Should people with disabilities have children?

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I ask that because of my neighbor Jessica who has a kid and is disabled

I feel sometimes the challenges of caring for her son is just too much for her and she might be secretly regretting the choice of motherhood!! !

This leads me to the question:

Should disabled people even have kids in the first place?

What do you guys think?

Thanks in advance!

If they know they can financially afford it and are in there opinion capable of making good parenting decisions most of the time I'd say yes

I have a friend with 2 sons with serious mental issues. It's very hard on the family. He's a stay-at-home dad, and the wife has a full-time job to make the money. He says his life is over. His youngest son has the most difficult challenges. A very low IQ. That son will need to be supported for life. The parents are super smart, both having Masters degrees. They also have a very nice daughter who has no such issues, but is clearly under serious stress.

That's sad, his life doesn't have to be 'over' he doesn't have to fall into gloom and despair. If he is a close friend maybe you could encourage him to talk to a therapist or something, if he is having trouble with how he feels. I mean yeah maybe the son will need support for life, but it's his son a person who even with disability has a personality and interests probably....It can be all doom and gloom, or it could be he steps up to make good memories with his child and even if they need lifelong support. Because even if he doesn't intend it, well even very young children can pick up on when an adult they depend on has more or less 'thrown in the towel' or given up on them so a lower functioning teen would certainly pick up on that even if they have a lower IQ.

Also why is their nice daughter without issues under serious stress? And by nice do they just mean she doesn't complain? LIke she might be struggling a lot to, but if her parents spend all their time grieving about her brother having a more severe disability she probably doesn't feel like she has room to talk to them about her issues and doesn't want to take away support from her brother with her 'less important' issues. She might actually just be more withdrawn and self conscious than just nice with no issues.

Well who would decide that? A lot of disabled people do choose not to have kids, but depending on the disability and person it could be manageable. But idk dwarfism can be considered a disability but some people with the condition still have kids who end up normal sized, or they might have kids who share the condition...but that's not super life threatening on its own. A person who has or could carry muscular dystrophy may choose not to have kids because they don't want to cause that suffering and a shorter lifespan on someone else if they can help it.

But like there should not be any mandates on if disabled people should or should not have kids, as it comes down to being a personal decision. Like at the end of the day it has to be up to the pregnant person with the uterus if they choose to go through a pregancy and give birth or not.

For a time some doctors thought I might carry muscular dystrpphy so even if I didn't for sure have the condition it was possible if I had kids they would get it. So if I was interested in having kids I'd probably go get that looked into further and if there was a good possibility of giving that to them I wouldn't have kids. I don't want to have kids so I haven't bothered but if I did If I had the information they could be born with that condition becasue of me I wouldn't want to risk that. But if a person with the same risk as me did get pregnant well it would be pretty gross to force an abortion if they aren't comfortable with that and would rather take it to term and give birth, just as gross as forcing someone to carry a pregnancy they don't want.

So its a slippery slope to legislate that, but In my personal opinion if it's likely your disability will like make the life of your offspring very difficult or impossible it's better not to give birth. But legislation to enforce it would cause a lot more problems than it would solve so ultimately it has to be up to the pregnant person if they choose to carry to term or get an abortion. Otherwise pregnant people end up with less access to medical care they need, and there ends up being a higher maternal mortality rate.

If they wish to do so, they should.

I would think that struggling to raise a child is challenging for most people whether they are disabled or not

I have Asperger's syndrome and I have a daughter who has autism

If I'd have had the right support when she was a baby then she wouldn't have been taken away from me and I would have been the best person to bring her up

Since I got her back I have paid for her to get an education (because the people who did bring her up didn't care about that) she's fit and healthy (because they also neglected that side of her life as well). She is now happy, healthy and has a really good job in law (which is what she studied at uni)

The people who brought her up were not disabled and they only put a roof over her head but apparently that was better for her that if she lived with me

Go figure

Yes, they have as much rights as anybody, but if one has never been happy with their disability and it's a genetic disability likely to be passed down to their children, then it's probably kinder they don't have children. My mother struggled with personal problems such as depression and anxiety, and that was passed down to two of her children (me and my brother), with me having AS and ADHD along with it, and my brother having mental health issues too, both of us having grown up hating ourselves and lacking in confidence. Then it became a vicious cycle - my mother became distressed because her children were not happy, resulting in her beating herself up for believing she was a bad mother, and wondering if it would have been kinder not to have brought us into this world. So that then made her more depressed, even suicidal, which made us more depressed too, despite all the unconditional love and attention she gave us.

I have the right to get married and have kids and I plan on doing so.

I'll address the elephant in the room here & state that the real problem is a capitalist system that expects all adults to be finachially independent & self-sufficient. Struggling adults are scapegoated as lazy entiled losers who are demanding that the goverment provides for all their needs & wants at the hard-working taxpayer's expense. The system is majorly ableist & also favors those being born into wealth. The underlying reason there is controversy about disabled people having kids is because the parents would likely struggle to provide for & raise their kids without some outside assistance. Then when the kids grow up, they are more likely to need outside help & assistance themselves. Instead of asking if disabled people should have kids, we should be asking why suciety expects everyone to take care of themselves instead of trying to help each other.

I don't think it's fair for someone who is disabled to expect the state's taxpayers to support their choice to have children. Having children is a choice but being disabled isn't for the most part.

If you are unable to support yourself and you decide to have children, you deserve to be poor. If you play stupid games you get stupid prizes.

And to all those who cite "accidental" pregnancy due to having unprotected sex or broken condom or whatever. In my opinion there is no such thing as an accident, we all know where babies come from and if you are having sex you are assuming the risks and consequences of that act.

Politics aside, I would say that the sort of disability that qualifies one for Special Olympics probably also brings into question one's suitability to raise children. Please note Special Olympics isn't the same as Paralympics. In general Paralympic athletes (all of whom are disabled) should be able to raise kids if they wish.

The uncomfortable aspect is that some autistic people can raise children whereas others probably shouldn't.

It's possible for non-disabled parents to give birth to kids that have various disabilities. I'm a perfect example of this. My three most major disabilities are thought to have genetic links by the medical community but no one in my immediate or more extended family has those disabilities. Those being a rare low vision disorder(Incomplete Achromatopsia), autism, & essential tremors. No one in my immediate or more extended family had any major disabilities till they've gotten older out of my parents, grandparents, aunts/uncles, my cousins & their kids, my parents cousins & their kids, ect ect. The only disabilities any of family members had when younger is that my dad has dyslexia & ADD, & my dad's mom had skin eczema that flared up sometimes when she was younger. I was lucky enough to inherent those disabilities myself but I got the eczema a lot worse & it's more of a chronic issue for me. On the flip-side I know of various people born with major disabilities who have non-disabled kids. It seems to me like genetics are based around random chance instead of being an exact science & some people are just more lucky or unlucky than others when getting conceived.

I never wanted to have kids partly because I do not want to pass my disabilities down & I also know that I would have major problems handling the responsibility because of my own various problems. So a major requirement I had when seeking a romantic partner was that she would not already have kids & could handle never having them. Pets are great but not human kids.
Most of my girlfriend's immediate & more extended family has major disabilities. Most of the disabled members have been on various benefits though lots of them have also worked at various points. My girlfriend has various physical & mental disabilities herself but has never had an official job. Cass kind of wanted to have kids because she likes kids & various people have told her she would be a great mom. She would of wanted to be a full time housewife & stay at home mom if she married a guy who was not disabled. She kind of made the decision not to have kids when she decided to pursue a relationship with me because she knew I did not want kids. She wanted me because she thought I would be more understanding & accepting of her issues.

How I feel about others having kids is that having kids should be a personal choice that should be agreed on by both potential parents. I strongly support using birth-control unless both partners having sex are planning on having kids. I believe all birth-control options should be completely free & readily available to all teens & adults. It's completely hypocritical for religions & governments to restrict birth-control & abortion access claiming to care about life all while they're also trying to restrict health care, education, & welfare programs that help kids after they're born. I also kind of wish the human race would go extinct considering all the problems the human species has been causing for the planet & towards each other like conflict & war.

Last edited by nick007 on 29 Jan 2026, 7:53 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Depends on the individuals, circumstances etc.

Yes, and it should be subsidized by the state. If that's not "sustainable" then your state isn't sustainable.

This is awful and makes me upset to read. So many people are completely sh***y parents but if you can't diagnose them with anything they'd never be questionable to anyone. With autists who come off as weird, it's the shortest leash in the world

RE: thread topic
Some people with disabilities would be fit parents. I don't think Autism is a disability that should disqualify you from having children in most cases, obviously it's different if you have some sort of uncontrollable anger issues I guess, but everyone is different. I think that what I don't support is passing down disabilities that are almost entirely likely to be passed down to your kid and make their life incredibly difficult, ESPECIALLY health-wise. I don't think the autistic life is so horrible with support, I certainly think my life is worth living, even if I haven't done enough with it yet. Basically, if you have horrible heritable disabilities you should probably give it up and not have kids and if you seriously need to parent just adopt or foster or something. Are your genes REALLY worth passing down?

Maybe I'm kind of weird though. I've always really liked the idea of passing down my genes because I think I'm attractive and healthy aside from maladjustment as an autistic kid f*****g up my head. And being autistic is OKAY. The world needs more thought diversity, obviously