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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

AIBU to have not given up my parking spot?

243 replies

KHR1606 · 05/12/2022 15:12

Sorry for the long post.....

I parked my car in the IKEA car park this morning. The bays next to me were for electric vehicles. I got out my car & went in the back to get my 18 month old DS out his car seat & to put his coat on. We then went to the boot to get his trike out. DS is stood next to me as I'm unfolding & securing the trike.

A woman then approaches me politely asking for my spot so she can charge her car. I look at the ground to see if I've parked in the electric bay. I see that I haven't & say "I can park here" she says, "I can too!" I politely say no because that'd mean me undoing the trike & putting it away then taking my son's coat off & putting him back in his seat then driving around for another spot. Just the thought of it wore me out! She offered to help but again I politely said I'm not willing to do it because it's just too much hassle.

The woman persisted & persisted & persisted, I'm not exaggerating. She kept saying I have an appointment & I need to charge my car. Again I said no. I said if I was without DS I would have given you my spot. She wouldn't stop asking so I got really fed up & shouted loudly, "Oh for f**k sake!" It's only then that she walked away to her car which was 2 bays away....... charging!!!!!

I didn't even realise her car was on charge because I was too busy getting DS in the trike. As I was strapping him in I heard her say "bitch", "evil", the sound of spitting but not actually spitting. All this time I was looking at DS's face talking & smiling with him. It's only when I was ready to walk off that I asked, "did you say something!?" She sarcastically smiled & said no!

She then went on again about it wouldn't have taken me long to move my car. I again repeated myself that I was parked in a suitable bay & I wasn't going to inconvenience myself & DS for her. I told her that being out with a child is sometimes difficult. She said I have a child too. I replied "Then you know! Stop being entitled!" All of this was being shouted. We had people looking at us.

I walked off and said have a lovely day!! It's only when I walked off & called my sister to vent that I realised her car was charging. Why the f**k did she want my spot then? Why ask a mother & toddler to move?
I'm glad I didn't move, especially after calling me a bitch and evil. She must not know about Jeffrey Dahmer if she thinks I'm evil!

OP posts:
GnomeDePlume · 05/12/2022 18:06

AriettyHomily · 05/12/2022 15:17

Some people are just fucking odd.

I find myself thinking that quite a lot on MN. If it's not the OP it's some of the responses.

Original poster
KHR1606 · 05/12/2022 18:13

Proneu82 · 05/12/2022 15:56

Something is all very odd about this (and the Jeffrey Dahlmer comment is just… peculiar).

I suspect the OP was in a charging bay but didn’t realise when she pulled in (possibly but I would hazard a guess she knew)

Wrong!

OP posts:
Sonyrecording · 05/12/2022 18:14

If I was on my own I wouldn't have moved. With my husband there, as was the case with Op, I might well have done to be helpful. No need to put child and trike back in the car, the child's father could have looked after them.

dementedpixie · 05/12/2022 18:16

Sonyrecording · 05/12/2022 18:14

If I was on my own I wouldn't have moved. With my husband there, as was the case with Op, I might well have done to be helpful. No need to put child and trike back in the car, the child's father could have looked after them.

OP does not say her dh was there
Why do you assume he was with her when she didn't say he was there?

SliceOfCakeCupOfTea · 05/12/2022 18:16

Sonyrecording · 05/12/2022 18:14

If I was on my own I wouldn't have moved. With my husband there, as was the case with Op, I might well have done to be helpful. No need to put child and trike back in the car, the child's father could have looked after them.

Where does it say there even is a husband let alone that he was there?

Original poster
KHR1606 · 05/12/2022 18:16

Sonyrecording · 05/12/2022 18:14

If I was on my own I wouldn't have moved. With my husband there, as was the case with Op, I might well have done to be helpful. No need to put child and trike back in the car, the child's father could have looked after them.

Who says my husband was there? He was at work. It was just me and DS

OP posts:
Twiglets1 · 05/12/2022 18:19

God this makes me glad I didn’t buy the electric car I was considering buying. I’m just not convinced there are enough rapid charging points.
YANBU - she was trying to make her problem your problem.

SliceOfCakeCupOfTea · 05/12/2022 18:21

There are a couple of replies here from people confused why the husband couldn't have helped. Do these people assume a woman can't go out without her husband?

Mummyoflittledragon · 05/12/2022 18:23

NashvilleQueen · 05/12/2022 17:06

What a rude cow she was. Good for you OP, I wouldn't have moved, kids or not. Not sure why EV owners get free fuel/priority spaces anyway, if they're wealthy enough to have one then surely they can pay for their charging. Pisses me off enormously when I drive to my local town and one of the three disabled parking spots in the town centre is now an EV space, same at local hospital, actually removing disabled spaces to cater for EV owners who presumably have the use of their legs.

Whilst I understand the inconvenience in losing a disabled space the rest of your post is ridiculous. Everyone will have an EV in the future and there are huge incentives in putting in the infrastructure asap to encourage people to move across and away from fuel. Also it's not free.

It’s much more than an inconvenience. It’s disgusting.

Ch3wylemon · 05/12/2022 18:41

SliceOfCakeCupOfTea · 05/12/2022 18:21

There are a couple of replies here from people confused why the husband couldn't have helped. Do these people assume a woman can't go out without her husband?

Plus I suspect the women might not have been so persistent had OP's DH been there.

Cruisebabe1 · 05/12/2022 18:49

Whatabouterry · 05/12/2022 15:35

I would have helped her - she started out by asking politely for something quite reasonable. Often chargers are different speeds, some don’t work properly - it may be that your space meant she could orientate her car correctly and save her considerable time.

Someone not wanting to help with the only reason being because they had a toddler would have left me in disbelief to be honest!

What!!!!! Are we all supposed to fade into the background because someone wanted a particular spaceto charge their car when she already had a charging point. ?- the OP was right. Ffs🧐🧐🧐🧐🧐

Original poster
KHR1606 · 05/12/2022 19:21

Scarftown · 05/12/2022 16:12

she was unreasonable. I'm with you it's exhausting just thinking about what you would have had to do to move your car. I'm what I assume is a busy car park. And if you weren't in a charging space then it makes no sense why she would want it. I hope your car was ok when you came back.

It was!

OP posts:
stillsmilingtoday · 06/12/2022 06:38

IKEA rage! It’s a thing. I always thought it was caused by pushing heavy trolleys interminably around the massive store, frustration at realising you’d have to go against the flow to return the items that you grabbed but don’t actually need or going back to get more bargains before finally standing in a massive queue for half an hour before paying tens or even hundreds of pounds for lots of stuff you hardly need.
Pretty bad news to get it before even entering the shop!! Possibly worth it for the bags of Daim though :-)

Paternosta · 06/12/2022 06:59

You weren't unreasonable to refuse. Her request doesn't make sense anyway. What charging point was she going to use?
Were there any free parking spots nearby even?

Pertinentowl · 06/12/2022 07:02

She was odd and in the wrong, you were really weird with the Jeffry comment. You totally derailed your own thread when all of us promptly forgot what you were saying and our brains came screeching to a halt wondering about how your brain works.

I was on a bus with my sister and a buggy once and as she got on and parked her buggy in it’s place a woman started screaming that no children should be on a bus and that my sister should take taxis everywhere. You come across people like that sometimes

LiquoriceAllsorts2 · 06/12/2022 07:07

She was probably in a space where the charger wasn’t working and was feeling desperate. It wasn’t unreasonable of her to ask you but she should have accepted you saying no.
I don’t think the trike is appropriate for in ikea, yea you are using it as a buggy but ultimately it is a bike.

SliceOfCakeCupOfTea · 06/12/2022 07:09

LiquoriceAllsorts2 · 06/12/2022 07:07

She was probably in a space where the charger wasn’t working and was feeling desperate. It wasn’t unreasonable of her to ask you but she should have accepted you saying no.
I don’t think the trike is appropriate for in ikea, yea you are using it as a buggy but ultimately it is a bike.

No it's not.

You can disable the pedals and front steering on these trikes so parents control everything from their handle.
It's nothing like a bike at all.

Shadylady52 · 06/12/2022 07:09

OP should have been earlier if she had appointment and car needed charged. She already had a charging point. So yes she was in wrong. Dies she think she is entitled

RubbishRobotFromTheDawnOfTime · 06/12/2022 07:09

Pertinentowl · 06/12/2022 07:02

She was odd and in the wrong, you were really weird with the Jeffry comment. You totally derailed your own thread when all of us promptly forgot what you were saying and our brains came screeching to a halt wondering about how your brain works.

I was on a bus with my sister and a buggy once and as she got on and parked her buggy in it’s place a woman started screaming that no children should be on a bus and that my sister should take taxis everywhere. You come across people like that sometimes

Don’t jump on the bandwagon of being rude to the OP because she made a comment you didn’t understand. It’s not weird at all, and no we weren’t all wondering how the OP’s brain works. The woman called her evil, and OP was thinking ‘how can she think I’m evil for not moving my car when there are people in the world who torture and murder’. It’s not really hard to work out.

juls1888 · 06/12/2022 07:13

I have an EV and a blue badge...do I win parking top trumps 😂

PurpleFlower1983 · 06/12/2022 07:14

The woman sounds crazy! Just try and forget about and move on. I’ve come across quite a few strange people in Ikea.

Proneu82 · 06/12/2022 07:14

It’s not weird at all, and no we weren’t all wondering how the OP’s brain works

well if you don’t think it’s weird to refer to a truly horrific serial killer in a parking thread on a parenting chat forum then you’re not going to be baffled about how the OP’s brain work, are you?

HikingforScenery · 06/12/2022 07:17

Yabu

marmitetoastie · 06/12/2022 07:18

I think it sounds like you were both really stressed out, nothing more

Reluctantadult · 06/12/2022 07:18

I think you were unreasonable not to move. She probably wanted access to a faster charger. There are not many car chargers still and some take hours. Getting a child out the car and a scooter out of the boot doesn't seem like a big deal.

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