As a dad of girls, public toilets are a minefield
CHILDREN telling you they don’t need to go is fake news. They always need to go, but when you’re a dad of three girls what public toilet option do you choose, asks Darren Levin.
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ON those rare days when we’re not watching six hours of Netflix, I like to take my kids out of the house.
We do the same pointless dance every time.
“Are you sure you don’t have to go before we leave?”
“No.”
“Are you sure?”
“Yes.”
“Positive?”
“Yes!”
“Doubly sure?”
“DAD!”
That is fake news. They always have to go. In shopping centres (five seconds after arrival). In supermarkets (at the checkout). In Bunnings (just as you’re about to enjoy some snag time). At airports (when you’re boarding). At food truck festivals (we live in Melbourne). They. Always. Have. To. Go.
And, if like me, you happen to be a dad with three daughters and you’re out on your own, well then that’s a whole extra ball of awkward. Because where do you go?
Yes, the most obvious answer is “a bathroom. Quickly”. But which one? Let’s cycle through the options. Spoiler alert: they all suck.
Option #1: The Men’s
As distinct from the ladies, which I assume has fresh hand towels and a selection of fragrant soaps, men’s bathrooms are … just like men. Absolutely disgusting. They smell and are caked in boy germs, and there’s always some idiot that can’t aim right and has left a puddle of urine on the floor.
And if that’s not bad enough, you have to walk your innocent daughters past a wall of exposed penises, attempting to cover six eyes with two hands, and hoping the one stall at the end of the exposed penis wall isn’t occupied. And it’s always occupied. Generally by people like me who don’t like making small talk with someone exposing their penis.
Even when you’re safely inside your 1x1 cell block, you have to cover every disgusting surface with toilet paper just in case your child touches, literally anything. There is not enough toilet paper in the world for this task you end up spending an hour bathing your kids in alcohol-based hand sanitiser until they smell like tiny drunks.
Option #2: The Ladies’
This option is not an option unless you enjoy altercations with security guards and, potentially, DHS. Sorry, dads.
Option #3: The Accessible Loos
I know how problematic this sounds, but if this option is available, I’ll take it every time. I’d like to stress the word “available” because there is no way I would steal a bathroom from a disabled person in waiting. That is wrong, and I would never teach my kids to steal unless they were starving or grapes were on sale at the supermarket, and they needed to test one for quality.
Additionally, and for those of you ready to run me off the internet, I would like to stress that corralling three children into an accessible toilet is nothing like parking in an accessible parking spot when you don’t need it. That’s something reserved primarily for the dregs of our society — mainly ponytailed Porsche drivers.
And this is not just my privileged perspective as an able-bodied person. Do some searching, and you’ll find an entire Reddit thread devoted to the distinction between “disabled accessible” and “disabled only.” The fact that a few disabled people are okay with able-bodied people using these toilets “in an emergency” helps me sleep at night.
Option #4: The Parents’ Room
The parents’ room is a great place to catch up with other parents over a hipflask of scotch. But they have change tables, not toilets, which is utterly useless to people who have conquered that echelon of parenting and ascended to the land of Those With Tiny Toilet Trained Humans.
Side note: if you think I haven’t thought about putting them back into nappies you don’t know me, and you’re dead wrong. But the fact that reverse toilet training is even an idea I’m open to proves that something needs to be done. There’s a big conversation going on right now around bathroom inclusivity and intersectionality. And while I’m loathe to derail it with something that amounts to #CisMaleProblems I do think there’s a pretty strong case for a new class of toilet that allows dads the fundamental right to take their children to the loo without walking past a wall of exposed penises, pushing past a disabled person, or having an altercation with a security guard.
Still not convinced? Consider this doomsday scenario: what if you’re the one that needs to go. There is no greater ignominy that doing your business in a cramped cubicle while an iPhone playing Peppa Pig is the only thing distracting your sweet and innocent children from the unfolding horror of witnessing their parent doing a number two.
Not that this has ever happened to me, of course. I always go before we leave the house.
Darren Levin is a writer, editor and wannabe dad-fluencer based in Melbourne. Find him on Twitter and Instagram.
Originally published as As a dad of girls, public toilets are a minefield