Hurrah for outraged tube commuter

[Cyclebump]

I travel an hour and a half each way to work and am now 22 weeks pg with DC1. Am starting to get very painful ligament stretching and have prior hip issues that mean it's getting hard to stand for long periods.

Bump is big and highly visible.

Last night on the tube, I stood from Victoria to Ealing Common. I just don't have the balls to ask for a seat but several people saw my bump and took seats anyway, I was even pushed out of the way by one.

Suddenly, man who was also standing got flustered. 'That seat should be yours! Does this sing mean nothing?' he shouted (pointing to the priority seat sign) 'What are you people? Blind?! It's disgusting!'

I gratefully took the seat that was duly offered even though I was only one stop from home.

[sh77]

LOL! I am quite a skinny bird and until recently, I suppose my belly looked like bad bloat, which may be why I have never been offered a seat. Nearly 30 weeks and the tiredness kicked massively in this morning. Not sure how long I can travel on tubes.

[GroovyGretel]

Isn't it strange how differently people react? I don't live in London anymore (sob) but regularly take my dc for trips and almost everytime we travel by tube we get offered a seat!

Now admittedly we don't travel at rush hour very often, but my dc are 7 and 5 and they quite enjoy strap hanging so I always feel embarrassed.

On the other hand, I am a big heifer so perhaps they think I'm pg as well.

[sh77]

There was a lovely lady on the tube this morning. She was sat in the priority seat but was engrossed in her book and so I didn't want to disturb her. When she got up for her stop she apologised profusely and said that I should have nudged her.

This is in contrast to a bloke sat in priority seat who looked at my belly and then looked down. I waited to see if he would get off at the next stop. He didn't and then I asked him whether he really needed the priority seat and he jumped off.

[Cyclebump]

Awwwww, what a star! Thanks to the snow I've been able to get a seat mostly as I'm one of the few braving it to get in.

[TL02]

I'm liking ricketyrock's thinking, just sit down anyway, if a person is in the seat or not!! love it. But everyone is so right, it's absolutely outrageous the way people look down at a paper or even pretend to be sleeping. I'm still in 1st trimester of my second child and people look at you as if you've got 2 heads. I'm very lucky though to have my own personal guard, my 4yo son shouts 'excuse me my mummy has a baby in her belly' it's priceless and always works for getting a seat.

[maxybrown]

lucielooo that is just bloody rude

[bumperella]

I agree that a lot of people in the UK do seem to just be plain rude. A lot, not all (I'm not... honest!).

[lucielooo]

Well to add to this, another of the ladies I work with is 37 weeks pregnant and very very clearly heavily pregnant.. she had to stand for 4 hours yesterday and when she asked someone for a seat they said no! no-one else in the carriage offered either. That's pretty disgusting actually.

[maxybrown]

Ushag - and that was my point I was making 6 million pages ago - how amout a bit of plain common decency! Like I said - not just to pregnant women. It's like sitting on the bus and putting all your bags on the seat next to you - fair enough if bus half empty and you move them when people get on but when the bus is packed and people still do that, then when people ask if they can sit down, they look all indignant at having to move their bags - er i don't believe your bags have paid for a seat have they?

[ushag]

I'm afraid people in the UK are bloody rude and not brought up properly! (I can't believe I just wrote that but....) When I was a kid and on the bus I would always stand up to offer my seat to an adult (pregnant or not) if the bus was full, because that it what my Mum brought me up to do. It wouldn't occur to me not to. I really don't think they don't notice, they're just too selfish. When we were on holiday in Spain and travelling on the train when ds was a baby people always got up and let me sit down as I was carrying a baby. The one time a young bloke didn't, he was berated by a few people in the carriage and looked like he wanted to crawl into a hole! Mind, we don't seem to be too fond of pregnant women, babies and young children here - I think its left-over Victorianism

[melwood]

Sorry to hear the awful stories on here. I have to say I got a "baby on board" badge (issued by the tube) and have been offered a seat on every journey so far. The people that usually offer are English oldish men, so keep on the lookout for them and stand in front of them I'd say! Good luck to all xx

[bumperella]

Should add: I commute to/from Edinburgh, so it really isn't just a London / Southern thing.

[bumperella]

I'm 21 weeks and don't mind standing (at the moment!). But what I do really REALLY mind is people pushing/elbowing me to get onto trains. I'ts not on to do it EVER to ANYONE for that matter!

[JintyMcGinty]

I can manage to stand for part of the journey, although I'm only 5ft 1 and huge and very tired at the end of the day. What I can't bear is being jostled and bashed. Some of the trains I get into work are so crowded that you can hardly squeeze on! It's the crush against me and men's lap top bags banging against my bump that I hate, hate, hate. I get very protective of my bump :) That's why I asked for a seat.

[dustythedolphin]

Ooops that was a bit unfortunate for your Dh but to be fair on him, non PG communters should have offered him a seat as he was also carrying a child

[oranges]

oh i can top this. DH actually asked a pregnant woman to stand up so ds could sit down. To be fair, he didn't realise she was pregnant till she got up, then she brushed away his stammering apologies.
It was very crowded bus and dh had a baby in his arms too and ds was four and kept falling over. But I still cringe everytime I think of the story.

[nancydrewrockinaroundxmastree]

I can recall a fraught bus journey one evening. It was packed, I was hugely pregnant and standing facing the seats that face inwards so that my bump was literally inches from a womans face.

For 45 minutes I was jostled and pushed and swung from the overhead rail, each time anyone shoved past as they got off, my bump would hit the shopping bags on her lap pushing them into her face. On about the tenth occassion she just looked at me and said "FFS can you watch yourself".

FFS indeed!

[spongecakelover]

Another large injustice is feeling sooo ill and crap before you even look pregnant. When I'd grown the bump i'd come through all the feeling horrible, tired, vomitous stuff and actually found I didn't need a seat as much then as before!!

Was also told to 'get out of the way you fat fucking bitch' by a cyclist who nearly knocked me and DS1 over while we crossed (green man on.) Joy joy joy.

[Louplet]

I had the same problem with commuting when pregnant with DS1. I did find that opening my coat to clearly show my bump and constantly rubbing it helped to draw attention to it and the fact I was pregnant and not fat.

I also found that young men were often quicker to get up than women which I found interesting.

I hated the tube, particularly all the ignorant pushing and shoving, even at the end when I was very clearly pregnant

[BonoboBabies]

This happened to me so much as I had a relatively small bump all the way through - a great tip I was given which seemed to work more often than me huffing, puffing and rubbing my belly is to carry a pregnancy magazine and read it with the front cover held out so people who are maybe wondering if you are pregnant or not will get a big hint that yes you are!

I do remember one time this didn't work though - I was stood directly in front of a 30-40 year old man who definitely clocked that I was pregnant - he looked at me, then my bump and then my magazine, but he continued to sit and read his own material of choice - a sodding bible. There's Christian spirit for you...

[BoffinMum]

My practice was always to ask the person in the special seat to give it up for me, if they said no or whatever, then ask the next person along and so on. I never did have to ask more than twice. People generally start jumping up all over the place. Even though it was London!

The berk who said 'you're pregnant, not disabled' was just that - a berk, and not worthy of taking notice of. Wait until he breaks his leg or whatever. Karma will deal with him.

[Lucy88]

Is this just a 'Tube' thing or a southern thing. I live up North and when I was pregnant and had to use a bus or a train in the rush hour, I never had to ask for a seat. People would not hesitate to offer me a seat. I would more often than not very politely refuse, as I was pregnat and not ill and was more than capable of standing. I was very lucky to have a very trouble free pregnancy. Even stood for 90 minutes to watch a football match 2 days before my due date.

[lucielooo]

To add to this lameness on the infrequent occasions I've had to stand, there has been a seat but it's been a middle seat with two big people on either side so no way that I would fit in the middle! (really no way, not just a bit squashed.. it's a bit of a squash with 3 normal people!) This makes it even more awkward as I can't ask for a seat because there is one but I am just too big to fit in it! I think we should all be able to start maternity leave on getting your BFP and be done with it :)

[Cyclebump]

Sorry lucieloo, mine came out wrong too! Was agreeing with you!

Have just noticed that the BBC story says that 76% of pregnant women wouldn't ask for a seat. How shy are we as a nation of askers?!

[kenobi]

Cyclebump Just wanted to say that being shy about asking for a seat is like pushing a door with rusty hinges. It's hard the first couple of times, then it loosens up.

If you start now, by the end of your pregnancy you'll be bouncing up to knife-carrying gang members on the tube and brightly asking for a seat.

And you'll get it too.

People are rarely malicious, they're just in their own world.