to politely decline to use the disabled loo?

[MsIngaFewmarbles]

I was waiting in a long queue for the loo in a coffee chain and saw a lady with crutches head into the disabled toilet. She came out while I was still queueing. Another lady further back in the queue caught my eye and offered for me to go in first. I declined saying that I wasn't disabled so wasn't entitled to use it. She then countered away to her friends telling them that she was going to use it as 'it was the law' that if it wasn't being used you could use it. I couldn't face an argument so just ignored her. It's still bothering me that I should have said something to her and corrected her.

"Entitled" maybe

Iggi, I agree that she may not have had a permanent disability, but being unable to use a standard loo is qualification enough. You can hardly start lining people up in order of severity and length of disability.

I've said it up thread, but I'll say it again, we need more loos all round.

FFS, it can be called a disabled toilet, an accessible toilet or a portal to the fucking moon, it doesn't change the fact that it is the toilet designed to be accessible to the people who find the standard toilets inaccessible - for reasons of disability or health - therefore, it would be decent to leave it free for those people to use, even if it means waiting a few minutes to go to the loo.

It is sad that the majority of people who 'get' this are the people who are disabled or have disabled family members.

Just to add another scenario, one that doesn't seem to get mentioned on bus/parking/toilet threads very often...My only first-hand experience of being around and helping to care for a wheelchair user involved not a 'classic' disability but a terminally-ill woman. A woman who sometimes didn't get much warning when she needed to go for (either bladder or bowel). A woman who was rendered half-blind and barely able to speak because of her illness. A woman who was desperately trying to maintain dignity in the face of serious adversity. A woman who had the right to expect the loo to be free (other disabled users aside) when she needed it, instead of wearing nappies and shitting herself.

I've seen the look on a healthy person's face when they come out of the disabled toilet. I've heard the shame in the apology. People know it's wrong.

There's no such thing as disabled loo. it's called accessible toilet.
take it away
Read the thread love.
And then, if you still feel the same, bugger off.

If there is no-one disabled then you are entitled to use it
Which bit don't you get, the bit where we then have to sit in wet or shitty underwear because you got their first, the bit where we have to sit in said underwear until we get back to the car/mode of transport. The bit where we've had to curtail our trip because you're in there. The bit where people turn away because we smell, because you're in there?
Have you any idea what it's like to be eighteen and for your bladder to go into spasm? You're with your mates in town, hopefully going to see a film, but no, some woman who isn't disabled has nipped into the disabled loo, well, it's okay, I can go after, I have a change of stuff with me. So then, I go again later, some woman, not disabled, nipped in again. Off home for me then. Halfway through a film. Ring Mum, wait in wet stuff until she can get me, but it'll take her a while because it's the weekend and some selfish bastard has taken the blue badge space, without a badge of course. By the time she gets me, I'm a bit cold, because I'm wet and can't regulate my temperature. I'm also a bit sore because the ammonia has started breaking down my psoriasis, but hey, your entitlement trumps my disability every fucking time.
Dawndonna's dd.

Dawn if a disabled person was using the toilet and your dd had to wait, would you be just as upset if she soiled herself?

Obviously not as the disabled person didn't have a choice. Unlike others.

DawnDonnas DD please keep coming onto these threads and giving your point of view, yes some people like lady luck will not read them properly but some will and every time you do it will make a difference to someone.

Ladyluck the point is that the situation is much less likely to happen in the first place if people who weren't entitled didn't use them.

Eek I hate saying "disabled person", was quoting.

Not sure why this is so hard to understand for some. It's just a matter of how you are brought up I suppose.

I fucking hate these threads.

The selfish bastards get told it is wrong. They should know it is wrong. But they don't because they don't care, disabilities don't affect them it's something that happens to other people not them.

Every time there is a toilet thread, or a bus one or a parking one it does make you see that a lot of people just see disabled people as an inconvenice. It is abslolutely sickening.

Dawn if a disabled person was using the toilet and your dd had to wait, would you be just as upset if she soiled herself?

First of all, that was my DD that wrote that. She did say so, at the bottom.
Secondly, As she pointed out, it has happened, she has a change with her, incase of that scenario. How many changes should she have to take.
The other point is, if the disabled lavatory were not empty as often as it is, why are able bodied people discussing using it.
Finally, why should people with disabilities continually have to battle for their rights. Able bodied people have any number of lavatories, parking spaces, shops, theatres that they can use. People with disabilities have had to fight for this and the selfishness of others constantly curtails their activities.
Now, how about your position? Why do you want to curtail my daughter's activities, you've asked me to justify her position.

Lady, I think it is Dawndonna's DD herself who is posting.

The point is that there are a lot more non-disabled people than disabled. So the number of times you have to wait because a disabled person is occupying the cubicle is quite small. However if non-disabled people feel equally entitled to use it, then it will very frequently be occupied.

Same as with a Blue Badge parking space, or a wheelchair space on a bus. Of course there will be times when another disabled person is using it. But there are a hell of a lot more times when the person using it is not disabled, just selfish.

FWIW, I often use disabled loos. I am almost blind, and find it hard to manage public toilets that are dimly lit and/or crowded and/or hidden away up flights of stairs and long corridors. But if the general-access toilet is manageable, then I use it rather than taking up the disabled one. I think most people with disabilities have a similar attitude.

Ladyluck I actually wasn't being pa.

I do believe it's how people are brought up . Either you are brought up to believe using disabled toilet is wrong or not.

Your rudeness is quite telling though.

It is fine for one cubicle to stand empty for long periods of time in case someone needs it quickly. It just is. If it were in use all the time like a regular cubicle, it would cause huge problems for a minority of people (and minor inconvenience to many more) who would then have to curtail not just their social lives but also ordinary day to day activities like food shopping.

I have no idea why this is so hard to understand.

Why pick on Fanjo for her post? Lots of people, like myself, are posting the same thing (not enough people, but lots).

Indeed hazey.

People always do. I guess they don't like it that I make them look in mirror.

I thought there was some sort of Fanjo klaxon that sounds, when you post on a thread

There seems to be!

I do wonder what a fanjo klaxon sounds like.

Reading the thread and I totally agree with Fanjo, dawndonna et al. However one post a little while back I want to address, can't remember who posted it sorry. It's the post about people coming out of the toilets and apologising because they know its wrong.

I don't have mobility problems that prevent me using regular toilets, but I sometimes use accessible toilets. I do sometimes come out to see people waiting and glaring, and I'll often apologise. The thing is, I don't know if I am in the wrong for using them. They just see a perfectly healthy 20 year old coming out of the toilet and looking ashamed.

I'd love to tell them that I only use that loo because I have EDS, which has caused horrendous IBS since I was 14, and other bowel problems from previous surgery combined with that means that I often can't wait, or that waiting is agony and the pain has made me cry in public on more than one occasion. But I don't feel able to say that, so all I can do is apologise, which makes it look like I know I'm in the wrong, when really I might be, but I don't know what else can I do?

can you get a card to show people? only if you feel you have to.

i think you can get some with "this person cannot wait" or something? Would mean you could hold it up and not even look at them, if you feel embarrassed.

But only if you want to.