We're getting 'Gender Neutral' toilets at work

This thread is about changing toilets from sex segregated to not sex segregated and my daughter has some skin in the game, as do I.

Lass my ten year old has started her periods and is struggling to manage them. I can't always be there and she needs sex segregated toilets. Is that okay?

This thread is about work toilets. Aside from that I don't think all this " oh my goodness , someone might hear me unwrapping a sanitary towel" would be in the least bit helpful to your daughter.

The few times I had been forced to use gender neutral toilets I have found them to be disgusting, pee splattered and messy. I hate, hate, hate, having to touch the seat (they always leave it up). In fact, I have learned to hold on on planes and I refuse to go to a lovely little bar near where I live for more than one drink because they only have gender neutral toilets. I don't feel comfortable or safe in them. Many women feel uncomfortable re menstrual issues as well and just because some don't does not mean the other women are unreasonable. Some women of some nationalities / faiths have big problems sharing such intimate spaces with men as well. Finally, there is the issue of make-up. I don't wear it, but it's expected in corporate culture, and hoisting tights, etc. in front of the mirrors. I'd be mortified if my workplace instituted gender neutral toilets. I'm lucky it is in a city, though, so I'd simply duck to the library around the corner or to another sex-specific toilet if I had to. Men and women have different anatomies, habits and needs and toilets should reflect these.

OP - why is this change being made in your workplace? Is it because someone in HR was bored or had a brain fart, or is it to appease a minority interest?

I've never come across them until a night out this week when someone said oh the toilets are unisex/shared
Went later on and they've done it because there just isn't enough room for two lots. It's a restaurant, the toilets were complete walls top to bottom and then sinks along a wall, offset so you weren't in full view but neither was it blocked off (no door to the toilet area)
It was a pretty clever design and because the sinks were open to the bar (as such!) it felt safe and I liked the full walls

I agree with Devi I have had no experience of which you've stated Nut and I work in a very large organisation.

Lass my ten year old has started her periods and is struggling to manage them. I can't always be there and she needs sex segregated toilets. Is that okay?

I don't really understand the fuss about gender neutral toilets. We've had them at work for years and they are fully enclosed cubicles with basins and free tampons/towels in a box. No one has a problem with it.

I really don't get the fuss about periods.

I've seen threads on here complaining that women are made to feel ashamed or embarrassed about periods but making a big deal of the fact a man in the next cubicle might hear you unwrapping a tampon and might know (or care) what it is hardly doing anything to help.

I am a woman and have periods and am not ashamed of them. I expect that others using the same toilet as me get that.

It is usually quite obvious from the rustling when a woman is changing her sanitary protection in a neighbouring cubicle

Is it? That's news to me. And even if it were so what?

They don't look like that for long since someone tends to jump down your throat like you did it...
Didn't help we were near a fast food chain so had a lot of "traffic".
There was an article on two teen girls putting superglue on a loo seat n a small girl getting stuck.

Gents smell is a cleaning issue imo, if you've got a female cleaner in a busy place it's hard to close off for five, with either gender, and spray it over.

And what does happen when you need to get changed in the loo? That's pretty common

What difference does it make ? If I were changing clothes in the loo I'd do it in the cubicle.

Yep some men pee like fire hydrants but they don't leave pads on the floor, flush bloody/shitty knickers and block the loos or vomit from one end to the other with morning sickness and big shitty splats too.
Erm I think most of us use women's public toilets regularly, I have never seem what you describe. I hear this about how disgusting ladies loos are and it just doesn't seem based in reality.
Gents however often stink from a distance away and in gender neutral toilets I've used they have been splatted/dripped on.

It doesn't bother me in the slightest.
More so in a work setting where you'll roughly know who's in the loos. Even more if your work checks convictions etc, I know it's not bullet proof but less chance of camera wielding people watching you change your pad or crap.

I dare say all of these men at least grew up around 1 female, mother, granny or wife, all of them will have had sanitary products that open like a loud crisp packet and all of them will more than likely have had d&v so there's a high chance they won't care... possibly might have their own embarrassing medical conditions.

And in all my years of retail as a young one the women's toilets are VILE! Yep some men pee like fire hydrants but they don't leave pads on the floor, flush bloody/shitty knickers and block the loos or vomit from one end to the other with morning sickness and big shitty splats too. Everyone's poo smells, if your worried someone smells yours look up poopuri, use it in public if I need to.
Haven't we all had to run into the gents if the ladies is full. Rather a loo that a puddle.

We have a couple of unisex loos as units of three. They are very unpopular.
Changing them all is crazy. And what does happen when you need to get changed in the loo? That's pretty common.

Also, some people really struggle with overcoming their inhibitions. I used to know someone who was so inhibited about pooing outside of their home they could hold on for a week's holiday overseas.

It is usually quite obvious from the rustling when a woman is changing her sanitary protection in a neighbouring cubicle. In my old department I was pretty aware of when colleagues had their period. Tampax wrapping paper rustling also makes a different sound to unpeeling a towel. I'm honestly not that interested, but nor am I deaf. I was surprised to learn that some men (surely they have to be quite rare) have a menstruation fetish & would get off on it. I'd hate to be feeding someone else's kink.

Oh I'd hate it. I can barely go for a poo in the ladies let alone unisex loos

When I'm in the loo I don't pay much attention to what other people are doing and whether I can hear farty noises or whatever. I imagine others are similarly uninterested in paying attention to my noises

I assume the world divides into completely sane people who realise waste removal bodily functions might be noisy and smelly and don't care and those who realise this but get pointlessly embarrassed by it.

If you are one of the latter and are next door to one of the former why worry - they don't care. If it's one of the latter in the next cubicle then they are probably as pointlessly embarrassed as you are.

You won't know anyway of the other person next to you is a man or a woman.
It's unlikely that you will see them going in and if they come after you, again, you won't know.

I also don't think you will have a lot of issue with 'hearing a woman removing a pad' if the walls are from floor to ceiling.

What you might get is men being grumpy about having to sit on sanitary bin (and how awful it is to do so) so you might end up with wider cubicles or better system to put sanitary products in the bin. Now that would be a win IMO!

It's not the embarrassment, it's pee splashed everywhere. I'm sorry but some men jetwash the whole room and that's not nice for women who sit to pee.

If a colleague hears me or sees me doing something period-related and feels uncomfortable, I'm most likely to think
you think YOU are uncomfortable right now, try being in my shoes, this is much worse.

When I'm in the loo I don't pay much attention to what other people are doing and whether I can hear farty noises or whatever. I imagine others are similarly uninterested in paying attention to my noises.

I can honestly say I have never sat in a ladies' loo and thought " ooh, rustling noises, the person next to me is unwrapping a sanitary towel "

It's not as if changing a towel makes any noise.

It makes a distinct rustling/peeling sound. It wouldn't bother me personally, but it is usually obvious that someone is changing a pad.