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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

to not want comments when buying a pregnancy test

61 replies

Sassafrass · 31/10/2007 21:49

Bought a pregnancy test today and was completely taken aback when the lady at the till asked me if it would be good or bad news and then proceeded to ask how many children I already had and how sure I was!

I made some kind of noncommital response but I was really embarrassed. I can't help to think that when you buy intimate things the cashier should know better than to comment.

OP posts:
Roarindrunk · 31/10/2007 21:51

Good job it wasn't a pack of Durex then ?

bohemianbint · 31/10/2007 21:51

YANBU! How rude!

spookykitty · 31/10/2007 21:51

Nosey old bag, I bought some this morning the woman was really nice and kept chatting to DD2.

Tell her to piss off it's none of her business

tigger32 · 31/10/2007 21:52

that's dreadful she should not have commented, there is time for small talk and that wasn't it!

LadyOfTheFlowers · 31/10/2007 21:54

When I have bought them, I put them on the counter with my 'F-Off a die look' and didn't get any questions!
I found the looks from other shoppers worse....

YANBU at all btw.

IntergalacticWarlock · 31/10/2007 21:54

I once bought some Cnesten.

Not something that's embarrassing, per se, but it's not trhe the done thing to have the whole neighbourhood knowing about the fact you have an itchy minge.

Anyway, I went to the counter of my local chemist, and ask the hangdogged woman at the counter if she had any Canesten Combi, and she looked on the shelf - no, twas not there.

So instead of quietly and discreetly looking in the storeroom for me, she proceeded to shout (in the shopk, whaich was bus=y at the time)

"SSSSSSSSSSAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANNNNNNNNNNNNNDDDDDDDDRRRRRRRRRRAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA AAAAAAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
HAVE WE GORRANY CANESTEN FOR THIS LADY HERE????"

she should hav added "Because she's got fanjo rot" but she didn;t thankfully.

But in answer to your question., YANBU

bigmouthstrikesagain · 31/10/2007 21:56

poor you how awful - I had a woman deliberately not charge me for a test (one of those expensive branded double packs) - I didn't mind that - but anything else - out of order.

Mind you working on a till does funny things to your brain - I have been there

olala · 31/10/2007 21:57

YANBU.
judgemental prat.
am now almost 30 and married, tis surely not only ok but positvely EXPECTED that i will reproduce...yet i still feel like a teenage slut when buying preg tests becasue of people like this woman. learn people learn. our children are going to be paying for your pensions!

NowKnownAsMummy · 31/10/2007 21:59

This happened to me a couple of months ago. (Am not pg but was just checking IYSWIM!) Cashier said the same as yours - "will it be good news or bad?". . Gave an uncommital response too. Have not even told close family about my pregnancies until after 12wk scan, so would not be discussing doing a test with the checkout lady! Another time I bought one there was one of those plastic boxes around the test box to stop them being stolen. Cashier was not able to get the box off and pressed her buzzers to call someone else over - shouting at them, "can you get the cover off this pregnancy test please". This was in the local massive and very busy tesco.

chipmonkeyPumpkinNorks · 31/10/2007 21:59

Oh, why do people do this? Two things spring immediately to mind with me. The first was when I was buying canestan. The girl behind the counter shouted to her colleague, "How much is the canestan?" She might as well have pointed and shouted out "Look over here at the woman with the thrush!"
The second time I was buying a breast pump and the assistant started going on about how hospitals really put pressure on parents of prem babies to bf. ( ds2 was fullterm and by now, 4 months old) When I explained that I wanted it to express when going back to work, she asked why I just didn't give him "the normal milk" pointing at the rows of formula.
I gave her a sharp dressing-down in the shop,first time I ever did such a thing!
Have to say, the last time I bought a pg test, the assistant turned out to be a patient of mine but she was luckily very discreet!

Original poster
Sassafrass · 31/10/2007 22:00

Thanks for all the replies. I'm over 30 as well Olala, but I still feel awfully embarassed when buying a pregnancy test. I wish I had told her that it was inappropriate to ask but I think my mouth just went on the polite autopilot.

I once sent my husband to buy one at tescos, thinking he could use the self service till. Of course the package was one of those that you have to ask a member of staff to open, and he has now vowed never to buy any again. =)

OP posts:
chipmonkeyPumpkinNorks · 31/10/2007 22:01

X-posts Intergalactic!!! Do we share a pharmacy or are these a particular breed of staff?

cazboldy · 31/10/2007 22:02

You should have seen the cashiers face when I last bought one,.
Incidentally it was for my sister. I had my 5 children with me and dd2 was only 4 wks and also ds1's friend!

mummypig · 31/10/2007 22:12

YANBU. Surely it should be part of pharmacy assistants' training that they are discreet about things like that? I seem to remember when I worked at Tescos many moons ago we were even told to quietly put tampons etc. in a little separate bag. Not very environmentally friendly of course .

By the way I bought a whole pack of pg and ovulation tests online earlier this year, they cost a fraction of the over the counter cost - and are still reliable - at least the ones I have used have been

here they are: www.accessdiagnostics.co.uk/

and I am not connected to the company in any way except for buying from them, so this isn't an attempt at viral marketing or anything like that.

Original poster
Sassafrass · 31/10/2007 22:20

Thanks for the tip. I'll check the website out. Might be in need of some =)

OP posts:
Lazarou · 31/10/2007 22:22

I once went in to the chemist to buy the morning after pill and avoid the hassle of the doctors. I went on my own without ds's. I thought they would just hand over the goods but instead she said 'I just have to get the pharmacist to have a word with you' and ushered me into a tiny room with about a millimetre of space between me and the male pharmacist who proceeded to ask me lots of embarrassing questions. I'm sure he thought i was about 15 until i told him that ds2 was only a few weeks old and i certainly didnt want any more for the time being. £25 it was too!

Loshad · 31/10/2007 22:26

you are definately NBU, how blummin rude is that, I would have been mortified.
When i was pg with ds4 and was out and about with the other 3, all littlies I couldn't believe how many people asked me if it was an accident

Tommy · 31/10/2007 22:26

the comments that you get when you buy a pregnancy test (I got a "Oooh!" from the woman I bought mine from in Boots once ) are just the nbeginning of the many and personal comments that complete strangers think they can make when you are pregnant

very bizarre

maggotandjerry · 31/10/2007 22:29

I was once in a supermarket queue behind a man on his own. Just as he was paying his wife/girlfriend came up to join him. The cashier waited until they had moved about 1 metre away before turning to me and yelling "Oh he had a girlfriend! I bet you were WELL GUTTED!"

I could not speak.

Lauriefairycake · 31/10/2007 22:45

This happened to me. Woman says in Tesco in a loud voice with long queue behind me "Oooh, are you hoping to be or not to be dear".

I said very loudly (and really quick thinking for me) "None of your bloody business but since you ask I'm hoping not to have miscarried"

Stony silence from cashier but worse in my opinion was at least two people tutted as I walked away.

(I had miscarried unfortunately)

bookofthedeadmum · 31/10/2007 22:49

I've never had that experience thankfully but I've only ever bought 2 tests in my life. One was at a very busy Boots in Oxford St - a dual pack one - and the second was actually last Dec when I piled it into the bottom of my basket in Superdrug.

I used to go through agonies buying sanitary towels and later on, condoms if it was a male cashier. I'm probably still not hard enough to deal with queries about pg tests though! . Especially if you don't know how you feel yourself.

catsmother · 31/10/2007 22:55

How absolutely rude and insensitive.

Laurie .... I bought a test for the same reason as you (in vain) and though no-one said a thing, I think I'd have burst into tears if they had done.

What the hell would these morons come out with next if a customer told them it'd be "bad" news ?

I'd have personally complained - though I appreciate that's often easier said than done.

NorthernLurker · 31/10/2007 22:56

This is awful - isn't it odd how pregnancy and babies seem to be some people's cue to ask all manner of things that they would never dream of/get away with otherwise eg: "can you afford it, will you stay with her, did you mean to have her/him, have you got three in there (arf, arf), ooooh you loook ready to explode (and my personal favourite) so is that IT now?"

I mean the bloke-next-doors-girlfriend even thought it was ok to ask dh if we had planned our third. I mean, he's exchanged about 8 words with this woman in 3 years and suddenly she wants to our inmost family details! We had as it happened but what business was it of hers or indeed anybodys!!

End of rant - feel better now

Orinoco · 31/10/2007 23:15

Message withdrawn

Mumcentreplus · 31/10/2007 23:26

Oh Dear!...I really wouldn't have gotten this upset about it t.b.h...maybe that's coz I'm a nosey cow myself...lol