Was I BU to use the disabled toilet?

[Unplastered]

At a local national trust place today, just me with Dd age 6 and baby in his pram.
The baby change unit in the loos is just in the main area, there's a long row of (tiny) cubicles and a large disabled loo with a sink in.
Dd and I both needed the loo, there was nobody around, so I took both kids in the disabled loo.
As we came out there was a woman approaching the loos on a crutch. She hadn't been waiting - she was just approaching as we exited. She told me, sharply, that I shouldn't have used that loo, the baby changing wasn't in there. I said I knew that, we hadn't needed to use it, just wanted a bigger cubicle so as not to leave the baby outside. She replied it didn't make any difference as none of us was disabled.
Was I BU to use the disabled loo?

Leave the disabled toilets for those who genuinely need them then, needaholiday

Who are the 'impatient twats' needaholiday?

Koala my IBS can flare up out of nowhere, I usually use whichever toilet is free first, sometimes that inevitably ends up being the disabled loos if they open up first and there's a queue for the general ones. In the past I've waited in the queue for fear of being shouted at for using the disabled ones, by which point it's already too late.

Oh and then the same people who make comments on the 'able bodied' (read - not in a wheelchair) people who use the disabled loos, make nasty comments about smells.

It's a no win solution for us sometimes.

It sounds like a very difficult situation to navigate MoominKoala I'm sure it's not easy and I hope you weren't offended by my question, I was just trying to understand it a bit better.

Ica I don't use buses for that reason. I suffer from anxiety, so getting on buses with a pram with possibility of everyone staring at me when I have to juggle my baby, fold the pram down, etc... While everyone tuts because they are impatient twats makes me avoid it.
That would be one reason why my wheelchair using daughter doesn't like to use the disabled loos. However, she, unlike you, doesn't have choices.

Accessibility refers to the design of products, devices, services, or environments for people with disabilities.

I am sorry if people huff at you for folding your pram, it is not something I have come across - although I have been huffed at for getting on the bus with ds in his buggy, meaning someone has to fold!

Why would you risk being huffed at by using the disabled toilets?

Oh and invisible disabilities have every need for the disabled loos too. But the OP didn't have any of those. Nor did the kids.

No not offended at all Koala sorry if I sounded defensive! I appreciate when people ask :)

The one that REALLY pissed me off was when I was on the bus with DS and DD. Not always possible, by the way - some buses can't even take two wheelchairs.

This mum gets on with a huge pram. So I decide to move DD over the other side as that would then create a space next to DS with a seat right next to it. Nobody has to fold and both wheelchair occupants and pram can have someone right next to them.

She parks up, the TAKES THE SLEEPING BABY OUT OF THE PRAM, dumps her shopping in the pram and buggers off up the back of the bus leaving the pram slamming into DS' legs (until I intervened).

I don't mind a bit of give and take but fuxache!

Grays - parent and baby bathrooms exist in some (although clearly not enough) places.

Not sure about all the shopping centres near me, but at least one is well equipped with these "family" toilets. They're great, large enough for most parks and complete with a toilet, baby change table, sink and hand dryers. Separate feeding rooms nearby for people who want privacy to feed babies. And completely separate from the disabled toilets (only accessible by radar key in this particular shopping centre).

Thanks to the good toilet provision, this is my favourite place to go shopping if I have to go alone with DC.

Large enough for most prams, even. You'd have a job fitting even a tiny park into any public toilet.

I don't get it?

Ds can't be left alone as he will wonder off and is very sensitive to the hand dryers , I take him in the disabled toilets. He has asd and looks around 10 even if he is 8.

I have a no win situation as I take him in the ladies I get dirty looks as I'm taken him in there or dirty looks for taking him in the disabled toilet.

needaholiday

I'm not sure I get your point?

Sorry, you are talking about leaving the baby outside! I didn't unless the door was ajar and they could see me, as they screamed blue murder otherwise! So I took them in with me - I couldn't think how this would be unsafe!

YWBU

I am a disabled woman with an invisible disability. I look fine but I have an assistance dog which is difficult to fit into 'normal' cubicles. So I use disabled toilets.

If the disabled toilets also have baby change, then I have no issue, but if they don't YABU.

Hello needsaholiday. I'm Dawndonna's dd. I'm 18. I use a wheelchair, sometimes, for short distances a stick. I have a form of cerebral palsy which means life can be a wee bit difficult for me. I didn't choose to have it, I was premature and suffered some oxygen deprivation at birth. Some of my internal bits don't work to well, my lungs for example, they didn't develp properly and due to the cerebral palsy they're a bit floppy, so I have really quite severe asthma. My bladder goes into spasm which means I have no waiting time, so whilst you and your precious cargo are taking a space that was meant for me, I'm pissing myself. I then need the space to get washed and changed. But if sometimes it's too late, or I've run out of clothes, (oh for a wheelchair that could accommodate me, a whole wardrobe and a pot of tea) so I have to sit in my stinking piss. All the time I'm sitting in it, the smell is getting stronger, and I'm getting colder. All the time I'm sitting in it, I'm getting sore. I have psoriasis too and the urine breaks down my skin which means I get sores, great big bleeding sores, often they get infected. This means that your it's only a couple of minutes and if it means I'm selfish, tough, (apologies for paraphrasing, but you get the gist) is fine, but it may mean two weeks out of action in pain for me. But hey, you go ahead, I feel more sorry for you than you do for me, and I'd rather it that way, thanks.

What is disturbing is in how life people with disabilities, and even mothers with young children are seen as some weird "other" thing that isn't a middle class, able-bodied white male, and that these groups are often pitted against one another by the way toilets, buses, car parks etc are designed- changing tables in the disabled loos, shared spaces for buggies and wheelchairs.

Everything as much as possible should be accessible, there shouldn't have to be a fight over whose needs are greater.

No, Moomin you didn't sound defensive I just didn't want to offend or for it to sound like I doubted your need for the accessible loo.

Sorry to hijack slightly but would I be unreasonable to use an accessible toilet when out on my own with my 8 month old twins (so huge pushchair) and 3 year old? She gets frightened at the noise of hand dryers so I couldn't leave her outside the cubicle and I wouldn't want to as she's so young. I have never used an accessible toilet that didn't have baby changing in but I just wondered what the general consensus would be if the situation were to arise?