To think this was a complete over reaction on her part and no need for this behaviour , person parking in parent space when disabled.

[fatisnotafeeling]

I am a Personal care assistant and support an elderly lady in her 80s who has had a stroke, struggles to walk and has a disabled badge.

I take her food shopping on a Friday to a small Waitrose, it has a very small car park with 4 disabled bays and 2 parent and child spaces.
When we arrived there were no disabled bays but there was a parent one so I took that one and we proceeded to get out the car.
We were then confronted by a lady with a baby in her car shouting that we didn't have a child and should not be fucking parking there. I responded that we had a disabled badge and could park there, she proceeded to call me a slag and drove off at speed.

When we went into the shop we approached customer services and explained that we had parked in the space and did have a badge that was displayed. This lady then came in the shop and began ranting that she has a baby and we had parked in a parent space and shouldn't have, I just repeated we have a badge and my client cannot walk distances and we are able to legally park in those spaces.
More staff members including the Floor manager and store manager were telling her to calm down and we had every right to park in the space. She called me a skank and stormed off.
She was very aggressive and at the point I was shaking and verging on tears. She then came back again shouting and screaming that I am a fucking bitch and how would I feel if i had a baby (I have 3 DC).

I had the the managers between me and her and another staff member took me to the side away from it, apologised said I had done nothing wrong. I'm ashamed to say I had started crying by this point. Me and my client were both given flowers by the staff.

AIBU to think that there is just no need for behaviour like this and that I did nothing wrong. I know some people have things going on that we don't know about and I always take that in to account when out, I feel on the verge of a panic attack now and this happened nearly 3 hours ago.

This comes up again and again on here.

Disabled people can use P&C spaces.

Parents cannot use disabled spaces (unless they or a person in the car is disabled).

It's straight-forward really.

FFS what a horrible woman
I haven't slept properly for over 10 years due to SN child
Honestly most of the time I'm dead on my feet. I still have never spoken to anyone like she did
There is no excuse for behaviour like that

So sorry you had to deal with such utter selfishness & rudeness. I hope you & your employer are OK.

And how well the Waitrose staff dealt with it - being really clear about your employer's right to park where you did, and giving you flowers.

Have some virtual Hope you both recover - I know I get really shaken by overt shouting & violence from random strangers.

What a horrible woman.

Shocked that this type of person would shop in Waitrose. My local Waitrose is usually full of upper class people. I only hear the words skank and botch in Asda 🤣

I hope she feels embarrassed by her behaviour and I feel for her child.

‘Bitch’

Disabled people should take priority over a parent with a child, 100%, I don't know how she had the nerve to rant and rave when she could clearly see the person you were with needed the space

Uuuuuuugh using "slag" in any context is the behaviour of a grade A wanker. I'm sorry this happened to you.

I'm similar in that when things like this happen to me I get home and sort of go into shock a little bit for a while, shaky and teary and obsessive about what happened / what I could have done differently.

BUT it usually goes away pretty quickly when the shock wears off so hopefully that happens for you too

Shocked that this type of person would shop in Waitrose. My local Waitrose is usually full of upper class people. I only hear the words skank and botch in Asda

My post was a joke BTW 🤨 sorry if anyone took it seriously.

😭
In tears on your behalf OP 😣
(Pregnancy hormones)
Deep breaths, you did nothing wrong

Frankly with her choice of words I'm more shocked she was shopping in Waitrose

I was thinking this - she doesn't sound like Waitrose material.

Lovemusic33 don't worry, I think most of us got it

My post was a joke BTW 🤨 sorry if anyone took it seriously.

oop sorry I'm Irish I don't get waitrose jokes, in my defense :p

A certain type of people don't understand that disabled people can use P&C spaces. They're generally the ones that shout and swear because they are so entitled. It's happened to me many a time. If it happens again, scream in their face. Long and high. Keep doing it until they back off. They will. Works every time.

Ydnbu. There's another thread with a pregnant woman who you can just tell is going to turn out like the woman you talked about. She sounds utterly vile, a totally common unintelligent nasty piece of work. Ignore.

So sorry that you and your charge had to put up with that, OP. There are no excuses for that behaviour, we all have shit going on in our lives at one time or another but it doesn't give us a free pass to abuse others.

I don't know if it might be an idea to suggest to places that offer these p & c parking spots that they might want to indicate on a sign that blue badge holders of course have priority in these spaces should all the blue badge spaces be occupied, it might preempt or defuse these kind of confrontations.

It sounds like she had a mental illness, that's bizarre and disturbing behaviour. I'm also surprised they didn't call the police, it doesn't sound like she was in control of her temper. Adrenalin is what will have made you shaky, it will pass but what a shame you and your client had to deal with such a nasty incident. Take good care of yourself.

She behaved appallingly.

You did nothing wrong.

A pp summed it up perfectly along the lines of C&P spaces are lovely to use when you have a baby, but given a choice of not having them but a disability that means you require a blue badge is a choice that would be easy to make.

Try to remember not all people are like that.

When DS was tiny I parked in the last free C&P space at a small local M&S. As I got out of the car I saw another car with a BB slowly circling around the disabled spaces (all full) obviously waiting for a space.

I walked up and offered to move so they could have the wider space. I couldn't believe how shocked they were that I would offer (obviously didn't happen often) and were so thankful. I just parked further away - less convient but no big deal (after all there was a time before C&P spaces and parents managed).

When I finished my shop I came out to find a bunch of tulips on my windscreen and a thank you note.

Two groups of people walked away from that small interaction feeling good about themselves and their day.

As much as you feel understandably upset she'll also be in a self righteous fury all day and her day shot. All over a parking space.

Don't give her another thought and have some (and maybe a stiff this evening).

Sounds like a nightmare and she sounds utterly batshit. Probably a one off, most people are at least semi-reasonable...

What she did was awful but part of me thinks maybe she's had a rough night of no sleep and that was just her tipping point.

Boo fucking hoo.

Going by that logic, everyone everywhere can blame utterly vile behaviour on lack of sleep...

I once sat in a baby group while people gave out about disabled and elderly people using P&C spaces. One even proudly told the story of how she'd challenged an elderly couple for parking in one. I tried to challenge but I was the only one not up in arms.

The class took place in a Tesco with a massive car park. Usually loads of P&C spaces, but there were a few baby groups in a row on that day of the week so sometimes hard to get a P&C space - but the rest of the car park was empty.

A few weeks later, I drove by the P&C spaces, saw they were full and carried on to the back of the (empty) car park. Saw one of the women sitting in her car, waiting for a P&C space. With her husband also in the car!! If they'd parked elsewhere and come back to find someone too tight to their car to get the baby in, one of them could've moved it to another space in the empty car park while the other minded the baby. She missed the start of the class. Madness.

Someone did that to me once.

They parked in the last parent and child place by the side of the building, next to the twin/small baby trollies at Tesco (they only had a few twin trollies at that time).

The disabled spaces were the next row back.

I couldn't park there because I was not disabled, so I had to go to the main carpark walk back to the trollies and leave the trolly in the road front of the car as there was not enough space around it in the normal car park, and move each of the small children from the car and to the trolley, the toddler having unharnessed both the babies in the meantime.

There was no advantage for him to have parked there because he still had to walk to the front of the building. The advantage was it was next to the trollies and provided a safe space for loading and unloading children.

He wasn't the only one to ever do this, but it was the last available parent and child space.

One option, if you want to do something once the shock has worn off, is to post what happened on social media.

You could frame it nicely by tagging and thanking the staff at Waitrose for their help/support but also asking people to share to raise awareness that BB's have priority and that there's no justification for being abusive towards an elderly lady and her carer.

If enough people share your post (and I would) maybe the women in question might see it and hopefully refrain from such behaviour in the future - if not, it would still raise awareness, of the difference between the need for BB holders to have these spaces v the convenience of a parent enjoy one - which is a good thing.

I'm surprised she wasn't banned from the shop. If I had been the manager I'd have demanded she leave and called the police if she refused to do so.

I don’t think I could behave like that sort of cunt even if I never slept again.

I’ve had similar happen to me. A woman in a transit van parked next to our car parked in the p&c space but she didn’t even park in an actual space. There was a wee shaded off box between the space and the road. She squeezed it so close to the car I couldn’t get myself in let alone my (ginormous) car seat with sleeping baby in.

I asked her to move and she shouted at me about her Mum having asthma and she was stressed so I could just fuck off.

Had to go into store and ask security to deal with her. As I was coming back out she peeled out of the notspace and screeched ‘Fucking slag I’ll have you!’ .

Hope you and the lady you care for aren’t too shaken up .