History Main / SuperpowerDisability

* The Impossibles in ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'' are [[CorruptedCharacterCopy twisted parodies]] of [[TheFantasticFaux the Fantastic Four]], of whom only Mr. Impossible equivalent has a useful superpower. Sally's skin was turned invisible, making her look like she's been [[FlayingAlive flayed]], and she has to concentrate just to keep it visible. Ned is incredibly strong, but his body is basically one giant callous. Cody has it the worst, as his "power" is to uncontrollably generate flames on contact with oxygen, which don't injure him but do cause ''extreme pain'' -- which is why he spends most of his time in stasis.

** ''ComicBook/Thor2014'': Every time Jane Foster transforms into Thor, it has the side effect of negating the effects of whatever chemotherapy she has had since the last transformation, meaning that her powers cause her to slowly succumb to her cancer.

* In ''Anime/YukiYunaIsAHero'', whenever the Heroes go [[{{SuperMode}} Mankai,]] they sacrifice a part of themselves in a process called the Sange. This sacrifice can involve losing anything from sight in one eye, to their voice, to mobility in both legs.

* Jonothon Evan Starsmore/Chamber, a Creator/MarvelComics character, is missing [[BodyHorror his lower jaw and a fair chunk of his chest]] (only his own powers are keeping him alive) from the result of his powers manifesting.
* Downplayed with Cyclops of ''ComicBook/XMen'': Because he can't innately control his EyeBeams powers, he can't see well; he has to wear a ruby-quartz visor to limit it and allow him to see "normally".
* Similarly, Black Bolt of ComicBook/TheInhumans gives off destructive energy waves every time he speaks- as in, him whispering can pummel the Hulk or come close to capsizing a battleship- so he has to remain mute if he doesn't want to become a PersonOfMassDestruction. He killed his parents shortly after gaining his powers.
* ''ComicBook/TheBoys'': During a screening of superpowered children (that strongly resembles child beauty pageants), one little girl's ''eyes melt out'' as she tries to show her powers, all the while screaming that she's sorry.
* The supervillain ComicBook/{{Taskmaster}} is capable of perfectly imitating any move that he's seen. Unfortunately, this takes up most of his short-term and long-term memory, to the point that it's questionable whether he can still remember his own name.
* In ''ComicBook/{{NYX}}'', Bobby Soul can temporarily possess other people and absorb their memories, but every time he uses this power, he loses huge chunks of his own memory, to the point that he once became a near-complete amnesiac.
* In ''ComicBook/NewMutants'', Prodigy can unconsciously absorb the collective skills and knowledge of anyone and everyone around him, but he can only retain that information for as long as the people who originally held it are around him. This effectively forces him to study twice as hard as everyone else, because he can't rely on his own personal knowledge base remaining constant.
* ''ComicBook/{{Deadpool}}'': Deadpool's HealingFactor comes with the unpleasant side effect of accelerating his already present tumor growth, causing all of his skin to always be scarred and blotched. It's also suggested that his insanity stems from his brain being constantly damaged by tumors before healing over in an endless cycle.
* ''ComicBook/FantasticFour'': Ben Grimm is NighInvulnerable and super strong... too bad he's also a giant orange rock monster, and unlike his teammates, he can't turn it off. Basically everything he interacts with has to be specially reinforced so he doesn't break it, and his sense of touch is all but nonexistent.
* ''ComicBook/Thor2014'': Every time Jane Foster transforms into Thor, it has the side effect of negating the effects of whatever chemotherapy she has had since the last transformation, meaning that her powers cause her to slowly succumb to her cancer.
* Some writers argue that ComicBook/TheJoker's insanity counts as a superpower. Sure, he's immune to psychic influence, and the lack of self-preservation instinct lets him fight harder than the average guy. But the downside is, well, he's ''insane''. His memories of his own life are a chaotic, indecipherable mess, and his impulse control and ability to interact with people in a non-lethal way are basically nonexistent.
* A one-shot character in from ''ComicBook/TeenageMutantNinjaTurtlesMirage'' was a man with SuperSpeed who destroyed his knees through years of running far faster than the human body is supposed to be capable of going, and now is wheelchair-bound.

* ''Film/TheGoldenVoyageOfSinbad''. Prince Koura visibly ages each time he uses his black magic. By the end of the film he's an old man. Luckily for him the treasure he's searching for can give him back his youth.

* ''Film/TheAmazingSpiderMan'' shows us the problem with SpiderSense. It immediately draws Peter's attention to ''any'' possible threats, no matter how minor, leading to sensory overload. In one scene, he has difficulty with simple conversation because a fly, imperceptible to anyone else, buzzes slightly near him, causing him to freak out. He evidently learns to suppress it with practice.
* The Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse does something similar with Peter's Spider-Sense. He reveals he used to have problems with sensory overload, until he learned to tune it out with darkened goggles. His new Stark suit comes with retractable lenses to help narrow his focus.

* ''Literature/SoonIWillBeInvincible'' features several examples. The only one which directly affects the plot is Doctor Impossible's [[ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder Malign Hypercognition Disorder]] (which some characters say isn't real anyway). The most severe is Rainbow Triumph, who needs a strict regimen of medication to stay alive. Crosses over with DisabilitySuperpower as her powers are artificial and were created when her father's company tried to fix her birth defects.
* In ''Franchise/TheWitcher'', gradual infertility is an inevitable side effect of magic use, which is a blessing for some (they're free to fool around with no danger of little accidents) and a curse for others, such as Geralt's LoveInterest Yennefer of Vangerberg: she wants children but is long past the point of no return, and ends up becoming a surrogate mother for Geralt's foster daughter Ciri instead.
* ''Literature/{{Worm}}'' has the Case 53's, or Irregulars, which are powered individuals left deeply disfigured in one way or the other [[spoiler:because they were used as test subjects for Cauldron's SuperSerum]].
* ''Literature/OttoAndTheFlyingTwins'' has the humorous version: the magical creatures, known as the Karmidee, cannot pronounce the word "lemon".
* ''{{Literature/Redwall}}'': Badger Lords have the Bloodwrath, a berserk rage that lets them fight through horrifying injury and lose all sense of strategy, plowing through armies they don't even see to reach their hated enemy. In Lady Cregga Rose Eyes' case (so named because while the Bloodwrath causes GlowingEyesOfDoom, hers was always on), it caused her to go blind after her final battle.

* Characters in the Franchise/MarvelCinematicUniverse who gain Inhuman powers often acquire a deformity or disability at the same time. For instance, Gordon gained the power to teleport and lost his eyes.
* In ''Series/{{Alphas}}'' Every Alpha has a disability alongside their powers. Bill's UninhibitedMusclePower comes with a heart condition. Gary can sense radio but is autistic. Rachel's super senses are easily overwhelmed. Kat has perfect muscle memory, but no conscious memory beyond the last month. Anna can understand any language but she cannot speak.

* ''TabletopGame/Warhammer40000'': Psychically empowered humans are very often completely insane, as their powers come from the daemon-filled dimension of raw emotion called the Warp.
* In ''TabletopGame/EclipsePhase'' asyncs develop psychic powers as a result of an extraterrestrial nanovirus rewriting sections of their brains, the process also leaves them with at least one mental disability, often two.

* In ''TabletopGame/PrincessTheHopeful'', each Umbra (specific ways that the Darkness can warp those it Taints), conveys a benefit balanced out by a drawback. For example, the Loathsome Weapon Umbrum twists some part of the Darkened's body into a natural weapon: fingers stiffen into claws, or a mouth elongates into a muzzle full of fangs. However, the Darkened can't change the altered body part back, and can't use it for anything other than attacking. Similarly, the Cold Flesh Umbrum makes the Darkened immune to the effects of cold, but at the cost of making him supernaturally vulnerable to sunlight (even a few minutes in direct sunlight will cause painful burns).

** ''Second Edition's'' version of the Oracle frames the oracle's mystery (aka their divine PowerSource) as this trope, since their curse is a direct consequence of their mystery--for example, the Life mystery makes the oracle a natural channel for healing, but that channel's one-way nature makes them much harder to heal in turn. The curse also grows stronger when the oracle draws deeper on their mystery through revelation spells, going from flavor text (Mild) to inconvenient (Minor) to crippling (Moderate) to dangerous (Major) to outright life-threatening (Extreme) if the oracle doesn't take some time to rest or Refocus. The curse still grants side benefits when drawn on to Moderate or higher levels, though.

* ''{{VideoGame/Drakengard}}'': Pact partners lose something when making a pact with a supernatural creature, which [[SharedLifeMeter links both lives together]] and allows the two to communicate telepathically. Some are physically disabling (Caim lost his voice, Arioch her fertility, Leonard his sight), some metaphysical (Inuart lost his musical talent, Seere lost his ability to age past six years old), and some aren't exactly hard to live with (Verdelet lost his hair, though his pact partner has since been petrified).
* In ''Franchise/TheElderScrolls'' series, the eponymous Elder Scrolls are a cross between [[TomeOfEldritchLore Tomes of Elditch Lore]] and TomesOfProphecyAndFate. Referred to as "Fragments of Creation," the Scrolls are of unknown origin and number which simultaneously record past, present, and future events irrefutably; what did happen, what could have happened, what might yet happen. As such, a reader can gain immense knowledge by reading the scrolls, and even predict the future to a degree. However, without proper training, merely glancing at one will cause immediate blindness, and even ''with'' said training (such as the kind members of the [[TheOrder Cult of Ancestor Moth]] receive), a reader will gradually lose their sight with each reading until they're completely blind. (Essentially a play on the BlindSeer trope.)

* In ''Webcomic/Sorcery101'':

* In ''WesternAnimation/BatmanBeyond'', repeated use of the Venom injection has turned Bane into a frail wheelchair-bound cripple.

* The Impossibles in ''WesternAnimation/TheVentureBrothers'' are [[CorruptedCharacterCopy twisted parodies]] of the ''Fantastic Four'' where only the Mr. Impossible equivalent had a useful superpower. Sally's skin was turned invisible, making her look like she's been [[FlayingAlive flayed]], and she has to concentrate just to keep it visible. Ned is incredibly strong, but his body is basically one giant callous. Cody has it the worst, as his "power" is to uncontrollably generate flames on contact with oxygen, which don't injure him but do cause ''extreme pain''--which is why he spends most of his time in stasis.

* ''TabletopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'': Unique among the [[ClassAndLevelSystem character classes]], the Oracle's [[ReligionIsMagic divine magic]] comes with a permanent {{Curse}}. Examples include clouded vision, deafness, a lame leg, a wasting sickness, and glossolalia. However, each curse [[DisabilitySuperpower has a side benefit]] that scales with character level.

[[folder:Real Life]]
* Per evolutionary biologists, this trope is responsible for the many flightless bird species native to New Zealand. Eons ago, when the two islands broke away from the landmass that is now Australia and drifted south, there were no large mammalian predator species that were able to sustain a population on the islands. Birds thus didn't have to be able to fly away from threats, eliminating any practical need for wings, whose muscle mass requires a great deal of a bird's caloric intake to sustain. This changed the natural selection balance to favor birds with less powerful wings, and eventually they came to dominate the gene pool, leading to birds like kiwis whose wings are largely decorative and were thus almost literally sitting ducks for predators that hitched rides, or were brought to the islands, when humans reached them.
[[/folder]]

* In ''Literature/TheCinderSpires'', [[OurMagesAreDifferent etherealists]]' powers come at the cost of SanitySlippage as the etheric currents eat holes in their minds. Most develop [[SuperOCD strong compulsions]] that "fill the holes" and help them concentrate, and might become lost and incoherent if their compulsion is denied.

* '' Manga/TheDisastrousLifeOfSaikiK'' show just how much it would suck to have just about every psychic power imaginable and have poor control over them when you just want to live a normal life. Kusuo Saiki constantly reads the minds of everyone around him so he cannot enjoy going to movies because he will hear spoilers from other people's thoughts. He doesn't like animals because he can read their minds too and thus knows what they are really thinking. His XRayVision makes other people unattractive to him because he can see their insides. He has to constantly wear transparent gloves so that he doesn't have to see into the past of any object that he touches or share the senses of any people he touches. He always wears green-tinted glasses to avoid turning people he looks at to stone. Before he was given a device to keep his powers at a manageable level he risked blowing up his house every time he slept and his SuperStrength has become so strong that without the device he can't touch anything without sending it flying away.

* In ''Manga/MyHeroAcademia'', Yuga Aoyama's Navel Laser can seriously mess up his digestive system [[HeroicRROD when overused]], and a birth defect makes it prone to [[PowerIncontinence leaking out]]. He has to wear a specially-made belt at all times to prevent this.

* Similarly, Black Bolt of ComicBook/TheInhumans gives off destructive energy waves every time he speaks- as in, him whispering can pummel the Hulk or come close to capsizing a battleship- so he has to remain mute if he doesn't want to become a PersonOfMassDestruction.

See also BlessedWithSuck, HeroicRROD, PowerAtAPrice, RequiredSecondaryPowers, LogicalWeakness, PowerUpgradingDeformation. CastFromHitPoints, CastFromLifespan and CastFromSanity are subtropes.

* Sapphires in ''WesternAnimation/StevenUniverse'' can usually [[{{Seer}} see the future]]. One Padparadcha Sapphire we meet instead sees the ''past'', [[PowerIncontinence and only the past]] (and the very recent past, at that), which mostly results in her having a DelayedReaction to everything.

* ''Literature/SoonIWillBeInvincible'' features several examples. The only one which directly affects the plot is Doctor Impossible's [[ScienceRelatedMemeticDisorder Malign Hypercognition Disorder]] (which some characters say isn't real anyway). The most severe is Rainbow Triumph, who needs a strict regime of medication to stay alive. Crosses over with DisabilitySuperpower as her powers are artificial and were created when her father's company tried to fix her birth defects.

** Seers' prophetic powers cause their eyes to degrade, turning the strongest of them into {{Blind Seer}}s.

* ''TabletopGames/Warhammer40K'': Psychically empowered humans are very often completely insane, as their powers come from the daemon-filled dimension of raw emotion called the Warp.