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This Mom Is Taking Selfies on the Toilet for an Important Reason

Ellen Stumbo
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This December, Sarah Brisdion, a mom from Brockenhurst, U.K., is putting a new spin on traditional advent calendars by taking a selfie on the toilet everyday for 24 days. Each day, Brisdion shares her photo with the hashtag #LooAdvent and a fact regarding the need for accessible changing places. Brisdion’s 7-year-old son, Hadley, has cerebral palsy, so they know firsthand how difficult it is to find adequate public restrooms.

“The slight embarrassment I feel from sharing these photos is nothing compared to the indignity my son feels having to lie down amongst other people’s urine,” Brisdion told The Mighty. “It’s easy for me to take a photo. It’s not easy for my son to live with being discriminated against.”

As the mother of a child with a disability, Brisdion said she finds the lack of accessible public bathrooms “horrendous, undignified, unhygienic and dangerous.”

“People are just so uneasy about talking about what we do on the loo,” Brisdion wrote on her blog. “But because we don’t talk about them, because there is a stigma around toileting, it makes our job as campaigners really hard!”

Brisdion hopes her #LooAdvent calendar will break this taboo a bit. “We all need to pee!” she said, “It’s nothing to be ashamed of.”

In addition to tweeting, Brisdion uses a Facebook page set up for her son to campaign for better accessible toilets and changing facilities. She also celebrates the places that get it right.

We have realized how much the world needs to catch up in order to be truly accessible to those with disabilities of all kinds, not just those with CP. On the suggestion of a friend, we thought we would set up a page to celebrate the places that we have discovered that we have really loved and that have been accessible and inclusive — particularly those that have adequate disabled toilet and changing facilities as they are crucial to us as a family. But then we came across a problem. There just aren’t enough of them! And so this has very much become a campaign community, to get better facilities for Hadley and the hundreds of thousands of other people in the UK living with disability, who face harsh toilet conditions that simply do not meet their needs, every single day.

Brisdion hopes her #LooAdvent campaign will inspire more businesses and places to install benches and hoists in their bathrooms. “I really hope it helps get more installed!” she said, “even if just one supermarket chain, one John Lewis store, one cinema or sports venue commits to installing better facilities I will be over the moon.”

So far, Brisdion’s campaign has captured the attention and support of Australian comedians, Adam Hills, Alex Brooker and Josh Widdicombe from the show, “The Last Leg.” The three joined Brisdion’s campaign with their own selfie on day nine. Paralympic champion, Hannah Cockroft, also contributed a selfie on day 12.

In addition to raising awareness, the #LooAdvent campaign also supports the Changing Places Consortium. The consortium advocates for more space and the right equipment, such as height-adjustable changing benches and hoists, for disabled people who cannot use standard accessible toilets.

Changing Places also has a U.S. presence, Universal Changing Places, led bySabrina Campbell, whose son has a disability. Like its partner in the U.K., Universal Changing Places’ goal is to make people aware of the need for powered height adjustable adult changing tables in public bathrooms.

While Brisdion hopes her campaign raises awareness, she said she believes real change will only come when the government puts more pressure on businesses. In the U.K., that means creating new laws and enforcing the U.K.’s Equality Act 2010 which made changing places mandatory in large public buildings like those that sell food and drink.

Those interested can follow the rest of #LooAdvent on Brisdion’s Twitter. 

Ellen Stumbo
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Ellen Stumbo is the founder of Disability Matters, an organization with the mission to encourage every church to embrace disability. Ellen is a national speaker who focuses on issues pertaining adoption, faith, disability and parenting kids with disabilities. Ellen writes for several online platforms including Focus on the Family, LifeWay, MomSense, Not Alone, Mamapedia, Group, The Mighty and the Huffington Post. Her writing also appears in several book anthologies. Ellen blogs at ellenstumbo.com and you can also find her on Twitter and Facebook.

ellenstumbo
Originally published: December 12, 2017
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