7.5 months pregnant & rudely refused a seat on the train!

MissKeith

Forget not asking for a seat, I'm heavily pregnant and also have scoliosis. There would be no way I could stand for a long period of time without being in intense pain. If I need a seat I've got no shame in asking for me.

On the other hand, pre pregnancy, I would rather have chewed off my own arm than stayed seated when someone else who needed my seat more had to stand. I would give my seat up in a heart beat and will do so when this baby isn't playing pogo on my spine.

I was raised to give consideration and compassion towards others. I'm saddened that others haven't the same mindset as me as evidenced by so many responses on here.

ash28

uk_american wrote: »

I'm finding this discussion to be quite interesting from a cultural perspective! All the insights of whether someone can/should ask or can/should offer a seat...

I've been here in the UK for 4 years, and seat offering is much more plentiful is my corner of Essex than it is in London. Previously I've been in Germany 5 years, where someone just standing in front of a priority seating area would be enough for a person sitting there to recognise the need and move, no asking needed.

Once on a local bus in Mexico, it was crowded and all the children were shoo'd off the seats as older people got on the bus, the babies and toddlers were then 'redistributed' to any available laps...I ended up with a random 2 year old riding on my lap the rest of the way. :eek: Different cultural norms...

Growing up in the US in the late 70's early/80's, I was fortunate to spend a lot of time with my 3 grandparents who were quick to drill in the lessons of growing up during the depression and WW2, one of those being, that as a healthy, able-bodied person, you have a responsibility to get out of a seat if someone needs it more than you, and when in doubt to gently offer. It seems to me a more prevalent mentality in the US, but maybe I need to compare more similar areas, such as New York to London, vs. small towns.

As a child in the 1950s and 1960s in the UK, where we lived was pretty much as you describe Mexico - young children who had seats were distributed around the other passengers and sat on their laps and no one gave it a thought.

As a child I was brought up to give up my seat to any adult that was standing and always did.

I would still give up my seat to anyone who was standing, an elderly person, someone who was disabled, a mother with young children or a pregnant woman.

Sometimes when I have the window seat and I have asked if I could get out and then asked someone if they would like my seat it has resulted in the person in the outside seat into giving up theirs too.....

I brought all of my children up (in their 30s now) to give up their seats to anyone that may need a seat more than they do and I would be horrified if i found out they didn't.

My bug bear is bags on the empty seats - I have asked before if the bag has a ticket.

Buellguy

ash28 wrote: »

As a child in the 1950s and 1960s in the UK, where we lived was pretty much as you describe Mexico - young children who had seats were distributed around the other passengers and sat on their laps and no one gave it a thought.

As a child I was brought up to give up my seat to any adult that was standing and always did.

I would still give up my seat to anyone who was standing, an elderly person, someone who was disabled, a mother with young children or a pregnant woman.

Sometimes when I have the window seat and I have asked if I could get out and then asked someone if they would like my seat it has resulted in the person in the outside seat into giving up theirs too.....

I brought all of my children up (in their 30s now) to give up their seats to anyone that may need a seat more than they do and I would be horrified if i found out they didn't.

My bug bear is bags on the empty seats - I have asked before if the bag has a ticket.

Oh yes, I have (on a train) asked someone if they could move their bag, they ignored me (looked at me and said why?) easy solution, I sat on the bag :rotfl::rotfl:
They moved it quite quickly then, crushed food and all

ginger_tony

I must say i think think that was terrible no one giving a pregnant lady a seat and her fellow passengers should be ashamed of themselves l personally would have given her a seat. On the other hand though one day on a bus one of my children (who had paid for a ticket) offered and old lady a seat and she nearly took the head off my child and was insulted that they had got out their seat to give her a seat , she was very abusive and embaressed my boy. I told my son to sit back down and praised him for his good manners and told the woman that she ought to be ashamed of herself for the way she had treated a child who was trying to do her a good turn, all i heard was here here. So maybe you cant win and this is why people dont bother anymore.

Nicki

If you read the Opening Post again, you will see that a couple of passengers did get up to offer the OP their seat, once the lady she had asked had refused though.

So the issue is not that the OP had to stand for the whole journey, but that she targetted one individual who was sitting in a priority seat and asked her to move, and that individual refused to do in very rude terms.

dundeediva

hmm I think this is a difficult one as I see both sides-

I was raised to give up my seat to elderly etc. No mention of pregnant women etc BUT I would and have offered my seat before to pregnant women. This isn't a necessity however. The bottom line is, other adults have paid the same price for their ticket and maybe don't see why they should have to stand.

I am currently pregnant (at the stage where its VERY obvious im not just fat lol) but I wouldn't take someone's seat on the bus if it's busy. Yes it sucks sometimes being massive and hauling big swollen feet and ankles around but at the end of the day, i'm not an invalid! I understand that some people may have health issues related to pregnancy but being pregnant doesn't make you "entitled" to anything that you weren't "entitled" to before. The only difference to me is my massive bump, it doesn't stop me standing for a while!!

Juxxize

Here is a quote from the BabyCenter Blog
'Shortness of breath. Inability to lift heavy objects. Need for specific seating. Exhaustion. Months of nausea followed by months, possibly a year, off work. Are these the markers of a disability?

Sorry, ladies. You aren’t disabled. You are pregnant.

A month ago I pulled my car into a disabled space in front of a baby store. My daughter is disabled and we have a badge. Next to me a man waited in his car, also in a disabled spot. No badge.

I knocked on his window. I tried – and probably did not succeed on any level – to not sound annoyed. “Sorry, but you are parking in a disabled spot.”

“But, my wife…” he sputtered, “she’s pregnant.” He gestured towards the baby store. “She’s inside and I’m waiting for her'

It gets my point across better than I put myself because these situations with pregnant ladies drive me crazy , they seem to think the world should stop for them because they are pregnant would the thread author have given up her seat for a real disabled person had one come along after the other person gave up their seat for her?
A person can not in any way consider being pregnant as a form of disability it's a insult to people who are really disabled in wheelchairs for life and such and not just fat for a few months it's maddness to class them as the same. Anyone who has had to make their way around and about with a person in a wheelchair knows it's not easy and nothing like being pregnant ( I know there are other forms of disability not just people in wheeelchairs, I'm just using that as an example because it's what I have experience in).
It maddans me that supermarkets have lots of carpark spaces marked for people with children and hardly any disabled carpark spaces because family's are the big spenders.
Being pregnant is not the same as being disabled end of, but that being said I think the young girl would have had that attitude whether the women was disabled or a 100 years old because she was just horrid, if she didn't want to give up her seat she could have just said 'no these seats are for disabled and old people as neither are on the train/ bus I'm sat here if one comes along I will give up my seat untill then I'm sitting here' I'm sorry but if there was no disabled or old people on the train/ bus she has as much right as anyone to sit there even if she was very very rude about it.
I want you all to ask yourself this if a person was just very fat would you give up your seat for them?

LannieDuck

There's a lot of bad assumptions and negative stereotypes in this post. You sound very bitter.

Juxxize wrote: »

Here is a quote from the BabyCenter Blog
'Shortness of breath. Inability to lift heavy objects. Need for specific seating. Exhaustion. Months of nausea followed by months, possibly a year, off work. Are these the markers of a disability?

Sorry, ladies. You aren’t disabled. You are pregnant.

I don't think anyone on this thread has claimed that pregnancy is a disability. What it can do is give the woman a whole host of painful and uncomfortable pregnancy-related illnesses, such as SPD. It's a bit of pot-luck whether you get them or not. Some women end up in wheelchairs by the end of their pregnancy, conversely there's a great video of a lady online who's 8 or 9 months pregnant leading a zumba class.

The description you post above is of an uncomplicated pregnancy. Maybe half of my NCT group had uncomplicated pregnancies. Everyone else had a range of complications, from full-on SPD to PGP (me), to other complications that wouldn't require a tube seat (e.g. infection that can pass from mum-child and the name of which totally escapes me at present).

Juxxize wrote: »

A month ago I pulled my car into a disabled space in front of a baby store. My daughter is disabled and we have a badge. Next to me a man waited in his car, also in a disabled spot. No badge.

I knocked on his window. I tried – and probably did not succeed on any level – to not sound annoyed. “Sorry, but you are parking in a disabled spot.”

“But, my wife…” he sputtered, “she’s pregnant.” He gestured towards the baby store. “She’s inside and I’m waiting for her'

There's a name for people like that - w*nkers. Unfortunately, even w*nkers are allowed to breed.

Pop onto any baby forum and you'll find Mum+baby spaces debated at length (mostly in relation to whether you can park in one when heavily pregnant). I haven't seen anyone on those forums who thinks they can park in a disabled space while pregnant.

Juxxize wrote: »

It gets my point across better than I put myself because these situations with pregnant ladies drive me crazy , they seem to think the world should stop for them because they are pregnant

Heh, way to tar every pregnant lady with the same brush! Read back over the thread - you'll find many who've explicitly said that they wouldn't ask for a priority seat. Not every pregnant woman will need to.

Juxxize wrote: »

would the thread author have given up her seat for a real disabled person had one come along after the other person gave up their seat for her?

If you have two people less able to stand and only one priority seat, I would hope that someone in a non-priority seat would give theirs up. You might as well ask what would happen if two disabled people got on that tube. Would you expect one of them to stand because there was only one priority seat?

Juxxize wrote: »

A person can not in any way consider being pregnant as a form of disability it's a insult to people who are really disabled in wheelchairs for life and such and not just fat for a few months it's maddness to class them as the same. Anyone who has had to make their way around and about with a person in a wheelchair knows it's not easy and nothing like being pregnant ( I know there are other forms of disability not just people in wheeelchairs, I'm just using that as an example because it's what I have experience in).

This is obviously an emotional issue for you, but again, I don't belive anyone is claiming that pregnancy is a disability. Only that a proportion of pregnant women are less able to stand on public transport.

Juxxize wrote: »

It maddans me that supermarkets have lots of carpark spaces marked for people with children and hardly any disabled carpark spaces because family's are the big spenders.

Mum + baby spaces have been created because of how difficult it is to get a baby seat in and out of the car in a normal-width space. Nothing to do with disabilities. They're in addition to, not instead of disabled spaces.

Juxxize wrote: »

Being pregnant is not the same as being disabled end of, but that being said I think the young girl would have had that attitude whether the women was disabled or a 100 years old because she was just horrid, if she didn't want to give up her seat she could have just said 'no these seats are for disabled and old people as neither are on the train/ bus I'm sat here if one comes along I will give up my seat untill then I'm sitting here' I'm sorry but if there was no disabled or old people on the train/ bus she has as much right as anyone to sit there even if she was very very rude about it.

Err... unless the space was explicity for disabled, old people or heavily pregnant people, as many are (read up the thread for examples).

Juxxize wrote: »

I want you all to ask yourself this if a person was just very fat would you give up your seat for them?

That's really quite offensive to women who have difficult pregnancies.

Saturnalia

Pregnancy isn't a disability but it can certainly make the pregnant woman a bit less able than usual, on a temporary basis.

I don't get not standing up to let a person who appears to need the seat more sit down. Besides good manners, a pregnant woman with a large bump is taking up two people's standing space on a crowded train, but if she sits she only takes up one seating space.

Ok, there are mums who are entitlement princesses but they seem to be a very small but very loud minority - and in the OP it was the non-pregnant sitting girl who had that attitude on her, not the mum.

will.i.amnt

I stay away from priority seats too,far too much hassle.

However,if they're the last ones left, I'll sit in one. Thing is,if I stand in one place too long my back muscles spasm and don't de-stress again for hours, or days. I'm 6'2" and relatively fit looking, but, yes, im just as entitled to sit as a pregnant woman imo. Taking tramadol for back pain really isn't my idea of fun,and my work put me sick for 48hrs every time i take it.

The problem is, i dont LOOK like i have anything wrong with me, if someone like the OP asked me to move,id refuse, but everyone else on the bus/train would think i was a !!!!!!. That's hardly fair.