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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

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Original poster

To use the disabled loo to avoid sitting on turds?

259 replies

HellHathNoFury · 18/04/2009 14:24

I was in Sainsburys earlier and in the queue for the loo. I was desperate and waited for a while. Eventually it was my turn, and this little old lady hobbled out and so I went in and saw she had left a whole actual nugget of a turd on the toilet seat.
At the back.

I am PG and it was not something I needed to see so I backed out and legged it off to the disabled loo.

When I came out I was told off by a man in a wheelchair for using the disabled loo. Couldn't be bothered to explain turd incident. Just walked off.

AIBU?

OP posts:

Reallytired · 18/04/2009 19:53

48 hours ago, I had a temporary disablity caused by SPD. (I gave birth to a daughter 2 days ago). For the last 4 weeks of my pregnancy I could only walk 20 metres. I found that walking upstairs a nightmare that reduced me to tears. Infact 4 days before I gave birth I could only walk if I held on to furniture. I also had incontinence issues which was embrassing.

Since the birth of my daughter I have got back about 80 to 90% of my mobiltiy. It is such a difference and I am confident that I will continue to make progress.

I posted a thread whether it was OK for me to use a disabled loo and the general concenus was not to be silly. However now I would not dream of using a disabled loo. Even though I have not slept in the last 48 hours.

I don't think that able bodied people should use disabled loos. I don't think that normal pregnancy or having children counts as extenuating circumstances.

BigBellasBeerBelly · 18/04/2009 20:03

Do you mean that you don't think you should have used the disabled toilet towards the end of your pregnancy reallytired? Your post is not clear.

BigBellasBeerBelly · 18/04/2009 20:04

Please can you link to your other thread so that I can have a read?

Many cograts on your baby as well, and glad you are feeling better

herbietea · 18/04/2009 20:09

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

herbietea · 18/04/2009 20:10

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn

BigBellasBeerBelly · 18/04/2009 21:30

Found reallytired's thread!

There seem to be a lot of different views on this subject, all very interesting.

saint2shoes · 18/04/2009 21:36

By Riven on Sat 18-Apr-09 18:15:38
'I cannot understand why people think that disabled toilets are only for disabled people? '

odd that. Us disableds campaigning for years so we could pee while non-disableds have been able to wee in public toilets for decades.
We don't have a fucking choice. There is generally only 1 loo for us. Non-disableds get lots of loos but some still feel the need to use ours.
The OP should have wiped the turd off and used the loo she was in. Its no big deal.

well said, I wonder if that could be quote of the week

BigBellasBeerBelly · 18/04/2009 21:41

So we go full circle.

Disabled toilets are for people who are registered disabled, not for people who in their own not very objective judgement happen to be feeling a bit disabled at the moment. They should not be used just because people are desperate or old or have a buggy or whatever. They are for registered disabled people only.

If you see a disabled sign, do not use the toilet. Simple as.

That was what marmazon was saying as well so it seems we finally have some consensus.

melll · 18/04/2009 21:44

i've read this thread now and am quite surprised by some of the views. namely those that say disabled loos are purely for the certified disabled. i am not the sort of mother to leave my baby on their own in a corridor or a public toilet while i enter the cubicle. i did so today in asdas as i had absolutely no choice but i don't feel comfortable doing so at all. and it is unreasonable to suggest that the child, who is possibly sleeping should be extracted from their pushchair and balanced on mother's knee. they can be quite wriggly you know! also all valuables would have to be removed from the pushchair and taken into the toilet... and then put back again. alone with sleeping child at the end of a day's shopping anyone?
seriously?

BigBellasBeerBelly · 18/04/2009 21:47

I always wait for the end cubicle and go with the door open and DDs pushchair blocking the door/view IYSWIM.

Would you feel comfortable doing that?

Reallytired · 18/04/2009 21:49

BigBellasBeerBelly,

Prehaps what I am not sure of was what counts as being disabled. Its really hard to know where to draw the line.

I can understand why some people might think at a pregnant lady should be allowed to disabled loo. However most pregnant women are quite capable of climbing stairs, even during the third trimester. Many pregnant women are physically capable of working full time to quite close to their due date. (Admitally I was forced to give up work quite early)

No one likes having a turd on a loo. However imagine that the disabled toilet was the only one that you could use and it had a turd on. Many people with disablites would be physically unable to clean the loo and might have had a toilet accident before a cleaner had done the job. If that had happened to me last week, I think I would have sobbed uncontrollably.

Having a disablity (temporary or permament) pervades every aspect of your life. Last week I found simple things like getting in and out of a bath a nightmare. My son has had a cr*p easter holiday as I could not take him out. I could not go shopping, do the washing and house work.

It is not an everyday convience like having a large push chair, lots of shopping or having a turd on the loo seat.

melll · 18/04/2009 21:49

i don't see why i should have to have people see me pee or worse when the disabled loo which 9 times out of 10 is also a babychange unless it's a radar key type is free.

ravenAK · 18/04/2009 21:52

Maybe we should be making common cause & using 'suggestion boxes' or emailling head office whenever somewhere doesn't have at least a couple of accessible loos - perhaps a ratio of 20% of cubicles?

I'd've just used a bit of loo roll to de-turd the seat, though.

melll · 18/04/2009 21:53

yes raven it would be great if in amongst the normal loos they had one wide one where you could fit a pushchair in. but in the meantime...

melll · 18/04/2009 21:54

sorry that sounds a bit arsey doesn't it. didn't mean it too sorry

BigBellasBeerBelly · 18/04/2009 21:59

Reallytired, yes exactly, which is why there should be clear rules. Being pregnant is not a disability, nor is being old or desperate to go or having a buggy. The consensus on this thread seems to be that disabled toilets are for registered disabled people only and that seems pretty clear cut and straightforward. Surely as soon as you start letting people decide for themselves, subjectivity creeps in and the system will be open to abuse.

FWIW I have spent time in a wheelchair myself (only a few months though) and many months in non-weightbearing plasters which make it a total bitch to get around.

I'm not sure what that has to do with anything though.

I think what I will take away from this thread is that if a toilet has a disabled sign on it then it is not for my use.

Like I said earlier it is easy enough to look for alternative facilities/ask someone where the non-disabled toilets are.

Babieseverywhere · 18/04/2009 22:05

Would it help if all public toilets were to be made accessible for everyone, large enough for wheelchairs/buggies AND have baby change stations. i.e. Get rid of Mens and Ladies all together. Just have more 'accessible for all' toilets ?

Although I do understand there will always be some people who may need to have priority access regardless.

MintyyAeroEgg · 18/04/2009 22:05

I used a loo with the disable badge on it today. Was in M&S. I went in to the ladies but there was a queue and I was quite desperate. Popped in and out, including handwash, in about 1 min. No one in a wheelchair waiting for me to vacate when I came out. Public loos are public loos and are provided for all to use.

I witnessed an awful scene in Surrey Quays shopping centre recently. A woman who used a wheelchair went to use the disabled loo but it was locked and needed a radar key and she didn't have one. I was taking my dc to the "normal" ladies loo at the time. She came in to the ladies in her wheelchair but the chair wouldn't go through the door into the cubicle. She was getting desperate, I could see. I went out and tried to find someone for her from the shopping centre so she could get a radar key. Eventually found a member of staff ... he went off to get the key ... she had been waiting ages by then and was getting really distressed.

Would she not have been better off if the disabled toilet had been accessible to all and, if she had had to wait, it would only have been for the one person in there before her? Rather than the 10 minutes or so to track down a radar key?

saint2shoes · 18/04/2009 22:10

MintyyAeroEgg that is bad, radar keyes are easy to get if you are disabled though.

saint2shoes · 18/04/2009 22:11

(I have dd's on my key ring so at least I could help people like that)

Grendle · 18/04/2009 22:11

So are the only registered disabled people those in wheelchairs then ? Or is it only people in wheelchairs who are also registered disabled who can use disabled loos? Cos, if that's not the case, then how would anyone know just by looking at someone else (pregnant or not and with or without a toddler in tow) whether they have a disability?

I used to know someone who used a catheter and was also occasionally faecally incontinent. She was registered disabled. She needed a loo with a sink in it to deal with her equipment. One day she might be pregnant and/or have a toddler in tow. If she uses a disabled loo is she breaking the 'disabled loo' rules and likely to be subject to abuse or negative comments from people who think that she's not entitled to use their toilet?

Which of us really knows what another individual's needs genuinely are?

GoodbyeClement · 18/04/2009 22:15

BigBella no no no please don't think that it is not for your use. it is an accessible toilet, so that people with access difficulties eg children/wheelchairs etc can go to the loo. But that doesn't preclude anyone else using it! There's a lift too, but it's not for the exclusive use of people who can't climb stairs!

The bottom line is that some people think you shouldn't, so if you want to avoid people tutting at you, don't use one. But if you want to be part of the body of sensible people who manage to change misconceptions, you can use it with total confidence.

saint2shoes · 18/04/2009 22:16

bloody hell so children in buggys and wheelchairs are the same!!

GoodbyeClement · 18/04/2009 22:28

no, but they need the same level of accessibility, which is what we're discussing

MintyyAeroEgg · 18/04/2009 22:36

Thats an interesting poster name GC. Did you know him?

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