Nothing About Us Without Us in the First 1000 Days: Developing Inclusive Early Years Support With Disabled Families

This article reports on co‐design workshops with 11 disabled families (‘co‐designers’) as part of developing a ‘universal’ (for all families) early years programme in health and social care. The programme aims to enhance caregiver and infant well‐being. Given well‐documented limitations of existing support for disabled families, ensuring disability inclusion from the outset was essential. The term ‘disabled families’ refers to 2 configurations: families where a parent is disabled and families of disabled children. Intensive workshops employed barrier mapping and solution generation activities. Thematic analysis revealed four domains where co‐designers identified exclusionary practices and proposed inclusive alternatives: physical and environmental accessibility, programme design flexibility, content inclusivity and professional practice and empowerment. Co‐designers demonstrated how institutional ableism operates through inaccessible venues, rigid attendance policies, normative developmental milestones and dismissal of parental expertise. Solutions moved beyond surface accommodations towards fundamental transformation. Co‐designers proposed accessible venues with sensory considerations, flexible attendance, strength‐based content, comprehensive facilitator training validating experiential knowledge and enabled peer support. This study demonstrates that meaningful inclusion requires dismantling rather than retrofitting exclusionary systems. Co‐designers' insights provide both structural critique of institutional ableism and practical design principles for inclusive provision, showing how participatory approaches can generate alternative possibilities for equitable family support.