Did you have to shower after PE?

[Quanon]

Question due to a conversation about when this became unacceptable. Was it ever OK? Really? I didn’t ever experience it but DH did, with a teacher enforcing that everyone showered properly. It’s surely not expected now in secondary schools for safeguarding reasons? Our kids certainly don’t.

Were you required to shower after PE at school?

If you could give me an idea of when (decade) and yes or no, it will help our discussion. I wonder if it was more boys than girl?

For us
90s, female, no
90s, male, yes after rugby (teacher watching)

Late 80s, female, cubicles with curtains (the boys didn’t have curtains) but you had to go and show games teacher in her office that your head and shoulders were wet above your towel.

so we all splashed.

I'd heard about it in the 80s, but when I went to my girls' secondary in 82 there were showers in the changing room but they never worked so weren't used ever, which was fine by me as they were open ones.

Yes, bullying, and the showers were a communal space with about 6 shower heads. No privacy at all.

All going through puberty, so already self conscious, at different stages so no one wanted to stand out as being more or less developed than the rest of the girls.

I remember one poor girl dropped her towel while bending down to dry her feet and showed her bum - she was called 'Moony' for weeks and someone told the boys about it so they joined in too. I was absolutely terrified of inadvertently doing something and getting ridiculed.

Same

We had to have communal showers after high school PE in the 1990s. The teachers would tick you off as you went into the shower, so no escaping it.

You could only get out of showering if you had your period, in which case you had to answer "No Miss" rather than "Yes Miss" when they called the register at the start of the lesson.

I absolutely hated it at the time but it never occurred to me to question or challenge it.

Yes, secondary '95 - '00. Similar to other posters, communal showers and they would take ur towel at the start and you had to go through. Was really awful. At some point the changing rooms were refurbished and they had seperate shower cubicles, we then used to go in and just splash water on our arms and legs!

Well, the boys attempting to force the external changing room doors that led directly to the showers so they could see us every lesson weren't particularly popular, even less so when they managed to get hold of a key from somewhere.

Then there was the teachers looking at our bodies. Also not fun, especially when they made jokes about development, cleanliness or BMI or remarked upon black girls being oily and would make us break our necks. Or when the headmaster strode in. Or when your menstrual cycle was up for public discussion. Or how they'd ask you how you got the bruises on your side in front of everybody like you would tell them.

Add in verrucas, athletes foot, etc, etc and it was just an exercise in making girls feel extremely vulnerable and with no agency over their own bodies.

90’s senior school (1990-1994) - we were meant to, pretty much no-one did and they gave up trying to make us.

Lining adolescent girls up naked in front of peers and teachers and getting them to walk through showers with their arms up..is a bit more than a glimpse is it not?

80’s girl here and we had cubicles with curtains thank god but still found it mortifying and had the quickest ‘dook’ possible. I can remember getting shouted at and being sent back in cos I had a muddy mark on my leg. That was after an afternoon of being shouted at cos I was so crap at hockey. I hated P.E

I didn't have to shower in the early 2000s when I was at secondary, but my DH did when he was at school in the 90s - and they had the teacher stood watching them.

Tbf, I doubt any of us girls ever broke a sweat during pe anyway, so no need to shower 😂.

1991-1996 at secondary and yes, they made us.

Watched us too, had to walk in a line with arms up, totally starkers.

I recused. I also refused to do PE. I was fat, large chested, forbidden from wearing a bra or any period products other than my mothers left over incontinence pads from when she was dying - as you can imagine, I was bullied to fuck and I didn’t need anymore.

Two times of getting changed for PE and being mocked mercilessly was enough for me.

Early 00s and yes had a teacher watching us and shouting to go back in if we were too quick.

rumours spread she was a lesbian which freaked a lot of girls so we would try and use our towels as a shield for the next girl but would still get told off 🙄

I think this is where my hatred of sport started!

80's teenager yes to communal shower. Teacher used to stand at the end and pass you your towel....one day she forgot I was there and kept talking to someone. I had to stand there naked waiting. I stopped showering after that lol

80s yes forced to shower, one sports block had individual showers, we were made to walk naked to the shower and back and not allowed to close the door while teacher (one was lesbian) stood and watched. In the more modern sports block it was even worse with a communal shower and we were again forced to walk to it naked and shower together while teacher watched us. I did all.i could to avoid PE so I didn't have to go in those showers or tell the teachers I had my period as it was all too humiliating and instrusive

Girls and boys did at my school in the late ‘80s/early ‘90s. In the first year, we had to share, two to a cubicle. The PE teacher took a register as we came out to check!

Female mid 1980's. State secondary.
Yes. Communal shower room (for 30)
No 'private towels' allowed, we had to use teatowels to dry off. Staff watched.
Horrendous & lots of us avoided PE.

80s female only after swimming

70s - communal shower with a foot bath at each end filled with orange dye. Supervised by teachers to make sure we went all the way through and had the tango feet to prove it.

Female, 90-95, yes. One row of showers, no cubicles. You could only get out of it if you were on your period. Supervised by teachers.

Yes, 1990s, female. Open shower room, supervised by female Games teachers. Had to leave towels on the peg, walk to the showers and then walk back.

80s female. Compulsory. Line of showers on a wall. We had to strip and walk to one end. Teacher would stand at other end and watch us walk through - often sending some girls back for another go. When satisfied she would hand us a regulation school towel which was a small handtowel size.
ended up with the “showering “ part of a PE lesson taking up more of the period than the PE bit.

High-school was 00s.
No never used the showers.

DS1 is high-school now and doesn't either

Yep.

Female. I started secondary in the early 90s and we were supposed to shower properly and the teacher would check.

My group of friends hated pe so barely did anything in the class, so didn't need showers but everyone rolled bra straps down and splashed water on rather than shower properly.

Didn't say it did, but as teen girls it wasn't very comfortable!

Late 70's female. We had to stand naked with towel in hand in front of the teacher to be ticked off the register. If you were on your period you could go and wash and it would be marked and commented on if she thought your last one wasn't long ago

We then had to walk through the showers holding our arms up, supposedly to get under arms wet. No soap involved