Was I being unreasonable not to fold my pushchair when travelling on a bus?

[mummycake]

I have recently read an article in the news of the world by veteran journalist Carole Malone who debated whether parents should be allowed to sit at the front of buses with their pushchairs as she believed that they take the spaces reserved for people with physical disabilities. She stated that pushchairs are designed to be folded flat and should therefore always be folded before going on a bus journey to avoid inconvieniance to others particularly wheelchair users. I used to be a regular public transport user when my son was tiny and rarely folded up my pushchair thinking that these spaces where meant for pushchair users also! Was I wrong to do this, as I would never for one minute want to inconvieniance anyone particularly those who would struggle to sit elsewhere. What are your opinions on this?? This is a genuine thread due to my interest in this matter and the hope that I have not made life difficult for people with more need for the seats than me. By the way I would have always given up my seat for wheelchair users but was concerned that people wouldnt come on the buses if they saw that these spaces were filled!!!

I have to say though, you wouldn't KNOW I got off because I saw a wheelchair.. I hit the bell when I saw the wheelchair at the stop and just wheeled off as normal. It wasn't some big deal, it was just a matter of course..

And I am in Yorkshire Wickedwench! Maybe it is just us!

The other point I would like to make from a disability standpoint - triggered by the comment about a child in a pushchair at 4 - is that I certainly know that I have had clients with children with autism (I am thinking of two in particular) who did not look obviously disabled who were wheeled about in pushchairs as it was the only way they could be kept safe in public/could be moved in the event of a meltdown. So it's not always straightforward. Certainly, for many of my clients there is also huge shame in being perceived as having a 'naughty' child. When you consider that children with physical disabilities are ignored when it should be obvious to others, then hidden disabilities are sadly going to be ignored even more.

Mrsbean (i knew this would go down the SN route) the 4 year old in the pushchair was chatting away eating crisp and when made to move (I am not shy and retiring) was being a totally everyday 4 year old with no sign of any SN psychical or otherwise (As well as a wheelchair bound one legged mother I have an SN child AS/tourettes) so I do take in to account these things.

Some people are just lazy/rude/selfish

Of course some people are, Kimi, just making a general point in the spirit of debate and discussion, not necessarily referencing your situation, it simply brought it into mind!

However, the essence of a hidden disability is that it is hidden.. which means that there are some four year olds who look outwardly to be typical in every way, when they are not e.g. metabolic disorders that cause children to tire easily etc.

There are so many variables, such richness of individual experience, that make it very difficult to judge the actions of a stranger in a brief encounter on the bus. One mother with a full pram might be making the first trip out, petrified. She might have PND. She might be in a total fog of terror about the whole trip and never stop to think once about anyone on the bus apart from her tiny bundle. Another might be a lazy old so-and-so who thinks it's her God given right to turf someone with a physical disability off a bus so that doesn't break a nail dismantling her pram. So hard to generalise.

I remember my first trip on the bus - I felt totally and utterly out of it. Now that I think about it there could have been a queue of fifteen people in wheelchairs lining up for the bus and I would barely have registered them because the little man was screaming and I was just caught up in it all. Selfish? Oh probably.. but it was all I could do at the time and pretty much a one off. In another three or four months, when he is sitting upright and I have done a few more trips, it will undoubtedly be second nature to me to fold and stow the buggy and comfort him all at once. In the meantime, I'm somewhere in between the two poles and so getting my clunky pram off the bus if necessary is a compromise.

This is one thing that makes me sick of mumsnet, the person that was there the person that knows get all this rubbish of "oh could be SN " "Could be having a bad day" and so on.

I had one woman on the bus keep pointing to the photo of the buggy as she could not read it said buggies could use the space unless a wheelchair needed it she just saw the picture of the buggy and that was that, she did move however.

I really like the bus drivers who refuse to move the bus till the offending buggy as been moved.

My mother gets out once a week, she has no choice but to get the bus, we do avoid it at school run times as lots of mums and buggies need to be on it more then we do, so I think it has to be give and take, sadly a lot of people just want the world their own way

Sorry, again, Kimi, I am just talking in a very general sense and not at all referring to the situation you were in specifically.

Just thinking aloud, as it were.

I haven't thought about public transport in this way in a while, and it's just reminding me of the issues that are faced by people with SN (given that this is my work and it is of interest to me).

And as before, of course there are total lazy so-and-so's who just have a total sense of self-entitlement. Surely the point of a discussion forum is to discuss the general rather than the specific - unless something very specific is highlighted, which wasn't where or how this thread started?

I know children do have hidden problems, I am sure a lot of people wonder why DS1 does what he does, this far we have resisted getting I have Tourettes tattooed on his forehead .

What, no flashing neon lights?

I have to say before I started my training, I don't believe I really saw people with disabilities, hidden or otherwise. What's worse, I didn't even realise I didn't. When you become aware, it's amazing to realise how many people are struggling that just didn't even register on your radar. I am shamed and saddened by that..

I remember, as a teen, seeing a man trying to get on a bus and waving wildly and (to my eyes then) grunting at the driver. He was kicked off because the driver thought he was high. It must have been four years later that he popped into my head and I suddenly realised - he was communication impaired! (Most probably deaf). I often think of that..

It's awful to think of people staying in their homes and avoiding public transport - which should be a lifeline if you don't have a car - because of this blindness to difference and disability.

Now, see, I fall out with the mother's who get on the bus with their prams (which is fine, I do it myself) park it in the space (also fine, also do) sit next to it, and then get their half a dozen mates to sit and stand in a clump next to them, not only taking up the other buggy/wheelchair space but also half the aisle and all the priority seats.

That's a whole new level of inconsiderate, imo, but it happens a lot around here.

I'll happily shift for the wheelchair user (and I am that new mother who'll get off the bus rather than fold, because I can't for the life of me imagine trying to fold my pram whilst holding my eight week old on an unstable bus with a bad back) because I think I should shift for the wheelchair user, but another mother's chavvy able-bodied mates....

Errr, no!

And, no, they don't move for the lone wheelchair user I've seen either.

I was once on a bus where a man had parked a large cupboard in the wheelchair space and then sat down on the pull-down seat next to it (which doubles as buggy space). When a mum (also very heavily pregnant) got on with a child in a buggy he got out of his seat and made her struggle to fold up the buggy and lift it up to the luggage rack while making no move to help her, and said not one word to the man with the cupboard who just sat there and watched. I wanted to get up and help her to make a point but didn't dare let go of ds's SN buggy as he was pushing his legs against the wall to try and tip it over and it was taking all my strength to hang on to him. (We were in second buggy space). The bus driver was quite aggressive to the girl and I kept wanting to say something to him but was too nervous and then it was too late. I'm still really ashamed of myself for not sticking up for her though .

Sorry the driver got out of his seat.

I'm obviously naive, but I'm just really surprised at cory's experience/expectation of so many unhelpful mothers. In my (admittedly rare) experiences of being on the bus with a buggy when a wheelchair user got on, there was no question of waiting to be asked. As the bus drew up at the stop and opened the middle doors, I exited. I'm not talking about being noble, I'm talking about a strong expectation that I would get publicly shamed if I didn't follow the rules. And I can't believe that only a minority of mothers would do exactly the same.

I bow to your experience, Riven. I'm just really shocked. Come the revolution...