TL;DR
We exist to make the invisible visible. To name what others overlook. To ensure disabled people are not just accommodated, but truly understood and supported. Founded on lived experience and academic research, our mission is clear: dismantle the unseen barriers that exclude and distress.
Our mascot, Cùran, represents safety, solidarity, and visibility. Whether on a hoodie, plush toy, or badge, their presence signals community and care.
We are not here to make gentle suggestions. We are here to disrupt what’s broken and build something better. Our framework is a new wave in disability thinking. A third wave. One we will turn into a tsunami of change.
Join us.
Full Version
What is The Unseen Barriers Foundation?
The Unseen Barriers Foundation is a disabled led charity founded in Scotland, built from lived experience and driven by an urgent need to confront the realities of distress based exclusion. We exist to dismantle the invisible systems of shame, sensory overload, and emotional exhaustion that prevent disabled people from accessing support, engaging with services, and participating in public life. We do not accept that people are simply “hard to reach”. We believe that systems are hard to trust. That services are often designed without accounting for how distress feels, how it presents, or how it silences. Our work is not about inclusion as a favour, it is about recognition as a right.
Why We Exist
Too many disabled people are missing appointments, disengaging from support, or disappearing from public life not due to lack of interest, but because the world around them is inaccessible in ways that are rarely seen or named. Long before someone is labelled “non-compliant” or “unwilling to engage”, they have often already been overwhelmed, disbelieved, ignored, or retraumatised. We call these unseen barriers. Whether it is the smell of an office triggering sensory distress, the fear of not being believed during a mental health crisis, the internal battle of masking pain in front of professionals, or the shame of not being able to explain why you didn’t show up, these are barriers. Not behaviours. And they must be addressed with the same seriousness as steps, ramps, or door widths.
What We Do
We challenge this through three main pillars of work. First, framework development. We created the Unseen Barriers Framework, a lived experience led model now gaining traction in academic, policy, and frontline spaces. It names and legitimises forms of exclusion that are rarely understood, including Scent Distress, Communication Management Distress, Cognitive Layering Distress, and Perception-Based Distress. Second, public education and visibility. Through our mascot Cùran, our storytelling campaigns, and our upcoming animated work, we are changing how people think about distress. Not as weakness, but as a valid and often protective response to an inaccessible world. Third, systems change. We offer training, consultancy, and direct partnership to services, charities, and festivals seeking to reduce missed appointments, improve support outcomes, and build genuine trust with disabled communities.
Who We Are
We are not another corporate brand trying to tick a box. We are a small, fire breathing collective of disabled people, neurodivergent creatives, trauma survivors, and allies. Our team is currently small, but our ambitions are not. The Foundation was created by Shaun Gray, a disabled researcher and creator of the Unseen Barriers Framework. It now includes a growing core team, a board of trustees, and a young voice actor bringing Cùran to life from a place of lived experience and strength. At their request, they will remain unnamed for now as they grow into the role at their own pace. We support them fully, on their terms.
Why Now
Because systems are failing people today. Because distress is not just emotional, it is physical, political, and structural. Because too many disabled people are being written off when they should be written in. Because nobody should have to choose between survival and support.