To have used the downstairs loo?

[WheresYourSecretSadness]

At a holiday cottage with a friend and each of our 2 kids. The cottage has 3 bedrooms - 1 downstairs 2 upstairs - and all bedrooms are en suite. There’s no other bathrooms or toilets.

I’m in an upstairs bedroom with 4yo DS, my friend is downstairs with her 3yoDS and our girls (7 and 8) are sharing the other upstairs bedroom.

When we’ve been downstairs and me or my kids have needed the toilet we’ve gone to the downstairs one, which is attached to my friend’s room. There’s a door entrance from the hall. This morning they both needed the loo so I took them to the downstairs toilet, but the door from the hallway was locked, it had been locked from inside the toilet. My friend and her kids were in the kitchen so we went through her bedroom to go to the loo.

She was a bit huffy when I came out and I asked what was wrong. She said she’s not happy about us going through her bedroom as its an invasion of her privacy. Fair enough, but my kids were desperate for the loo. She then said that she’d like us to use our own bathrooms for the toilet! Meaning I have to traipse upstairs every time me or the kids need the loo! Not ideal especially when they’re desperate. I (reluctantly) agreed but I think she’s being a bit precious and don’t think it’s a big deal at all sharing a bathroom? If it was me in the downstairs bedroom I honestly wouldn’t mind.

AIBU for using the downstairs loo or is she being precious about “her” bathroom?

Yes even if you are right next to the bathroom door! That's her 'en-suite', it's not a sharing downstairs loo even if it does have another entrance. Your solution OP is swap bedrooms! You take the downstairs one and that's your problem solved

@VinylDetective No it's not. It's not a bathroom with two doors.

It's what they call a Jack and Jill arrangement. That means it has 2 doors. One from the bedroom and one from a hall or landing.

The reason it has a LOCK from the bedroom side is that no one can use it from the hall or landing. so it can be made exclusively into an ensuite.

Maybe your experience of this is somewhat limited.

@MJMG2015

There’s a door entrance from the hall

It is a dual purpose bathroom/toilet. It wouldn't have an additional hall door if it was only intended to be an en suite.

As a child family friends had a bathroom like this door in their bedroom, door in the hallway. We'd often have to go in via their bedroom as someone had forgotten to unlock the hallway door after using it. They didn't care & that was their proper bedroom, not just a holiday bedroom.

Her stupid/selfish, passive/aggressive move to lick the door caused the need to go through her bedroom. How was the OP even supposed to guess it was deliberate?

Her 'friend' is being ridiculous.

Just because the house was built in a particular way doesn’t mean it has to be used that way. How is it not plainly obvious to you that two families in a holiday let with two bathrooms would take a bathroom each - irrespective of what the architect had in mind when they did the floor plan.

The friend is not being ridiculous, I expect she was genuinely shocked at OPs rudeness, like most other people that have read the thread.

@VinylDetective

I can’t believe the responses here - or your friend’s behaviour. In my world you just use the closest loo to you when the urge takes you.

Me neither. Another one of those MN is mad days

@VinylDetective, but the 'public' door was locked. This isn't like being at a friends house, its a shared holiday home. Each bedroom is a private space and each has their own access to a bathroom. The fact the downstairs bathroom has an extra door is irrelevant in this case, as it's two families sharing. If the op is entitled to a private ensuite, so is her friend, especially since the op guilted her friend into taking that room. For the sake a nice holiday, surely respecting boundaries is more important than 'I can access that place, so I will regardless of other's feelings'?

I’m sorry I can’t get past the mixed households sharing a holiday cottage when COVID is rampant across the country and many of us are in total lockdown.

Stay home, use yer own toilets!

YABU, it's really rude to go through someone's bedroom to use their toilet. I would have assumed, as your friend did, that this is basic manners and I wouldn't have to tell you not to use it. I've lived in houses were the room downstairs is turned into a bedroom with an en suite, I never once assumed I could use it. I really do think you owe her an apology.

OP: AIBU
Everyone: Yes
OP: No I'm not....

If I had the downstairs room I wouldn't begrudge you using it in a desperate emergency but I'd be annoyed with you using it routinely, especially if my rooms ended up smelling because somebody else's child pooped in it. Your daughter can hold it all day at school but not long enough to get up the stairs?

If you were staying in a holiday cottage that didn't have a downstairs loo, you'd have managed.

OP: AIBU
Everyone: Yes
OP: No I'm not

It was ever thus around here!

Your daughter can hold it all day at school but not long enough to get up the stairs?
That's it in a nutshell. I smell something fishy, tbh. Bizarre thread.

I would be annoyed if I were the friend to be honest. The only way I would think what you would do was acceptable is if all other toilets in the house were being used and it case of being desperate for the kids.

Three bedrooms, three bathrooms all will access from the bedroom...seems pretty obvious to me! The fact that it was locked from the inside should really have been a massive hint!!!

@WheresYourSecretSadness prior to this morning, have you ever actually asked if you could use the loo, or did you just assume you could? Because you might find this is part of the issue....

@ColleagueFromMars

😄. I had missed the discrepancy in being able to hold it in all day at school but not long enough to get upstairs. T

@Candleabra

OP: AIBU Everyone: Yes OP: No I'm not....

This: Nail. On. Head.

Depends on the friendship I guess?

No way would I mind if my friend used the downstairs and I know she wouldn't mind either.

But at the same time there's nothing wrong with her wanting to keep it as their private bathroom so you should respect her wishes.

Most houses bathrooms are upstairs with no downstairs loo so you can't really argue that the DC were desperate!

You should have taken the hint when the first entrance you tried was locked tbh.

So upon finding the hall door locked you didn't take the hint and 'traipse' upstairs but went through her private bedroom. What would you have done upon finding the second door locked because your friend was having a dump or shower? Would you have banged on the door demanding immediate access? Or managed to traipse upstairs and hold it for another toilet?
At first I thought this was one of those crappy reverse posts because you come across as incredibly selfish and entitled.
However, it seems like your family may have some lingering trauma and issues from your ex and it might be worth seeking some counselling.
My own 6yo boy is currently going through a phase of not wanting to be in a room or toilet alone but I am seeking out strategies to manage this gently with him.
Your daughter is much more extreme though and I would be coordinating with school to gently work through this.
Good luck and I hope you apologise to your friend.

What makes it worse is that OP and dcs appear to work as a team when visiting the loo, so it wasn't one desperate person sprinting to the nearest loo, but the whole lot of them "traipsing". And as for doing a poo! Unless the OP's dd had an urgent attack of diarrhoea, she was quite capable of making it upstairs.

Agree that covid makes it all worse, and I would not want multiple people going in my - clearly purposed as - ensuite and using the towels.

OP having read 4 pages of the thread I'm surprised at the response. The bathroom has a door into the hall, I think. Meaning you can access it without going through the bedroom. I would have used it too. I would also expect the door to the hall only to be locked when your friend was in there, showering or using the loo herself.

If she wanted her own private en suite, she should have chosen an upstairs room.

But clearly I'm in a minority!

You are wrong OP. Use your own toilet and don't walk through other people's rooms if they're not your family.

If she wanted her own private en suite, she should have chosen an upstairs room.

She wasn't allowed that as an option, OP wanted the rooms upstairs.

@Brakebackcyclebot Op decided friend should have downstairs room.

Yes, TheMandalorian, how embarrassing (and annoying) to be sitting in one's en suite and someone not only trying the handle of the communal door, but then coming through the bedroom and yanking the handle of that one too. And you may not have locked that one . Absolutely not on.

@Brakebackcyclebot read the thread properly, the op forced the friend to take the downstairs room due her own children's undealt with issues. The poor woman never had much choice and now doesn't even get her only bathroom to herself because the OP is too lazy to climb the stairs.