ABSTRACT
Love may perhaps discount the cost, but dependency workers shouldn’t have to bear it alone, and society should not expect that of them. And yet it continues to do so and to be a key to the elusiveness of equality for women. The affect of love, and its history in a relationship, can be too thick, too laden with conflict and tensions that are almost inescapable in deep and close relationships. But it is the idealized version of such love that figures in the term “love’s labor”. Although care motivated by love is an ideal that is upheld, love and care are paradoxically not always compatible. Furthermore the expression evokes the affective and relational character of the most important and successful dependency relations. The appropriate treatment, training and care of people with the sorts of disabilities is to discover what the abilities are, what the disabling conditions may be, and how to maximize the possibilities for a rich life.
