To ask a parent to move their buggy from a café so I can sit down?

[TheUmberFawn]

Went to a busy café at lunchtime. One table was occupied by a mum with a large pram taking up the space of two chairs. There were no other free tables, so I asked politely if she could move it so I could sit. She gave me a dirty look and mumbled something about needing space. I get that babies come with stuff but why should that mean no one else can sit? AIBU for asking?

So you’d go for a four person table rather than a two person table with the prams on the side. The babies are staying in the prams or sitting on their carers laps as they can’t sit yet. Wouldn’t it be easier to be at a two person table? Like on a train, bus, plane when the baby sits on your lap? I’ve seen carers and babies in prams using tables with seats for the carers - two carers means two seats. I’ve never seen empty seats that count for babies in prams.
Of course there’s maximum capacity at venues and this is a noted occupancy like at a hotel. This isn’t seats but people that are counted.

The wheelchair is the seat. The unrequired chair can be taken to another table of course and indeed it is often set aside to give access to the wheelchair user to the table.

Which is another good point as I don’t want a stranger with a hot drink sat next to my baby. I can control the environment on my table when some random doesn’t join me

What do you mean? I’ve never encountered a shared space where a stranger would expect to sit with me at a small table I was occupying and eating at.

I'm kind of thinking most 2 people tables wouldn't have space beside them for buggies.

Are mums never allowed a hot drink?
Mums cannot juggle babies and hot drinks.

It's also a PITA to eat anything that involves cutlery with a baby on your knee.

Cafes and restaurants are for eating and drinking, trains are for travelling. It’s really not a comparable scenario.
No I don’t think I should have to hold my baby in my arms while I attempt to eat my lunch with no free hands because someone who arrived after me wants the space I’m using.

If she was on a 4 person table then YANBU. If it was a two person table you essentially asked her to remove her baby from the pram, fold it up, find a space to store it and then locate a highchair and settle her baby. So yes OP you were being unreasonable!!! She’s probably sleep deprived and trying to enjoy a cup of coffee in peace and you’re there asking her to move heaven and earth so you can share her TWO person table?!

It's very much unusual IME!

I've never asked someone if I can share their table, and I've never had anyone ask me.

If it's so busy that there's no tables then I go somewhere else or order take away. I'd never ask someone else if I could sit at the same table. I certainly wouldn't ask someone on a 2 seater to move their belongings (or baby!) to let me sit.

It is just as odd here. I don’t understand why people are pretending it isn’t. The baby in the pram is irrelevant. Even if the OP was alone at a 2 person table it would still be extremely weird to want to join her.

This is bonkers. You really encountered a mum at a cafe with her kid, using a 2 person table, just sauntered up and asked her to move her baby so you could sit there instead?

You the CF!!

That’s your experience and it’s different to mine.
You’d be troubled on public transport because in trains it is usual to have some one next to you or across from you eating and drinking. On a plane people eat and drink. It’s the same in cafes - well those that I go to.

Yabu. One of the worst things about the Internet today is that you will 100 percent find other like minded people who will tell you that you're reasonable but the majority are already saying you're not. I wonder if it will change your mind in future?

Don’t be silly. You surely know that a train/plane isn’t comparable to a table in a cafe.
Just for the record, I hate it if someone sits next to me on a bus, but I suffer it because it’s socially acceptable.
I have never needed to sit next to a stranger on a plane as I’m seated with family.

FYI on a crowded train eating and drinking is also completely unreasonable

It’s not really the done thing to ask to share small tables in a cafe. Nothing to do with whether there was a pram or anything else in the space that you wanted to sit - the fact is she was using the table and the space wasn’t free.

The babies are in the prams whilst the carers eat and drink.
It’s not easy looking after a baby. I never had a hot drinks whilst out with my kids or anything tricky to eat. I used a sling instead of a pushchair. At home I was mindful or hot drinks and avoided these. A hot cup on a coffee table is a danger. I organised myself to focus on my child’s needs.

It happens all the time!

Changed my vote from YANBU to YABU.
I thought you meant the pram was blocking the way for you to sit down at a table.
You wanted to move the pram to sit at her two seater table though?!
YABU as there'd barely be enough room for her and the baby without some randomer pitching up at the table as well.

You realise this is MUMSnet? Yet you've chosen to go with that angle. Right.

As I pointed out last night, OP made no mention of a spare CHAIR.

Secondly, the day all mums with babies stop visiting cafés and paying £3 for a cup of tea is the day those cafés shut up shop for good, having gone out of business. Cafés need all customers, possibly with the exception of people who bring a laptop and stay for the whole working day, nursing a single coffee.

Would your discrimination stretch to a mother with a child in a bulky wheelchair?

The comparison to public transport doesn’t work. We get on a bus / train knowing that strangers might sit with us.

If I was in a communal changing room, I’d think nothing of someone changing in the space next to me. I’d think they were mad if they suggested they shared my cubicle.

There’s nothing wrong with a baby being in a pram while you eat your lunch though! What sort of mummy martyrdom is this where you expect someone to organise themselves to focus on their child’s needs by forgoing a 2 handed lunch!! This is crazy.
There’s nothing wrong with having a coffee or lunch while out with a baby 😂

YABU. I hate sharing tables with strangers and would have said I minded if you asked me.

Didn't you check to see there were spaces before you ordered?

If the woman was sitting at a three person plus sized table with her pram placed two where other people could sit AND there was an alternative, convenient, easy to access space next to her for the pram YANBU to ask nicely.
If you expected her to collapse the pram or move the pram away from next to her or for her baby to be anywhere other than when it was or ot put herself to a great deal of faffing about then YABU

When you use a sling instead of a pram/pushchair you have to adapt to your child’s needs. No hot drinks and no difficult to eat hot (warmth not spice) foods. The reason for this that when you sit down your child is on your lap and if you are standing up your child is against you. I didn’t carry my child on my back which changes standing and eating.

You were super unreasonable OP. For obvious reasons.