'AITA for staying in a disabled spot, or was grandma overreacting?'
"AITA for staying in a disabled spot, or was grandma overreacting?"
I’m 25M, disabled, and I have a valid disabled parking permit. I drive an older BMW, a nice one (imo). After my physiotherapy, I walked back to my car, parked in a disabled parking spot. I got in and spent a few minutes on my phone before heading home. Just taking a short breath, i always do that after physio.
The parking lot was nearly empty. Next to me were three regular open spots, and across from me there was another empty disabled spot with two free spaces beside it. And it’s a free parking area, by the way. Then a woman, somewhere mid-60s, drives up. She stares at me for a few seconds, then parks her car half almost crisscross across the disabled spot opposite me.
She gets out, walks straight up to my window, and says: “Why are you taking up a disabled spot? You’ve been sitting here playing games for fifteen minutes, and I want to park here.” Honestly, I was a bit surprised . So I said, “I’m allowed to park here. I was just doing something on my phone and was about to leave.”
Before I could even finish my sentence, she cuts me off: “You don’t need to justify yourself.” Yet she keeps going, telling me it’s rude of me to sit there and that I should move over because she “can’t park her car anywhere else, because its too long.”
She came over a bit rude. I tried to stay polite, but I could feel the frustration creeping in. This kind of thing happens sometimes tho, someone sees a young guy in a car and immediately assumes he’s stealing a disabled spot.
No one sees why that blue card is there in the first place. Eventually, she walked away mid-sentence. And I was a bit confused. I wasn’t blocking anyone, I had a valid permit, and I was planning to leave. So was I really being rude, or was she just frustrated?
Edit: I think I stood there for 5, maybe 6 minutes. No longer. As for my disability, I have Friedrich Ataxia. I currently walk with a walking stick, am a bit wobbly when standing, everything costs energy and my voice is a little distorted. It doesn’t get any better. When I sit I look completely ‘normal’. Not for pity, just understanding.
Here's what people had to say to OP:
Mistakenfrog wrote:
NTA. It's better to handle your business on the phone before driving than doing it while you drive, lol. G-ma here overreacted and probably was upset someone took her regular spot is all. You did nothing wrong. Next time she comes to talk to you, honk every time she speaks.
limiz87 wrote:
NTA, you had a valid license to park there. There was another disabled spot available. If she really wanted your spot for whatever reason, she could have approached you as a decent human being and asked when you plan to leave in a calm and polite manner.
ElectricDreamGoth wrote:
NTA. My husband looks too young to be disabled. He'd pulled into a disabled parking bay, switched off the car, and was placing his blue badge on the dash. An elderly woman who had been parked in the space next to his was so busy leaning and craning her neck to have a look at this badge that she reverses straight into a taxi.
Her car was literally days old out of the factory, and because she'd crashed into a commercial vehicle, her insurance would go up much higher than it already will. They just can't help themselves.
Warbird979 wrote:
NTA. You can park there if you have the permit, which you do. There is no rule that says you have to immediately leave once you get in the car. If you need to catch your breath before you leave, that makes sense to do that to ensure you're driving as safely as possible. If you were there an hour in a busy parking lot, maybe she would have a point.
kswilson68 wrote:
Yeah, some people are absolutely rude about handicapped parking. My husband and I were parked at a department store, it was the 90s, we were in our mid 20s. Guy walking out of the store starts in on my husband for "a***ing a handicapped plate and parking spot" since, evidently, due to our ages, it could not have been our vehicle and neither of us could have been disabled.
My husband, ever the Air Force veteran, took off his hat, bowed his head, and said "I apologize, sir." Immediately, the guy started apologizing and back pedalin ...my husband had 32 staples in his surgically shaved head from a skull surgery, complete with scabs, scars, and it just looked gnarly.
Prestigious_scars wrote:
If there aren't any other handicapped spots around (or yours is somehow special) I'd say the respectable thing would be to move your vehicle to another space once you've gotten in if you need a break before actually driving home. But that said, the woman was out of line. NTA.
Emjennings wrote:
NTA. You're parked. What would she have done had you not been in your car at all? Oh my God, I know! She'd also have had to wait, or park in a different spot for disabled people. There is no rule that states you can't sit in your car for 10-15 minutes, catching your breath, decompressing, e.t.c. If anything, it's safer if you do, so you don't get overwhelmed right away in traffic.
And if other spots are too long for her, she needs to take it up with the city or whoever else is the proprietor of the parking lot and ask for extra spots/differently located spots. Regardless, not your concern. Her needs or disability do not rank higher than yours.
carr1e wrote:
NTA.
My dad had prosthetic legs below the knee. You couldn't tell he had prosthetics if he was wearing pants. Even with shorts on it was tough to notice right away between the suspension sleeves, and he had really good skins on his prosthetics.
He always used this line when someone confronted him about parking in a disabled spot: "Not all disabilities are visible. I had no idea what your disability was until you opened your mouth."