Sister. Mother. Friend. Nurse. People have made many assumptions about Natalie Rose’s relationship with Tim.

“I’ve been called his mother – twice — by two separate people,” says Natalie, sitting with her husband in their apartment in Toronto’s Danforth neighbourhood. “But never once has someone asked, ‘is that your husband?’ ”

Tim, 29, was born with cerebral palsy and uses an electric wheelchair to get around. Natalie, 30, is able-bodied. Frustrated with society’s perpetual surprise at their relationship — and a lack of resources for couples in their situation — they founded the Rose Centre, now known as the Rose Centre For Love, Sex, and Disability.

The Rose Centre aims to promote the idea of seeing the positive side of disability, particularly when it comes to love, sex and relationships.

Tim and Natalie have been giving presentations on sex and disability around the GTA for the last several years, and the revamped Rose Centre is launching this October.

“Very few people are doing this,” says Tim, who has a Masters of Law in Human Rights.

The couple has embraced their role-model status, working to break down the myth that people with disabilities are not sexual.

“We find that society is uncomfortable with disability and they’re also uncomfortable with sex,” said Natalie. “So when you tie the two together, nobody wants to go near it.”

THE ROSES HAVE lived together, along with Tim’s black Labrador service dog Rush, for more than three years. They were married in October 2013.

The couple laughs when asked about how they first met. “He’s got this one rehearsed,” Natalie says, looking at her husband. “Go for it!”

They had mutual friends, Tim explains, and Natalie took him to get a tattoo the day they met. She lifts the sleeve of his shirt, revealing a large blue wheelchair symbol on Tim’s upper arm.

After hanging out a few times, Tim says he began to develop feelings for Natalie.

“But I was too chickens--- to say anything because in the past I always got the “you’re a great guy but . . . ,” said Tim. “And so I decided not to say anything this time, because I was so sure the ‘but’ was going to be there.”

After going to a party together one night, Natalie asked if the evening had been a date.

“I crashed my wheelchair into a tree. Like full out into a tree,” said Tim. “And I believe my exact words were ‘abdubdubdub.’ And she said ‘because if it is, that’s good, I’ve had a crush on you for ages.’ ”

Tim has spastic quadriplegic cerebral palsy, which affects his entire body. He uses an electric wheelchair to get around, and requires attendant care for six hours a day.

Cerebral palsy is a neurodevelopmental disorder that occurs when the young brain is damaged during pregnancy, delivery or in the first several years of a child’s life. Symptoms range from mild to severe, and include impairment with muscle tone, fine motor functions, reflexes and balance.

Natalie says telling people her boyfriend was “really, really disabled” was a bizarre experience. Many people were surprised, or acted as though she was a saint for being with a disabled person.

“I’ve had the experience of a lot of people saying, ‘Oh, that’s great for you. I mean I could never do it, but what a nice thing for you to do,’ ” Natalie recalls. “There were questions I had around how to navigate other people, and how to deal with that.”

The couple turned to the Internet for answers. They found nothing.

“I think that’s really what got us started,” said Natalie. “We wanted to know what other people were doing, but we couldn’t find other people . . . And it surprised both of us.”

ENDING THE STIGMA surrounding sex and disability and promoting the idea of “disability positivity” is what the Roses are striving for, in all aspects of their lives.

“This has become our world,” says Natalie, in the second year of her PhD at the University of Toronto. Her research is looking at how disability can bring positive things to romantic relationships.

“There are many benefits to being in a relationship with Tim,” she says. “We don’t wait in lines, ever. We get two-for-one for most things.”

Tim’s disability also forced them to communicate from the very beginning, Natalie explains, particularly around sex.

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“I certainly didn’t look at him and intuitively know what to do,” says Natalie. “I mean, sex involves transferring and repositioning and everything else.”

The couple recalls being “terrified” the first time they had sex — but notes that their sex life today is awesome.

“I used to think I was bad at sex because I can’t do it in the traditional way,” says Tim. “So I didn’t enjoy it. And I thought it was wrong that I didn’t enjoy it. It wasn’t until I had a partner, Natalie, who was willing to say, ‘OK, let’s figure out what works for the two of us’ that it started to be great.”

“I just thought of another bonus, Tim could never cheat on me!” Natalie says, smiling at her husband. “The amount of planning that he would need to cheat on me would be enormous!”

“I’d make an awful one-night stand,” Tim agrees.

The lack of information about sex for people with disabilities is not a new problem. Tim remembers being excluded in high school.

“I used to get sent out for sex education classes all the time, because it was seen as, ‘Tim, you don’t need to know this stuff.’ ”

It may seem archaic, but Dr. Miriam Kaufman, pediatrician and division head of adolescent medicine at Toronto’s Hospital for Sick Children, is not surprised.

“Young people with disabilities often miss out on some pretty important stuff,” she says. “And then they get the message, ‘I didn’t need to be there because I can’t have sex.’ ”

Kaufman’s main interest is working with young people with chronic illness and disability. She says the topic of sex comes up a lot.

“People make a lot of assumptions about people with disabilities,” she says. “That they’re not sexual, that even if they were sexual nobody’s really going to want to have sex with them, that it’s not something that’s ever going to be in their lives so why would you make them feel bad about something that they can’t do . . . there are a lot of things that float around in people’s heads.”

Kaufman co-authored, with Cory Silverberg and Fran Odette, the book The Ultimate Guide to Sex and Disability — a resource the Roses have used extensively in their personal lives and their talks.

Kaufman first met the “role model” couple when they gave a presentation to the Sick Kids Adolescent Health Team. She says some of the young people in a study she is running have mentioned what a valuable resource the Rose Centre is.

“I think their work is incredibly, incredibly important,” said Kaufman, noting that if she ever wins the lottery, the Rose Centre will receive a sizeable donation. “They’re really changing the way people think about disability, and about sexuality.”

The Rose Centre has revamped its image since the early days, and their kick-off event is the upcoming “I’m Sexy and I Know It!” fashion show. The event, Oct. 5 at Toronto’s Buddies in Bad Times Theatre, will feature models both with and without disabilities.

“We want to shatter some people’s ideals,” says Tim. “And have people with disabilities in lingerie, and just blow a couple minds!”

“We want mass appeal,” adds Natalie. “Unless we’re interesting to more people, not just people with disabilities who struggle with relationships, then we’re not making those bigger changes, or tackling that stigma.”

Not bad for a centre based out of the Roses’ apartment, with an operating budget of around $5,000. But for this trailblazing couple, being a resource for people who may once have been sent out of their sexual education class trumps profit.

“We’re on the edge of people ready to accept this,” says Tim. “Let’s not look at disability as a tragedy, let’s look at it as something to be celebrated and have fun with.”