There’s way more shows than this!

#whattowatch #disabledrepresentation #lemon8challenge #wheelchairuser #deafcharacters #disabledcharacters

But these happen to be some of my favs as someone who is disabled. Are they perfect? No. Did they all make me smile and cry? Yes. The American/Netflix shows feat actors that have the disabilities of the characters that they are playing which I especially loved.

Twinkling Watermelon is available on Viki and is a proper kdrama with plenty of ups and downs. The main character gets thrown back in time and meets his parents before they met and ended up together. Unbeknownst to him, his father was once hearing like him. His mother was born deaf. It’s incredibly sweet how hard the son works to have his parents end up together. Definitely my favorite on the list. It was the sweetest of the shows hands down. You cannot help but fall in love with how sweet the family dynamic was in this in flashback scenes. The family cared so much for one another. You can stream this on Viki. Cannot recommend this one enough!

S*x Education features such a diverse cast and is available to stream on Netflix. Definitely features mature content, so be warned. It was hard not to enjoy it. There were lots of tears with this one, but in a good way if that makes sense? Lots of laughs as well and lots of hard issues tackled with this show. The later seasons introduced disabled characters which made me so happy to see. And they really made it part of the plot to talk about the ableism disabled people face in day to day life, from the perspective of different disabilities in their final season which made me so happy to see. I don’t talk about it here as much but I use a wheelchair, so the plot about the broken elevator hit really close to home.

Special is a comedy with half an hour episodes and can be viewed on Netflix. About a man with CP who explores life as a disabled gay man, based on some true stories that the lead actor went through in real life (he’s a writer for the show). I appreciate how the main character had to go on a journey to unlearn internalized ableism. I definitely had to do the same once I became disabled. Not enough shows talk about that, and it was refreshing to see in a show as a main plot point!

Switched at Birth can be watched on Hulu and features multiple actors who are hard of hearing or deaf in real life. This was definitely more of a drama if that’s more your speed.

Last but not least is another comedy, Speechless. The show surrounds the Dimeo family who has three kids, one of which is JJ who uses a wheelchair and a speech board to communicate. It talks about the struggles of what it can be like to be disabled in America (especially financially), and what it can be like for kids in school. I love that it wasn’t just a comedy but had some great lessons for viewers as well.