Baby-changing etiquette

[MyRealName]

Can anyone clarify the rules for me?

My DD is now 10 wks old. She loves being taken out to the park/the shops/visit people, anywhere there are new things to look at. And I love taking her. However changing/feeding her away from home just stresses me out.

When she was 4wks old, DH and I took her out to shops far enough away (15 min drive) to have to change her while out, for the first time. Within seconds of entering the first shop she started crying, showing signs of starvation (she is EBF) and needing a nappy change. In a flustered-new-mum-first-time-out kind of way I headed straight for the baby-changing room. The door was propped open with a chair, but I had to move it and close the door to get to the changing table, but didn't lock it. I changed her quickly, but she was still upset and hungry. There was a nice comfy armchair in the opposite corner and no queue (I checked), so I sat down to feed her. Less than a minute later, a lady comes backing in with a buggy. She sees me and apologises for barging in, and asks if I mind if she uses the changing table. I apologise back for taking up space, and say of course I don't mind. However, her two friends outside, one with a pram, start moaning loudly about me. Things such as "she's shut herself in there for the duration", "she would leave us out here for hours" and "these young mums have no consideration". I'm 27. I was so flustered, I cut short DD's feed and followed the other mum out. The friend who also had a very young baby glares at me and goes in. Honestly I was in there max 5-6 minutes in total. I hurried back to the car and fed DD there, but did go back to finish the shopping I was determined to do.

Not many days later I was in a different baby-changing room, this time one with a toilet in it. I really needed the loo, but was changing baby first. I locked the door, obviously. As I started changing her, someone tried the door. Then they knocked, so I called out something along the lines of "changing baby, just a minute". She replied to hurry up, her boy (a toddler who was crying) needed changing. I did hurry up, but she continued knocking and making impatient remarks. I left quickly without going to the loo, and she huffed past me.

Now, am I missing something?
Do I just attract miserable people or is there an important point of etiquette that is passing me by? Is 4-5 minutes really an unacceptably long time to change a newborn? When there was no queue and a comfy chair, was it embarrassingly wrong to start feeding? Do you lock the door, or not? When you see the changing/feeding sign on a door, does that mean bottle-fed babies only? Now when I'm out I find myself rushing to change nappies and try to avoid doing it because of these early experiences. I am fairly comfortable feeding in public now e.g. in a quite corner of a coffee shop, but do prefer to be discreet. I'm sad it has all become a source of stress.

Please, someone give me "THE RULES".

PS-Sorry for being long-winded!

i've got 3 kids (3, 2, 6months), i ebf too and in 3yrs i've only ever had a bit of a sigh outside the door - and there are times when my whole family of 5 have locked ourselves in a room to all use the toilet and change 2 nappies!

If it's a room with lots of changing mats I don't lock the door (TBH I've never seen a lock on those doors cos presumably they are meant to be used by a few people at one time). If it's a room with only 1 changing mat I do lock the door purely because it's a PITA if you open the door thinking it's empty, manouvere your pushchair half in only to realise someone is in there and you've got to go back out again.

Presumably the room with a comfy armchair in was a feeding room? And if you are using a feeding room that is because you aren't yet comfortable feeding in public. So you would lock the door because you wouldn't want someone else to walk in and start changing their baby surely?

It would be better if shops had seperate feeding rooms to the changing room to prevent this problem or at least a curtain so someone could feed their baby whilst someone else changed theirs at the same time.

I can't comment on feeding because I'll bare my boobs anywhere but changing takes the time it takes. We flew with DS (coming up to 4 months) yesterday and changed him in 2 airport changing rooms, 1 busy where we were all good-naturedly manouevering round each other and one which had been occupied by another woman, and in an airplane loo.

If it's designed for multiple people you try to be polite with space, if it's single occupancy you take as little time as you can, same as if you yourself are going to the loo and there's a queue. If you and any need sorting you sort both of you. My nightmare is going to the loo myself when out with DS in his pram!

As for feeding, well, you were there first, no?

When I say occupied it was a big room and her stuff was e.v.e.r.y.w.h.e.r.e!