Babies can already be difficult enough to handle, due to how fussy they can be and their very demanding needs.
One can then only imagine the stress you would have to deal with as a parent of a baby, since it is a 24 hour job, seven days a week.
Dealing with children is often a thankless task as a parent, and so we are always grateful for whatever little help we can get!
Unfortunately, help in the form of supportive systems can be hard to come by, as this Dad found out.
A seasoned father of several children, Chris Mau was taking his turn at taking care of his 8-month-old baby girl, Kali.
When the infant soiled her diapers and began making a fuss, Mau had to attend to her immediately.
So the family proceeded to enter a nearby fast-food restaurant they happened to be close to, and Mau headed off to the bathroom to change the girl’s diapers.
In the meantime, his fiancee was left behind to supervise the older children enjoying themselves in the restaurant’s provided playground.
Once in the bathroom, Mau found himself in a dilemma – there weren’t any changing facilities provided in the men’s restroom.
Or really, within the general vicinity of the washroom.
You would have assumed that since this restaurant provided its patrons with a playground, it would be a child-friendly facility – including ensuring patrons had access to a dedicated changing room.
This was Mau’s assumption as well. Unfortunately, his assumption was proven to be utterly wrong, as there wasn’t a single surface he could use to change Kali’s diapers comfortably.
Because there was no other option available, stressed father of the crying child was finally forced to change his baby’s diapers on the dirty floor of the men’s washroom.
Luckily, he and his wife have made it a habit to carry around an emergency towel, which he laid out on the floor to use as a makeshift changing space.
However, the entire situation was still highly unhygienic and uncomfortable for both parent and child.
This is especially so since the bathroom was already in a less-than-satisfactory sanitary condition.
Throughout the whole experience, Mau couldn’t stop being upset and frustrated over this highly preventable situation, where the restaurant didn’t consider to provide even a simple table for fathers.
He later took to writing an essay about the whole situation on a site called Love What Matters.
In the essay, he elaborated and explained about how exasperated he felt about the whole situation.
This isn’t the first time he’s dealt with something like this either – he easily recalled that many public restrooms did not provide either a generally-accessible changing room or a changing room in the men’s washroom.
Often, he would have to resort to changing his daughter’s diapers in all sorts of locations, such as in the back of a car, on the floor, or pursue a relentless search in hopes of finally coming across a facility.
Hopefully Mau’s online essay will reach the appropriate authorities, and we will see more support for fathers to take care of their babies and children via the provision of these important facilities.