Online Dating with a Disability: App Accessibility and Transportation

I’m very used to getting lots of questions surrounding my disability. Most of them are questions to the tune of, “How do you use your phone if you’re blind?” or, “How do you use a computer?” But more often than you may realize, dating does come up. I’ve been asked how I know I’m attracted to someone and if my blindness affects my relationship. It doesn’t — my partner is also blind — but this question does make me realize how many things can affect dating with a disability. Not just the disability itself, whether someone is blind, deaf, deaf blind, a wheelchair user, etc. but the resources (or lack thereof) that can have an impact on dating and relationships.

I see online dating as a very popular thing nowadays. I know a few people who used a dating app to find their partner and it worked out for them. My sister met her boyfriend online — they live together now. Another friend of mine married someone she met online. I’m happy for them. But as a blind person, I’m not sure this is something I’d ever try. I think about that more often than you think someone in a long-term relationship might, but it has crossed my mind. If I were single, could I join this trend? I don’t know. It isn’t just the accessibility of the app itself, although that surely is a factor. I’ve tried dating apps briefly. Honestly, it wasn’t really that I wanted to find someone, I was just curious if dating apps were even accessible with the screen readers we use like VoiceOver on the iPhone. It’s the fact that they’re very photo based. Do people even read the profiles? I’m sure they do, but the first thing they see is the picture. So then I'd stress about my picture, if I wanted to eventually use online dating as a resource. 

I didn’t use dating apps very long, and it actually had nothing to do with my picture. It had everything to do with the fact that I think it made me far less confident in my disability and affected how I viewed my blindness, and myself. The stress on whether or not I should mention my blindness in my profile — and if I did, when and where I should mention it — was too much. If I mentioned it and didn’t get any matches, I’d automatically think it’s because I’m blind. If I didn’t mention it and then got to talking to someone, when should I mention it? Before we meet? What if I didn’t, and then they'd think I ambushed them? These thoughts consumed me and wasn’t a mindset I wanted to have. Nothing against online dating, but if I met someone face-to-face, they’d know I was blind right away, and that was a comfort.

There’s also the safety factor for me. As a blind person, I can’t tell if someone’s face matches their profile picture. I was also having a conversation with a friend about online dating (before writing this post, actually, to get some perspective), and she made a good point and said that there’s also the concern of not being able to leave right away if the date isn’t going well. We’d either have to wait on a rideshare or text someone and wait for them to pick us up. I’m sure that doesn’t just have an effect on me as a blind person, but people with various disabilities as well. This isn’t to say that online dating doesn’t work. I’ve seen it work. Having a disability just makes it extra challenging and gives us more to think about.

One of the biggest things that can also impact dating with a disability is transportation. Not just the planning aspect of when to schedule the rides to insure punctuality, but access to it. I think a lot of the times when we talk about how transportation as a whole affects people with disabilities, we forget that not everyone has access to it. I have a friend who lives in southern Illinois in a very remote area in a college town where they just started making rideshares available, but there aren’t always rideshare drivers out and about at the time she wants to leave. Without proper access to transportation, this can make meeting up for a date difficult, especially if it’s someone we met online. I can’t speak for everyone, but for me, if I met you online, I’m not comfortable having you pick me up at my house. So meeting up with someone in an area where transportation is limited can definitely be a hindrance.

For those that have access to transportation, especially the door-to-door paratransit services, we know the service area dilemma all too well. There’s somewhere we want to go, but we don’t know if paratransit will take us all the way there. So even if you have accessible transportation, there’s the added barrier of having to find out if it’s in the service area — the area in which paratransit will transport disabled passengers. Even outside of dating, there have been plenty of times when I want to meet up with friends and the paratransit service won’t take me there. So then I have to decide if I should rack up rideshare charges or pick somewhere else.

People with disabilities are fully capable of having strong, healthy, long-lasting relationships. I think there’s just a little more to consider when doing so, and more factors that go into it that people may not realize. Access to resources that make our lives easier does impact our dating life, but I’d say we’re pretty good at navigating these challenges. And whether your partner has a disability or not, finding someone who understands these things and works with you is so important. Someone who’s willing to pick a different location if transportation is difficult, or to learn about activities you can do and how to make them accessible. Someone who asks questions to get to know you, but doesn’t let your disability define your entire relationship, is everything. Because it does play a factor, but it is not our entire identity.