Family Planning with Cerebral Palsy

I'm in New York city with a friend of mine from college. I haven't seen her in years. We had stopped to go to the bathroom at one of those popup stores they have during Christmas season. Except this is a popup bathroom stop. I'm sitting there with her laughing at the fact that people could take pictures sitting on a giant toilet. She notices no one is around and says, "I think I'm going to have a baby." And I'm like, "Right now?" She says, "I'm planning on it, so expect an email." She turns to me, "Can you have a baby?" We never had this conversation about me having CP. It was more like, "Sarah's really short." A conversation about height, not disability. "I mean, I guess so? No one has ever said 'no.' But no one has ever said 'yes' either." I hadn't had a physical in years. I'm making the assumption that everything is okay. I go home and look it up. After pages and pages and pages, I keep reading.

Most individuals with CP can have children. There's a period after the sentence, but is that really a complete sentence? The rest of the page has to be there somewhere. How many family planning types of conversations have I had? Basically, none. Everyone in high school had the "This is a condom and this is how it works talk, but Sarah, you don't need to learn this." Instead, I was told, "Don't go out alone. If someone attacks you, do you know how to get away because you have a higher chance of getting raped than other people." We went from dancing toilets to the harsh reality in six hours. There's info about everyone else and not about me. As I've gotten older, I realize it's something that needs to be addressed. The older I get, the more I need to talk about my disability, instead of leaving an elephant in the room. Well, today didn't end up how I thought it was going to be. That's Christmas in New York.