to have asked these people to sit somewhere else?

[musicposy]

I honestly don't know if I was or not, so any opinions welcomed, and I will suck it up if I was

I work for a music examining board and we are at the time when I have to collate all the exam entries. It's part time, seasonal work, but when it comes in, it is hours of work to a very tight deadline.

I took the DDs up ice skating this morning. The really needed not to miss it as DD2 has a couple of competitions coming up. But I really needed to work. So I sat in the leisure centre coffee shop with a coffee at a big table, spread out all my paperwork and got on with it. It was pretty early morning so the place was virtually deserted, masses of empty tables and just a handful of other people there.

Halfway through some complicated adding up (it's literally thousands of numbers) a lady came and sat at my table, opposite me. I thought it was strange because mine was one of the only occupied tables and most people choose a vacant one. She kept making sniffing and sighing noises. Under normal circumstances I might have smiled or asked if she was OK, but I was trying to get this work done.

After a while she got up, got a drink of water, sat down, shuffled some of my papers over and put the drink down. She started the noises again, trying to get my attention, I think, and I did start to think at this point that she might have some sort of special needs, though you wouldn't have known looking at her. I just completely lost concentration in my adding.

About 5 minutes later a man who obviously had Downs Syndrome came over with a coffee on a tray. He said a cheery hello to me and proceeded to also sit down, putting the tray on my paperwork.

At this point I said very nicely "I'm really sorry, but would it be OK if you sat at a different table? I am really very busy."

They looked terribly hurt and got up. A lady a few tables over I then noticed was obviously looking after a whole group of people with learning difficulties. She said "sit here, you're welcome at this table, " and glared at me like you wouldn't believe. Then she sat and shot me looks for the next half hour.

I felt rotten afterwards. I know that in a different cicumstance that could be me or a family member. I really hadn't meant to upset them. But on the other hand, I was at one of the only occupied tables, I asked very nicely, and I didn't think it was unreasonable to expect to be left in peace when the place was so quiet.

So, was I being unreasonable? Did I deserve the glares?

YWNBU! I would have done the same. No reason why you should have to move your stuff. Different if the cafe was busy and it was necessary to share tables. Also different if you were idly staring into space and didn't mind passing ten minutes in conversation, but you were busy doing important work! Why should you disrupt that because somebody else hasn't followed the social cues? You were polite, not rude.

I think the man's SN is a bit of a red herring, and has taken the thread off point a bit. Two strangers chose to sit at a table where the OP was obviously busy, when they had a choice of free tables to sit at. The man's SN may explain why he didn't understand the social convention that makes this rude, but it doesn't make his action any less rude, nor does it remove the problem that he caused for the OP. We don't know whether the woman had any reason, that wasn't visible, not to know the convention.

In that moment, OP did her best to deal with the situation politely. Now she's wondering if/how she could have dealt with it better. None of this is unreasonable IMO.

"As soon as I realised or even suspected that the people who sat down had special needs I would have moved myself. You were insensitive. They didn't realise, or maybe even thought you were part of their group."

IMHO this could also have been worthy of a cat's bum face. Do you really think it would have been perceived any better. i think OP was actually much kinder as she talked to them and asked them politely if they would not mind sitting else where. That was definitely giving them more consideration than just packing her stuff and leaving the table without a word.

OP I think you did nothing wrong and whist I agree that the carer was probably trying to give her group more independence, she should have been more on the pulse WRT the situation. There is little chance that if the table was covered in work papers she wouldn't have noticed unless she was not paying the attention she should have.

I would've just got up and moved somewhere else if there were free tables - I wouldn't dream of asking someone else to move.

sorry, need to add this. I think leaving a table because you realise people have special needs is far worse than politely asking them to move table. OP's problem was not that they had special needs but that they were disturbing her work.

I think that it would have been far ruder to have got up and moved. She explained why she needed the space, in a polite way-much better.

I totally understand and don't think you were rude at all.

However as the mother of two adult children with autism and another with learning disabilities I know they cannot adhere to the conventions of society. My children would always have sat at an occupied table, rather than an empty one, and not realised or understood if the person there was busy. They are also unable to read body language and they are therefore deprived of the realisation the other person may feel uncomfortable with them there. They have in the past sat with other families who were having a picnic, attempted to strike up conversations with strangers and follow them back to their car and so on. To them everyone one they meet is a friend and over the years it has been the most difficult job to try to get them to understand that is not the case, and that strangers may not always want to/be able to be their friend back. I have failed though, as their sunny and over friendly personalities cannot be dampened. Obviously as a responsible adult I have been able to intervene when I think they are being inappropriate, but when they are at their day centre I have to rely on the staff there to do the same thing. Therefore I think if anyone was wrong it was the lady looking after them who could easily have been more pleasant when calling them to her table.

It's one of the greatest difficulties that I face, but had it have been me I would have really appreciated you not being rude or unkind (believe me most people are not!)

the man's SN may explain why he didn't understand the social convention that makes this rude, but it doesn't make his action any less rude

Of course it makes his action less rude :bangs head against bring wall:

I'm not getting the big deal here really. Two people with LD's sat in the wrong place and moved when asked.

DS1 often runs up to look inside peoples car boots when they open them. He never touches the cars, never touches the people, never gets in anyones way. He's usually standing some distance away. He does something actually utterly harmless although a little odd (he's usually checking out how many lights the boot has). Reactions from the general public range from talking nicely to him or joking to me about it, to huffing and puffing in a hands on hips way to screaming (literally) at him or swearing at him. Luckily the screaming and swearing doesn't happen that much. Although I am mildly surprised at how many people huff and puff. I feel it's a little unnecessary to get quite so twitchy when someone with obvious LD's does something a little bit odd (but utterly harmless).

This falls into this category surely. They sat in the wrong place, carer didn't notice they were touching things, and moved when asked. No need for all the talk of 'pestering' or 'rudeness' or 'lazy carers'. It was a short transgression into a perfectly neurotypical day that was quickly sorted.

Okay carer got the wrong end of the stick, but that's presumably because of the abuse that is so often aimed at people with LD's. You have to live it really to realise how constant it is. One of my helpers said that's been the biggest eye opener for her. She's a lovely girl, training to be a speech and language therapist and I often have to calm her down because she is so angry about other people's reactions to ds1 when he isn't doing anything!

I think you sound like a very reasonable person musicposy for admitting that you maybe should have reacted in a different way.
Sometimes we are put into these situations, and no matter how politely you handled it, there's always going to be one person, like 'catsbum' who made a thing about it.
As I said, I think you sound like a reasonably person and please don't beat yourself up about it hon... I wish I could go back and do thing differently. x

Can I ask anyone who thinks the OP is being unreasonable, what they think she should have done?

*reasonable.... infact, scrap that... I like 'reasonably person'!!! x

somebody with downs syndrome can understand when asked to move somewhere else yes its a learning disability but they understand . Its ok to ask somebody to move whatever the disability .

Ignoring the sn for a moment, if people enter a public space they can sit where they like. I have had people in cafes, or on trains or on the beach come and sit right next to me.it would never occur to me to ask them to move
It seems common,especially in England to sit as far away from other people as possible - every train I get on seems to have one person in each row of two seats and two people in every four grouping. It is normal and yet pretty anti-social. I had to ask a bloke on a train yesterday to let me sit in the empty seat next to him. He had a lap top and phone, notepad and pens and grumbled loudly when I made him move - but not every feels that way.
If I want privacy or more space I smile, gesture at my book or say something about wanting a quiet corner and move. I want an exclusion zone so I move to one.

I don't think the OP did anything wrong but I wouldn't act as she did as I woukd regard it as unreasonable. If you are able to spread out and work great. But the public tables are not yours and it is frankly tough if someone, for whatever reason, choses to sit near to you. You should be prepared to move, however irritating you find it.

I also have a sneaking suspicion that had two burly,surly sorts sat where the two people with SN had, the op would have put up with it or gathered her stuff without a murmur.of course I may be wrong.

No, I don't think ywbu, really. If you weren't impatient or rude, I would have done the same.
I can kind of see the carer's pov too, but then, she could easily have helped to avert the situation herself.

I suspect the answer is that she should've dropped what she was doing and entertained them.

I don't think she should have to do that.

She made her intentions known in a polite and respectful manner. She could not have been more pleasant about it, without accepting and indulging the disruption.

If you think the OP was unreasonable, then you are pretty much telling her that she has no right to expect respect and personal space from people with SN. That is wrong.

Why do people keep taking about 'entertaining' these people. It's incredibly patronising. Would you usually suggest that you might have to entertain two random adults sitting at your table? (Or the two burly men that pagwatch suggests)?

I would, yes. Anyone unknown to you, encroaching on your personal space is looking to be entertsined or indulged in some way or other.

Don't turn this into a low brow you-hate-people-with-special-needs thing.
It isn't.

yabu
it wasn't your office ffs and not "your" table, they were hardly being rude.

Pictish, I think people are allowed to say she was unreasonable for many reasons. You can chose to extrapolate that into not having any right to respect and personal space from people with SN but I don't think you are allowed to tell other people what they mean.

If I may also say, complaining that people with SN disrespecting the general public is a terrible problem is in danger of being one of the most unintentionally ironic things I have ever read on here.

mrs jay - but most people with autism would not be able to understand as they do not have the ability to recognise personal space or have the empathy to realise other people are uncomfortable. Yes they would move if asked because they are willing to please/do as they are told but they would not be able to undertstand. It was definatelt the carer who sould have handled things more politely...but goodness it really is hard to strike the right balance in a world where many people are not as reasonable and polite as the OP was.

On an aside (soapbox moment) my children's greatest disability is not looking as if they have a disability and therefore being expected to conform to societies' norms. (shutting up now).

pictish as I said to the OP last night (who sounds a pretty reasonable sort) she shouldn't have been trying to do complicated work in a public space. If you do that it's very easy to get irritated with people around you, but you don't actually own the space and it's tough. I gave up trying to do complicated work in a public space years ago because I found the interruptions for whatever reason irritating and realised that I was being pretty unreasonable. Not the people going about their daily business.

Actually I have just remembered that ds1 did once plonk himself down at an occupied table at a cafe (I was pondering that he had never done it) And the other three seats were taken by big burly men (lorry drivers - it was on a ferry) who were about to tuck into a huge fry up. They were very friendly to him if slightly taken aback, obviously I told him to move!

Who said anything about a terrible problem? She's allowed to not want to engage - that is all!

I'd love to stay and argue the toss, but I have a dental appt to go to, then I'm off for the afternoon.

I'm sure this thread will run and run.

Actually it is getting pretty low brow.

If anyone thinks my son needs entertaining, he doesn't.