Double Buggy Buggers

With three kids under the age of three, the Double buggy was crucial to getting out and about. Braving the town, or anywhere outdoors, with three small children in tow, made one of these monstrosities essential.

I did consider ‘wearing’ the third child (such a crap saying, I was just going to carry him around in a sling) and continuing with the normal stroller, but having been left with half a back and a floaty hip (as a result of SPD – Urgh), I decided that my body had reached its maximum loaded child bearing weight and having found the Tandem Buggy way too heavy, I opted for the Double Buggy to wheel him and remaining children around in.

My time with said Double Buggy has recently come to an end and even though I am quite sad to see it go, in many ways I am very pleased to be rid of it. This has nothing to do with the actual Buggy itself, as it was truly awesome – a real work horse, but more to do with factors beyond its control. While the Equality Act of 2010 has ensured provisions are in place to make various properties and businesses accessible (such as ramps, wide doors, toilets and baby changing facilities etc) which has made life easier for Double Buggy users, the law has failed to protect us from the arseholes of society in general. As I reminisce about our time together there are quite a few things that I will not miss.

For instance, the knob that parks across the path leaving little or no room for us to get through forcing us onto the road. If people cannot park sensibly then I cannot be held responsible if one of the small children decides to run his toy car along the side of said parked car.

Then there’s the shop that puts the kids clothing at the BACK OF A TIGHTLY PACKED SHOP leaving hardly any room for the Buggy to get through. I’m not meandering my way round for the fun of it dragging half the shop with us, I actually want to buy some fucking kids clothes. Come on people, make it accessible for the actual customers. Otherwise you deserve snagged skirts and shirts on the floor; I cannot be held responsible for small grabby hands.

Speaking of badly planned shops, there’s the department store that puts the kids stuff on the first floor with a tiny little lift that we can just about squeeze into. It can all be quite exhausting and can even make me swear a little.

And usually after a trip into town with most of the above occurring there’s always a few members of the public, oblivious to the Double Buggy and always assume the right of way. It can sometimes be impossible to manoeuvre out of their way which often results in a pedestrian/double buggy stand-off.

I will not miss these typical occurrences which was life as we knew it with a Double Buggy. I’m not going to go on a crusade, demanding equal rights for Double Buggies, as we are a small minority. While yes, it is completely stupid to try shopping with three kids in tow, sometimes there’s no other choice but to squeeze them all in the Buggy and hit the town. For this reason I will be forever grateful to the Double Buggy for enabling us to get out. I will miss the fact that we could strap two children in it and rock them off to sleep and I will miss the amount of shit that we could carry around on it.

With its sad departure from our life it will now mean that I am only able to restrain one child in a buggy and the other two are now loose. It won’t be long before all children are loose and I will spend most of the shopping time chasing them round the town.

Lord help me.

So, this little blog of mine has been shortlisted for a BiBs 2016 Fresh Voice Award and if by any chance it lightens up your day and makes you smile instead of cry then pop over to Brit Mums to vote or you can click on the badge below. I’m up for Fresh Voice and its the first category on the list – EASY PEASY