Travelling with stoma

[Chris]

Difficult subject, this. Our holiday in France later this year will be my first time travelling abroad since having a stoma, and I'm wondering what others do regarding disposal to avoid having to cart everything back home. In UK I've been lucky with many disabled loos (especially in Service Areas) having clinical waste disposal, but can anybody with similar needs offer any reassurance about the same in Brittany? 

Chris

[Pierre ZFP]

I hesitate to reply to this as I have no direct experiance but at least this will bump your question up the list!

I had a friend (alas no longer with us) who had a stoma.  He was always open about this and it didn't slow him down in any way.  Over a sherbert or two one evening the subject of 'disposal' came up (as it does) and he said he never had a problem.  He travelled extensively in Europe (he worked for a haulage company, but not actually driving the trucks) and he said that in France and Germany on the autoroute/autobahn there were facilities in the 'Disabled' loo - now I'm not suggesting that you're disabled of course but that is were you will find disposal facilities.  Can't say about Brittany specifically but I would imagine it's the same all over France.

[Chris]

Thank you for this helpful and reassuring reply, but sorry you have to write about your friend in the past tense. I realise it is a bit of a minority interest, but, although it is a personal inconvenience, being dead (which was the only alternative before me) seemed rather more inconvenient. Re your comment about being disabled, when I was responsible for introducing disability discimination rules in an organisation a couple of years ago I was depressed to find I had four 'official' disabilities at the age of 50! (Should make me unsackable anyway!)  We looked round the 12 people in the room and couldn't find a single one who wasn't disabled in terms of the Directive.