you live i.e. between the North and the South of England.

For a start, we know that Yorkshire is a huge county, the largest in England. We also know that Inclusion North works across a huge area that includes many rural and remote villages and towns. Public transport can be limited. Getting to bigger cities and towns where there are more services can be difficult. So, what does this mean for people with learning disabilities trying to get support for their reproductive health – a topic we already know is hard to find support about in the first place!

We also know this topic is hard to talk about. As a diverse team, some with learning disabilities, sharing what we want to do, and why, often makes us upset. This is because the ways people with learning disabilities are treated when it comes to reproductive health has a very real and often painful impact. More than ‘reproductive health talk’ or silence, this is about people’s human rights to a life that they want for themselves being denied. From children being removed from parents, forced sterilisation, and excruciating menstrual pain, to being told not to try and have relationships, sex and build families in the first place.

Our ‘working together’ agreement, developed with Paradigm - a development and training organisation with a passion for supporting people with a learning disability, and/or autism, to live lives THEY choose, includes values such as: being respectful being curious (not judgmental) and being brave. We hope for a future that principles like than can be included in all work to support people with learning disabilities make decisions about their reproductive lives.   

Written by Rachael Eastham and reviewed by Kirsty Trimming and Sandy Marshall from Inclusion North