Be blunt, that’s why I’m asking. Is there any reason to believe that a handicapped person’s urgency is greater than mine (discounting the fact that I said I’d come back later)? After all, I don’t wait for an emergency… is there something about a dude in a wheelchair that would make him wait until it’s an emergency?
It’s getting to be my preference,even though I’ve lost weight,because the normal bathroom stalls can be incredibly tight squeezes. I’ve been in some where just moving your arms (especially in the winter, in a coat) is nearly impossible with the big huge toilet paper thingy on one side and the trash box on the other. I’ve had to straddle the bowl in some just to get in enough to close the door,and that’s not great with bad knees. And when traveling with a rolling carryon and a purse and CPAP? It’s the WABS every time.And in all the years I’ve been using public bathrooms since WABS came into being,I have never seen a person in a wheelchair enter one. If they ever did, you can be sure they would be given first crack at the facilities. And I find those stalls are usually cleaner than the others, in contrast to someone upthread.
Years ago, when I first read people writing in to chide Ann or Abby for “allowing” normal people to use WABS, the argument some people had was that the handicapped person may have to go immediately, and could not wait for someone using the WABS to finish. Well, what if there was another handicapped person using it? They’d have to wait then, wouldn’t they? And sometimes, I am the one who has to go immediately, able-bodied though I am. I don’t have IBS, or Crohn’s, but there are times when, if I eat the wrong food, or have waited too long, I need a bathroom right now. If the WABS is the only one available, I’m heading for it.
Put me in the “It’s Accessible, not Reserved” column. And make all stalls bigger!
I use the WABS at work all the time. There are no handicapped women where I work; in addition, most of the ladies avoid this stall because of its position relative to the sinks (you can see the toilet if you’re standing in front of the sinks at just the right angle). This stall tends to be the cleanest and best-smelling in the restroom; because it’s located on the opposite side of the room from the other stalls, it is rarely enveloped by the clouds of cheap air freshener some ladies insist on using.
In public, I’ll use WABS if the other stalls are occupied or excessively filthy.
Yes. Nerve damage.
It varies from person to person depending on injury and/or disability. For example, someone may be able to feel that her bladder is full but NOT have voluntary control over the muscles that keep urine in. So the time period between “Oh, I have to piss” and actually pissing herself may be minutes or less - and remember, she has NO ability to stop her bladder from emptying. Yes, such people frequently wear incontinence pads a.k.a. adult diapers but even if their piss won’t be running all over the floor forcing someone to sit in their own bodily wastes is… well, it’s cruel. There’s no other word for it.
In other cases, the nerve damage may be such that they simply can’t feel their bladder and bowels. At all. So they basically find out they need to go after their body has emptied itself into the diaper and, again, making someone sit in their own piss or shit is cruel when you could let them go ahead of you, able-bodied person who CAN control his or her bodily functions. In some cases these people are using catheters and a collection bag for their urine. If they’re just in to empty the bag they MIGHT be able to wait (and if so they’ll say something like “I can wait in line with everyone else”) but on the other hand if the system is overfull or some connection is coming undone they will really want to attend to it quickly. And so will you, because those collection bags can sometimes hold a pretty good amount of piss and you don’t want one to unload on the bathroom floor. You will personally find that unpleasant and inconvenient, as you will now have a puddle to walk through.
Beyond nerve damage, the actual muscles that hold in urine can be damaged (both a bad childbirth and a very traumatic rape can do this, in addition to various other problems such as muscle deterioration syndromes that lead to same). So, she could be telling her muscles to hold in the piss and the proper nerves firing full blast but the muscles aren’t physically strong enough to hold it in. So, she might be able to hold it in for a couple minutes but not as long as an able-bodied person. Damage can also occur to the anal sphincter muscle, too.
Now, a person with a walker or cane or in a wheelchair is unlikely to yell “I have damaged nerves and bladder muscles and I"m about to piss my panties!” but that might indeed be the case. You just don’t know. But the fact they’re in a wheelchair, scooter, or have problems ambulating would tend to indicate that there is some sort of bodily damage. Particularly with wheelchairs, assume there is nerve and/or muscle damage. Few people using wheelchairs have normal bladder and bowel control. Unless they say otherwise assume they CAN’T wait.
It’s not that they wait until it’s an emergency, it’s that their bodies really don’t have normal control over these functions. I haven’t known a lot of handicapped people well enough to discuss the matter, but I happen to live with a man who actually does have poor control over these functions. He would LOVE to avoid such situations but he can’t because his body is damaged. He tries to go before he leaves home and avoid getting into situations where it’s a problem, but sometimes his bladder and bowel just start up and he really has almost no ability o stop it. Nor can he even physically run to the toilet. The best he can manage is a fast, limping walk and hope he gets to the toilet before he literally pisses or shits in his pants entirely without any control over the matter. Being allowed to jump ahead in line can be the difference between sitting down to shit in time and filling his shorts (and his jeans, and his shoes, and even, poor man, his shoes on occasion). At which point, if he’s LUCKY, I’m around and can run out to the car to get him clean clothes but if not he has to wipe himself as best he can, then walk out to the car in his shit-filled clothing and drive home that way and THEN change.
By the way, did you know that bodily wastes are more or less corrosive if you sit in them? The result can be open sores that take weeks to heal. Don’t make me have to clean, medicate, and bandage my husband’s ass for a month because YOU weren’t willing to wait an extra minute or two.
Please, please, don’t subject people to these things. Don’t make people soil themselves. Don’t make them sit on a dirty diaper. Don’t make them risk sores and open wounds. Don’t make them suffer public humiliation (and pissing and shitting on yourself IS humiliating).
If there is no one else around by all means use the handicapped stall. Just don’t take all day about it, and if someone handicapped comes in do finish up as quick as possible and let them use the stall. If you’re in line and someone in a wheelchair shows up let them go ahead of the line because, really, most likely they CAN’T physically hold it as long as you.
For anything more detailed I’ll leave it to the Dopers who have more personal experience in these matters. Although, if they’d rather NOT discuss incontinence in public, even on the internet, I completely understand. I hope I haven’t hurt or offended them by talking about this (I had an internet friend once who used a wheelchair who was so embarrassed she’d get angry if someone else discussed incontinence because of a fear people would then regard her as baby-like and discount anything she said… she had issues. And I don’t blame her, because people can be cruel and life unfair).
Yes. A lot of things that cause “handicaps” which would require one to use a handicapped accessible stall, like paralysis, spinal cord injury, neuropathies, muscle wasting, etc. will also affect the nerves or sphincters that control the bladder and/or anus. These people may have less or even no sensation that their bladders/rectums are filling, and the window between, “hmmm, I wonder if there’s a bathroom around here?” and “OMG OMG OMG GOTTA GO!” is much smaller than for you or I.
ETA: Dang you and your thorough yet speedy answers, Broomstick! 
Yes, they would have to wait. And maybe they’d soil themselves while the other person is struggling with the toilet, grab bar, chair, and anything else they have to deal with. But really, the odds of two handicapped people hitting the same restroom at the same time is pretty low (barring a convention of wheelchair users or something like that). I can’t control two wheelchair users battling for who gets the big stall first, all I can do is control my own actions. I choose not to contribute to bathroom accidents and/or public humiliation of another human being if I can prevent it through simple action on my part.
And if you’re so physically large (for whatever reason) that you don’t fit in a normal stall, or you need to carry medical equipment with you like CPAP then I, personally, would view you as disabled and have no problem with letting you take “cuts”. Because disability doesn’t always involve a wheelchair.
I let obviously pregnant women go ahead of me, too. They’re not disabled in the same way as someone who is paraplegic, but they are known to have bladder issues, not to mention the occasional need to vomit due to pregnancy nausea a.k.a. “morning sickness”.
This sums up my attitude as well.
I will use the handicapped stall if:
- I’m the only one in the bathroom when I enter it
- There are a lot of people and it’s the one that’s free first
- I’m carrying something bulky and expensive (violin) that won’t fit comfortably but which can’t be let out of arm’s reach
Otherwise I usually go to the regular stall. And of course I would never get in the way if I saw a handicapped person needing to use it or really anybody looking desperate. If you’re about to mess your pants or throw up on the floor, please, shove me aside!
Urinals are usually located closest to the entrance while the stalls are usually further into the room. If I have to ‘sit-down’ and they’re all open, i generally opt for the last stall (furthest from the urinals) as a courtesy to those that only have to pee. Seems like this is usually the handicapped accessible stall. I would not occupy the stall if a disabled person were there.
ETA: I also like this furthest stall because at least one side is next to a wall. I don’t really like pooping between two other poopers.
Not all handicapped people use a wheelchair. I’m mobility impaired, and I don’t use a wheelchair. I’ve used those scooters in grocery or big box stores a couple of times, when I was really bad off, but that was only a few times. Now I walk with a staff or cane. I do need a stall with grab bars, though.
Read Broomstick’s post again. And again. There are a lot of people who would love to get out more, but they know from experience that they probably will find that the ONLY stalls that they can use are already in use, and usually by someone who seems pretty nimble. So, rather than take the chance of soiling themselves, these folks just decide to become voluntary shut ins. Because of people like YOU.
People say they it just takes a minute. Someone with nerve damage might not have that minute. And people say that there’s nobody with an obvious problem when they go into the stall. However, someone who actually needs that stall might come in, and again, they might not have that minute.
Now, if all the regular stalls are occupied or out of service, that’s one thing. But if all or most of the stalls are empty, then I really don’t think that the able-bodied should use the handicapped stalls on a regular basis.
Ann Landers was wrong when she said it was OK for the able bodied to use the handicapped stalls, and she got called out on it. However, most people only remember her original answer, because it gives them the answer that they want.
I do use them whenever I can, they have the grab bars 
(I have a bad ligament in my left knee: not enough to get a crip tag, but plenty to make the grab bar helpful.)
I would never use one before a wheelchair person, and I don’t linger in them.
I follow the don’t be a jerk rule.
If no one else is in the restroom or the WABS stall is the only one open, generally that’s the one I go for. I like the room and the (usually) higher commode is easier on my knees.
Women who are disabled, visibly pregnant, have small kids or assisting someone who is disabled get first crack at the big stall though.
Having traveled with small children, the combination of a changing table and the recently added toddler seats in the WABS stall makes life much easier for more than just those who are disabled.
I don’t use 'em. or let me qualify it to say if I’m in a restroom, about 2 seconds away from soiling my drawers, and the only open stall is a handicapped, then I’ll take it. Otherwise, i just get a regular stall.
My answer is somewhere between the second and third. If there’s a line and someone who would clearly benefit from the wheelchair-accessible stall is close behind me, I’ll offer it to them. That could be someone in a wheelchair, using crutches, with small kids (particularly in a stroller), etc. However, if there’s a long line, I’m not going to scan the whole line for a person on crutches thirty people back, you know?
I’ll avoid using the wheelchair-accessible stall as much as possible. A few times during power-Christmas-shopping trips I’ve used one because I had so dang many bags with me, but like a good little bleeding heart liberal I felt guilty about it later.
And not everybody who’s handicapped is in a wheelchair. My grandmother needs the grab bars too, she was SO happy when we told her those stalls had them, as she thought they were “for people in wheelchairs only”.
As Shagnasty and others have said, they’re “handicapped accesible”, not “handicapped reserved”. I’ll use a regular stall if one is available, but if there’s a line and the handicapped stall is not in use, I’ll be the person pointing out it’s for the rest of us mortals too. If I can, I let people with “logistic problems” go first (little kids, handicapped, old ladies), following the same rule I follow re. opening doors for others.
I use them if I’ve got the pram and there is no parent’s room - prefer that to leaving her out where I can’t see her. I wouldn’t do it if there was someone in a chair who needed it though.
I prefer to use the regular stalls–mainly because WABS doors open outwards, and I worry that a good tug on a loosely locking stall door will open it, revealing me mid-pee, too far away to reach out to prevent the door opening.
I did once, but normally I would avoid it. That once was a small rural hotel in Japan that had only squat toilets and one handicapped toilet. I really cannot squat (I was 60 at the time) and I could not imagine defecating in that position.
Thanks Broomstick and WhyNot. I now consider myself enlightened.
I don’t prefer to use them over regular stalls or anything, but have used them in a variety of situations.
I have never been in a public toilet with a woman in a wheelchair (this has been something I’ve noticed for years! I see plenty of people in wheelchairs out and about, but never in the bathroom with me). 90% of the time when I’m in a public bathroom it’s just me and 1-3 other people. In an unusual situation where there’s a line or it’s very busy I pay attention to who else is there and would certainly let a disabled person ahead of me in line to use the large stall. I usually let mothers with small children in ahead of me as well.
My dad is disabled and needed a toilet with grab bars for several years. I certainly consider myself sensitive to the needs of people with impairments like his, but I still don’t consider handicapped stalls ‘reserved’.