AITA for using the disabled toilets when I feel I am e**itled to do so?

A Reddit user recently shared a dilemma that arose during a friend’s birthday celebration. Due to their IBS, they opted to use a disabled restroom for quicker access. However, their extended time in the restroom led to an impatient parent trying to enter with a staff member to access the baby-changing area. Now, they’re wondering if they were wrong to prioritize their health needs over the convenience of others. Read on to learn more about the situation below.

‘ AITA for using the disabled toilets when I feel I am e**itled to do so?’

So this happened today and it was a celebration for my friends 22nd birthday and we decided to do a Pub crawl for a celebration. For important info is that I have IBS so when I drink I Rarely can be triggered by it. I take medication to try and reduce my symptoms so I can’t gauruntee that my medication is 100% effective.

Anyways yeah I go out for a pub crawl for my mates birthday so naturally we start drinking alcohol and I start needing to use the toilets and I decide due to my ibs and several other underlying I am e**itled to use the disabled toilets which also acts as a baby change. Anyways I go to use the toilets and I am in there for 10-15 mins at max at least.

Some woman comes to the door and starts getting impatient. It gets to the point where she gets a staff member to open the door so she can go In so I have to shout that the toilet is occupied just so the door doesn’t open again (for clarity the door did open whilst I was still using the toilet).

I respect the woman needs to use the baby change and respect the baby has needs I should respect however I also have needs that should be respected too. So after what happened and they say maybe I should have just used the normal toilets. While that is viable and the disabled toilets were closer (disabled downstairs and right next to me normal upstairs) I feel like I have a right to use them unjudged and undisturbed. AITA

See what others had to share with OP:

Doktor_Seagull −  From my experience (my partner suffers regularly from IBS attacks) there are times when IBS suffers might have no choice but to occupy the nearest available toilet. The alternative being potential embarrassment or agonisingly painful cramps that induce nausea. Not everyone who suffers from IBS has the same symptoms though.

That said your post doesn’t mention any urgency. Just that you required the toilet. In that case you should prioritise the normal toilets as the disabled/baby changing facilities are the only ones available to the people who need those. Have to agree with the other commenters, YTA in this case.

aemondstareye −  I truly cannot believe that anyone would respond Y T A to this. First up: Disabled persons receive *priority* for disabled bathroom stalls. They are not *solely* for the disabled. I dare anyone on this website to tell me that they’ve never ever used the big stall when it was available in a crowded place and no disabled person needed its use. That’s absurd.

What’s fully clear, though, is that having a baby is *absolutely not a disability,* and **that woman has absolutely no right to demand that whoever is using the stall—who, for all she knows, could be a wheelchair user occupying the only workable stall—rush out as soon as her baby soils its diaper.

The fact that the restaurant has chosen to stow the changing table in the disabled stall is the restaurant’s problem—not yours. No one is obligated to accommodate that baby’s needs except that baby’s parents.

She’s not angry about the baby. She’s angry about the time that’s being taken away from her own night out and probably ruminating that this change should have been her husband’s turn. If you could have made it upstairs, you probably should’ve gone there. Ultimately it’s a pub bathroom.

There are not really rules to be had here. And you didn’t impact a person using a mobility device; you impacted a person who seemingly thought that anyone using the disabled bathroom—users who might ordinarily take longer, of course—should miraculously disappear out of existence as soon as she needed the table. Soft ESH.

[Reddit User] −  INFO: Why did you feel the need to use the disabled toilet? Were all the other ones taken?

RaineMist −  YTA. You having IBS should know that drinking alcohol can worsen and irritate it. There was no reason why you couldn’t use a regular stall.

CrimsonKnight_004 −  YTA – IBS does not prevent you from using a normal stall. You are not e**itled to use the disabled stall, especially when you know your condition (triggered by the alcohol) will likely mean you’ll be in there a long time, hogging it from people who genuinely need it. Whether that be for disability reasons, or changing a baby.

EDIT: ESH. The door to the stall should not have been opened on you. That was inappropriate and wrong. And since you clarified that you were flaring up, I definitely understand that you needed to rush.

[Reddit User] −  NTA – Why is she bringing a BABY TO A BAR????

LibelleFairy −  the a**hole in this case is the restaurant for putting the baby changing facilities inside the disabled toilet.

LogansRunaway −  Edit: NSH. It seems to me: OP is trying to *prevent* a poonami, it is an emergency scenario. OP doesn’t carry around spare pants, like say…in a diaper bag. Baby has *already had* a poonami, so it is no longer an emergent issue.

Just maybe a 5 minute diaper rash issue. Which, let’s face it, is usually for a much longer period of time. Parents don’t normally have a Bat Signal for their child’s frequent excrement, and it might be an hour or more for attention. The world does not revolve around your s**t machine – that you schlump around *in a bar*.

It also begs the question, why is OP engaging in an elective activity which always causes these situations? Party at home in the bathtub and start wearing Depends or something. Lactose intolerant people have similar symptoms, and *choose not to eat or drink* something that is toxic to them. At least in public.

-sic-parvis-magna −  ESH. Staff shouldn’t be opening a bathroom that’s in use without communicating with the occupant or thinking there is an emergency in there. Accessible bathrooms aren’t something you’re e**itled to, they’re something you need.

As someone with IBS, I understand that sometimes you need the closest bathroom because your body has decided it’s go time, but if you’re able to use a non-accessible bathroom then you should.

deathandtaxes2023 −  NTA – You have IBS. You don’t know how quickly you will need the bathroom – or how quickly that need will become urgent. You also don’t know how long you will need the bathroom for. I have autoimmune gastritis and, if it flares when I’m out I cannot imagine having to go through the cramps and sweats etc in a stall 2ft from someone else.

Do you think the Redditor was within their rights to use the disabled toilet, or should they have chosen the standard restroom despite their condition? How would you balance personal health needs with the comfort of others in a public setting? Share your thoughts below!