2022’s Wildflower: a case study on the infantilisation of disabled sexuality

In trying to quit TikTok (again) recently, I found somewhere worse: YouTube shorts. As the janky algorithm took me from right-wing podcast clips to GenAI alpha werewolf stories, clips of a film I'd never seen filtered through: 2022's Wildflower, starring Kiernan Shipka.

She plays Bea, the non-disabled, neurotypical daughter of two adults with intellectual disabilities, Sharon and Derek. Their mothers are Loretta and Peg.

As an auDHD trainee counsellor with aspirations to specialise in sex and relationship counselling for neurodivergent couples, I stop scrolling for a moment when the clip appears; depictions of intellectually disabled people in romantic relationships aren't often written about.

Although sceptical — because 'cripping up' even in 2022 is outdated and cringey — I'm curious if this clip will depict anything nuanced that could challenge people's biases when it comes to the portrayal of two disabled people engaging in romance and even — gasp — sex.

Disabled sex remains taboo; few clinics offer "specialized services" for disabled clients, even fewer for older disabled people (Sakuma et al., 2025). Autistic people are denied sex education based on the assumption they won't be interested, leaving autistic adults at greater risks of unwanted pregnancies, STIs, coercive behaviour and abuse (Belluzzo et al., 2025). A lack of sex education was also found in a study in South Africa with visually impaired people, with the only information given typically through "a fear-based, abstinence approach" (Mabena et al., 2026). Clearly in wider society, to be disabled means you cannot also be a sexual being; there is no desiring or being desired.

So it's no surprise when watching the clip that Sharon and Derek's parents immediately launch into extreme ableist rhetoric. Peg says, 'We should get them a divorce!' while Loretta declares, 'Sharon needs to be sterilised — we can't let them procreate!'

To quote the internet — yikes.

In media, depiction is not always endorsement. To be charitable to the text, Loretta's rhetoric is absolutely framed as extreme and even horrifying. But this defence is flawed for two reasons.

Firstly, Peg's response, 'Why on earth would we do that when we can just get them a divorce?' is no less ableist. The solution is still the erasure of Sharon and Derek's autonomy, just through divorce rather than sterilisation.

Second, the entire scene is played for laughs. At the end of this scene (right as Peg wonders aloud 'maybe they're not even interested in sex?'), it quickly cuts to Sharon giving birth, Derek by her side.

Joking about forced sterilisation ignores a long, painful history of the disabled community undergoing exactly that. It's clumsy at best. However, this is a subject that deserves its own essay. Instead, I want to focus on the framing of Peg and Loretta in this scene.

Something the scene unintentionally gets right is the way it portrays caregivers of disabled people making decisions about their children's romantic life without their consent and without presuming competence.

This is an extension of 'infantilisation': reducing a disabled adult to a childlike state — believing they can't make decisions, care for themselves, or engage in 'adult' things like sex.

'Infantilisation' can be well-intentioned but still extremely dehumanising. To focus on autism for a moment: it's still common to hear 'they are an adult but they have the mind of a child!' — both in the media and, in my previous experience as a carer, in supported living and care homes too.

Wildflower does this too, telling us Derek's 'body kept growing but his mind just kind of stayed the same' after his accident at 12. This framing comes from wanting to ensure care, but assuming responsibility for someone's needs while repeatedly calling them incompetent reinforces an objectifying dynamic between disabled person and caregiver.

This objectifying dynamic leads to the lack of quality support all disabled people deserve. Project an enforced 'innocence' onto disabled bodies, and you disregard their agency — disabled people's sexualities are as expansive as anyone else's, and sexuality is a human right. Not acknowledging this puts disabled people at risk of real harm.

In many of the previously cited papers, there is evidence showing that disabled people are actually more likely than non-disabled people to engage in sexual activity — and for these encounters to happen in unsafe circumstances (Stevens et al., 2026). Statistics don't capture the internalised shame that drives it.

Sonya Renee Taylor's The Body Is Not an Apology captures that shame. Taylor asked a friend with cerebral palsy — navigating a pregnancy scare — why she'd had unprotected sex with a casual partner. Her friend replied that her cerebral palsy made it difficult to be sexual, and thus she did not feel entitled to ask her sexual partner to use a condom.

This is a heartbreaking insight into the ways many marginalised people feel they have to barter not only for love but also to feel they are worthy of affection, often at the expense of their own personhood. Sex education and therapeutic support can give people the power to articulate these experiences and learn the tools needed for self-exploration and self-advocacy — whether through a disabled lens or a queer lens. Working at Fighting Fear has shown me how often these lenses intersect.

Once the Wildflower clip finished I watched the whole film to make sure I could base my opinions on it correctly. It contains a lot of messy ableism, but one thing I will give it: at least Sharon and Derek fall and remain in love for the whole film. It's small, but portraying a relationship between disabled people where the path to finding love is safe, full of agency, and ultimately shameless is rare.

So if I could leave anyone reading this with one lasting message, it's this: marginalised people deserve to fall in love and/or have sex in a safe and shameless way. And no matter how far that feels from you, I promise — it is possible.

PS — pray for the people rotting their brains on YouTube Shorts because they're too stubborn to go back to TikTok. They're deep in the trenches with that cursed algorithm. And the GenAI alpha werewolves will not save them.

Elle Summers

11/10/2026

#neurodiversity #ablism #disabilty #AuDHD #ADHD #autism #abuse #sex #sexuality #queeranddisabled #lgbtq #wildflower #dehumanising

References;

Belluzzo, M., Giaquinto, V., De Alfieri, E., Esposito, C., & Amodeo, A. L. (2025). Sexuality, gender identity, romantic relations, and intimacy among individuals with autism spectrum disorder: A narrative review of the literature. Psychiatry International, 6(2), Article 44. https://doi.org/10.3390/psychiatryint6020044

Mabena, K. M. E., Ngidi, N. D., & Mnguni, M. A. (2025). Adults with visual impairment's reflections on receiving comprehensive sexuality education during teenage years. In L. Ubisi (Ed.), The psychosexual experiences of individuals with visual impairment in South Africa (pp. 45–62). University of South Africa. https://doi.org/10.25159/214-8.005

Sakuma, Y., Lin, B., Kpokiri, E., Khan, J., Zou, H., Tucker, J. D., Shakespeare, T., Kuper, H., & Wu, D. (2025). Sexual health behaviors and outcomes among middle-aged and older disabled adults in Britain. Perspectives on Sexual and Reproductive Health, 57(4), 453–469. https://doi.org/10.1111/psrh.70034

Stevens, J. D., Valentine, A., Hoyle, J. N., Li, F. S., Zionskowski, K., Harris, J. A., Akobirshoev, I., Mitra, M., & Horner-Johnson, W. (2026). Inclusive intimacy: Sexual experiences, debut, and partners among females ages 15–25 with and without disability, NSFG 2011–2019. Sexuality and Disability, 44(2), Article 16. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11195-025-09931-9