To think this is really a bit much, or is it apparently ok?

[Stickaforkinimdone]

Very busy main road in south London this morning at 9.45ish, I find myself stopped in traffic waiting for the lights to change
To my left is a bus stop with a number of people waiting in the shelter and I watched (slightly in horror I admit) along with pretty much everyone else as a woman who had pulled up her car into the front of the bus stop, gets one of those portable potty things out, gets her daughter out of the back of the car, trousers off, and sits her on the potty in the middle of the pavement in front of the bus shelter.

Now is it me, or is that just really not appropriate??

I managed to toilet train two children with additional needs and have never resorted to having them pee in the street. What I did do was remind them before we left anywhere with toilets that they should go then. In my work, I can't just nip off to the loo and so I go during my break whether I need to or not.

If a child can't hold on for 5 minutes and recognise the need to go before it is urgent, then they aren't toilet trained yet.

My dd needed a wee earlier so I let her use the potty... IN THE CAR. I would never make her use it in front of people.Even a 2 / 3 year old is entitled to privacy!

Sounds like one of those women who has forgotten how normal people behave and is all baby brain.

Oh, no! One of those women.

Or perhaps she was just a parent stuck in heavy traffic with a child in the backseat wailing 'please, mum, pleeease, I have to go now, pleeeease!'. I wouldn't want there to be a national trend of pissing in bus shelters (although, judging by the state of the ones round here, that tradition has long been with us), but it can be very distressing for a child to soil or wet themselves when strapped into a seat. Some kids give you one warning then do it without much upset, and some (especially those who've been doing quite well potty-training) can get incredibly upset, especially if they've been doing their best to tell you it's coming, and have begged you to stop, but you're stuck in traffic.

And YY to questionable stress-based decisions. My DD gets horribly carsick. Once, I pulled over and asked DH to empty the sick bucket. Miles of rural hedgerow on both sides, plus a convenient ditch. A single house in view. Watched in horror as he chucked it over their garden wall. WHAT WERE YOU THINKING? Still no idea.

I agree with everything you've said ARum.

Like most things, isn't there a balance to be had.

Small children do need the loo often and need to use the potty. Parents of small children need to remember that just because they are living in the small child zone, not everyone else wants to nor should be forced to see and put up with toddlers on potties, toddlers screaming in restaurants in the evening, toddlers in the flower beds.

My current experience is that often parents of toddlers become so wrapped up in their kids, that they forget about other people and feel entitled to do whatever they like with little or no regard for others....they often have a huge sense of entitlement to continue their own life with little or no thought for the impact it has on others....as if the needs and wants if mall children and their parents trump all others.

Of course, it is possible to use a potty without it being in the middle of the pavement. Of course it is possible to go out for the day without allowing a toddler to run round a cafe and shout, spoiling the enjoyment of others, of course it is possible to have a day out, without the toddler needing to get in water fountains or flowerbeds.

Potties can be used in cars, in deserted areas, at the edge of the pavement if needed, behind bushes. Sometimes, it might be that they are used and create a bit of mess for a parent in the car....and many parents will choose to inconvenience themselves like this, rather than to inconvenience and upset others by the potty being in the middle of the path or the middle of the supermarket aisle because.....they understand that it's their child and so the inconvenience should be to themselves and not to every other passerby. The problem is when parents decide everyone else should be inconvenienced because being a parent with a toddler trumps everyone else and the parent and child should always have exactly their own way.

Rant over...almost.

So, use the potty when needed. But engage brain and consider others too. Try to put others first and be prepared to inconvenience yourself sometimes, rather than letting your children inconvenience others.

All the running around with potties is not needed if people actually wait until their child is ready to be toilet trained. Most children will transition from nappy to toilet very easily if done at the right time. It generally all comes down to competitive parenting again so people can say their child was out of nappies at a young age, when in fact they're weren't toilet trained early the parents were just spending their time mopping up behind them.

I'd never have thought about carrying a potty around with me when toilet training my 3. Toilet before you leave house, and hold it in until you can get to a loo whilst out. Accidents happen (and just my reasoning-could be wrong!) might encourage the dc to learn to hold it in for longer in the future until you can get to a toilet.

Really don't think it's fair to judge negatively in this situation and instead ask - where is the harm?
Having been in that situation with kids desperate in the back I have pulled over and let them use a verge. She had a potty so wasn't just going in the street, really don't see the harm and hope that if I was in this position people wouldn't judge negatively ...
Worse things happen 😊

People have toilet-trained kids forever without resorting to public potty use

Utter nonsense. 40 years ago my parents took my potty everywhere. It's hardly surprising that people put potty training off forever if people are so horrified by a toddler using a potty.

Yabu op, it wasn't anywhere near food/ on the table of a restaurant or something. She was somewhere busy, not much else you can do tbh.

Utter nonsense. 40 years ago my parents took my potty everywhere

It's actually not. Your parents notwithstanding, nobody I know does or did it. Either 40 years ago, or in the decades since.

We must just be genius toilet trainers in Australia.

Well done you Koala

In the UK right now there is constant parent-bashing over potty training in the media. Too late/ too early/ unreliable at school whatever. It's hardly surprising when people want to have a pop at whatever others do in relation to this.

I see things I'd rather not see most days. Surprisingly enough it was a woman who is berated here, I suspect if it was a bloke then he'd be congratulated for his hands-on parenting. Personally, I'd rather not see dogs dropping turds on the pavement and people picking them up, it's gross. BUT I accept I have to share the world with others. Other animals (including many men) basically pee anywhere but a toddler can't hold it in for 10 minutes have a go at the mother

Meh. Pulling over at a bus stop isn't clever, but I couldn't care less about seeing a potty being used in public.

When you gotta go, you gotta go.

Oh please even the op said there was a supermarket right there.
She could have gone in there, or simply stopped there, but no chose to do the convient thing for her and not for others so I will judge,

TBF I agree with that Francis it is unreasonable to park dangerously, but it isn't imo unreasonable for a toddler to use a potty where needed within reason (so not in the middle of a cafe for example).

DD, now nearly 22, hated the idea of using nappy-pants for our regular 2+ hour drives between cities, so we would pack a potty in the car in case she needed to go between motorway service stations. OH would pull in at a layby and we'd plonk her in between the open passenger & back doors; effectively creating a cubicle. All was fine until a lorry driver thought twas a great idea to blast his airborne at her & flash his lights. She still gets bashful bladder

Before having children, I probably would have said YANBU.

But when potty training DS at 2, when he needed to go, he needed to go. It was pretty much an instant thing and he would freak out until he could go to the toilet, he wouldnt be able to wait until I could get to a supermarket, park, get to the toilets etc. and I have pulled over in the past to let him use the potty or he would soak the car seat.

I probably wouldnt do this in a bus stop and would try to find a quieter place to stop but perhaps the mum was very stressed and in traffic I can see why she might stop i the first place possible with a toddler in the back desperate to go.

I don't think it's a big deal, yes maybe the position of the potty was not great but it was just a child needing a wee.

Stopping at the bus stop is the only inappropriate thing about this. I'd rather a child have a quick wee on the potty than wee all over their car seat because they're absolutely desperate. Can't believe some people actually see an issue with this.

A major part of toilet training is learning to hold on, surely? Whipping out a potty wherever you happen to be so they can go at a split second's notice doesn't really do that...
I've trained three kids without a single instance of public potty sitting.

Why couldn't the child use the potty in one of the footwells of the car?
If your dc is not reliably potty trained then you should take stuff that enables you to deal with it, eg potty liners.

Floggingmolly - Exactly!

A major part of toilet training is learning to hold on, surely?

Well obviously that's part of it but you have to learn to use it first.

I don't get all this 'I didn't need x', nonsense, different people do things differently, different children are erm different.