To think if you don't have a baby/toddler...

[jorahmormont]

You don't need a changing table when you go swimming, and should use one of the millions of other changing rooms available?

We are at butlins and went swimming yesterday. They have limited baby change tables anyway, but as we tried to find an empty one, we saw a woman with her two kids - about 7 and 9 - going in and piling up their stuff on the baby change tables.

I couldn't work out if I was BU or not to think that's pretty selfish and shitty? There are loads of individual changing rooms and loads of big family sized changing rooms without changing tables free. Why would someone do this? Sheer selfishness or am I missing something?

(For context we couldn't use a normal changing room as DD would roll off one of the benches, and isn't steady enough on her feet to get dressed standing up as we think she's hypermobile so we did need a baby change table).

I've been baby swimming. Two family rooms. Ten babies. No other cubicles. You work out what happens.

You cope. Or your baby would get cold waiting for a room. You do not NEED a cubicle and you are being ridiculous if you think its an essential that you somehow deserve priority for. Its a nice luxury, but not essential.

Its not a big deal. Even when I'm by myself. Even when DS learnt to crawl and was OFF but wasn't steady enough on his feet. Not when he learnt to walk and was even more active but is still in normal nappies.

I don't see the need for a change table. I tend to avoid precisely because DS is so mobile and threatened to skydive if I used (straps are useless on houdinis).

We've managed going to lots of places without a change table. Like camping.

I am truly baffled by this belief that somehow the world ends without a change table.

Again how are you going to cope when your baby is over 11kg? Especially if not steady on feet still?

I think complaining over this is hilariously funny and really precious. As previous poster suggested, there should be staff directing people to the correct rooms at all times and managing the number of babies in the pool at any one time to prevent too many children congregating in one place at the same time to prevent changing table disasters.

Actually if I was taking DD swimming alone and there were no baby change cubicles at all, we'd have to leave. I physically can't change her on the floor. If they're busy, I wait until they're free. If DD falls, she could quite easily dislocate something. When she's over 11kg (a while off yet as she's a teeny thing despite being 20 months), I'm hoping she'll be steady enough on her feet to get changed standing up. If not then we either have to take that risk of her dislocating something, or not go swimming, I suppose.

I'm not complaining about the fact that I had to wait. I'm not saying she's the antichrist. I was just wondering whether it's a bit of a dickish thing to do. Some people say yes, some people say no, so clearly I'm not totally unreasonable.

The world doesn't end without a changing table, but it makes life very difficult for parents with mobility issues, or with children with mobility issues, which is why it strikes me as a little selfish for someone to just use it for their bags. But hey, some people agree, some people don't - that's life. You seem to be unable to understand why some parents need changing tables. Maybe you're able-bodied parent of the year but we aren't all that lucky.

I'm glad you think it's hilarious and precious, Red

OP you are massively over thinking this! There is no way she went in there despite having thought about people needing it more, it was just empty so she used it!

Just ask next time! Will save all the angst

I am not angsty! (Well I'm not angsty about her using the changing room! She went in, got changed, came out, we went in, got changed, went swimming, had a lovely time, all done).

I don't think she thought "Oh yes I'm sure there are people who need this more but I will use it anyway muahaha". It's more that if I didn't have a baby with me, it wouldn't occur to me to deliberately seek out the baby changing room (which, due to its location, you would actually have to do). Which was why, as a chronic overthinker, I wondered whether I would've been in the right or in the wrong to ask her for the cubicle (as I said she was already so aggressive we decided it was easier to wait).

I'm getting angsty over people thinking I'm having some kind of existential crisis about a baby changing room. I'm procrastinating because I have lots of post-holiday washing to do, I'm certainly not rocking backwards and forwards in a darkened room muttering "bags... changing table...". I'm also getting angsty over people who think that because they can manage without a changing table, everyone can.

to be fair op, you hadn't mentioned the fact that you have mobility issues so need to change your dd on the changing table.

I think this being the case, you needed to have explained the fact that you need the changing table to the woman. Are there disabled facilities that you could use?

If she walked past other empty ones without changing tables to get to that one then maybe there was a reason she needed it.

Maybe she was using it thinking "Hah! I don't need it but I'm gonna make those who do wait, just because I can."

None of us can really know her reasons for using it.

But generally, when there's any doubt, life is better if you assume the best of people rather than the worst.

Disabled facilities don't have a baby changing table, plus I didn't want to use those because there were lots of wheelchair users and people who need the facilities of a disabled room far more.

I honestly didn't think my own mobility issues were relevant, I only had to mention them when people started talking about changing little ones on floors or on those lower benches every changing cubicle has.

Regardless, some people think she was BU and some people don't, and some people think I'm BU for even asking which I suppose is par for the course on AIBU so the natural balance is restored

YANBU and definitely not precious either. I wouldn't want to try and change my baby without a table. The floor is dirty, hard and wet!

sadly most disabled facilites dont have changing tables at all, so if you have to change a disabled child/adult....its the floor.

I really support the Changing Places campaign for better changing facilities for disabled children and adults, as no-one should have to change anyone or be changed on the floor - especially in toilets and changing rooms where it is wet and dirty. I can't get down onto the floor to change DD as my knees aren't stable enough and I can't guarantee I'd get back up again without a fight (and potentially a dislocation).

It's more that if I didn't have a baby with me, it wouldn't occur to me to deliberately seek out the baby changing room

How do you know she deliberately sought it out?!

This is silly, she more than likely just saw it, used it, didn't over think it.

I appreciate you hsve mobility issues but that wasn't your question - you wanted to know if she was unreasonable to use a changing room with a baby table when she didn't have a baby. I'm saying no, she wasn't at all. You were unreasonable for not just asking her if it would be ok to swap because you did need it.

What Because, as I've said, she had to walk past dozens of free individual cubicles and four or five free 'family changing rooms' to get to the baby change one, which was right in the far end of the changing room and around a corner.

Why should I have asked when I was happy to wait? That's not what I was asking anyway.

And as I've already said, she was aggressive and seemed stressed. If I'd asked, I could've been posting "AIBU to have brawled with a lady on the floors of Butlins changing rooms?"

If you were happy to wait, what was the problem then?!

I walk past loads of cubicles when I go the pool. The reason I do that is because if I choose a cubicle closer to the pool area I have less distance to walk when I am changed into my swimwear, I then use a locker in that vicinity do that when I get out of the pool and am freezing cold my stuff is not at the furthest end of the changing room. That could also be the reason that the woman walked past many empty cubicles. Whether the cubicle had a changing table wouldn't be part of my thought process but if I went into the cubicle and saw a changing table I might put my bags on it to free up space for my children and I to get changed.

As I said in one of my other posts What it's one of those burning philosophical questions that occurred to me at 6am this morning - would I have been a dick to say something? Was she being a dick to use the changing room? I couldn't decide so I asked MN. Apologies for not running it by your Acceptable Post guidelines first

Iamnot I thought about that but the cubicle was further away from the pool than the other family changing rooms! (weird layout)

for you op, I think if you had asked the woman if it would be possible to use another cubicle, and she had given you the arse, then you would definitely not be unreasonable.

But on the whole I don't think it is unreasonable to use those cubicles if you haven't got a baby.

We have one disabled changing room, with an adjustable height full size changing table in our pool, but otherwise I have to change ds on the floor, it isn't great.

to go with the cuppa.

Do you know what hazey that is just what I need I have raging raging PMT (is it obvious from the tone of my posts? ) thank you

It's awful that you're having to change your DS on the floor :(

I think you are being unreasonable. I go to Butlin's Minehead regularly and have done since mine were younger. It's one of the most baby friendly places I've been. I have managed changing babies on the tiny bench they have in the little cubicles now.

But these days I do use the large changing rooms with or without a baby changer. Usually first one available. My son has one of those invisible disabilities and we need the extra space there and then. Otherwise we can't go swimming at all. If someone approached me while I was in a swimming costume to put me in the awkward situation of negotiating who was more entitled to that changing room at that point, I would not only be pretty pissed off but it would cause my child significant problems.

Medusa the site in general has been so baby friendly, it's just the changing rooms we've struggled in. Great that you can change babies on the tiny benches; I can't bend over to do that. I can only use the changing tables. Two of the changing areas don't have them and the other four have one each. The Skyline pavillion has one baby change area (in the main bit). We reviewed Butlins last year and the lack of baby change areas was the only criticism we could find from a child-friendly point of view.

I didn't say it was not baby friendly, I said it's lacking in baby change facilities for how many people with young children are there.

Fair point. I know I'm probably over sensitive about disability access. We're going to Butlins for Christmas week and already the thought of trying to get DS out of the pool and clothed is making me feel exhausted.

Acceptable post guidelines

I just really don't see how her walking to a cubicle big enough for her family makes her a selfish cow who deliberately chose the cubicle with the changing table just to spite you!!

Or why, if you were happy to wait, you are complaining at all?!

As someone said up thread, people gpnog about their business don't routinely think about the impact on others when they choose that parking space, cafeel table, changing cubicle. They see one free and they take it. If someone then came along and explained that actually, that table etc would make their life easier for xyz reason, the vast majority of people would be more than happy to swap, because not every one is inherently selfish as you appear to think this woman and her family were.

Next time, man up and ask if you can use it as you really can't manage without it, or don't complain. You can't have it both ways!

She probably just didn't think.

"Hi, sorry but can I just grab that baby changing table please? I can't find another. Thanks".

Job done