To think there is no reason my 11 yo DS can't try on jeans in the fitting room in Women's Wear

[SoupDragon]

Given that the children's wear one is shut and it's all separate cubicles?

They tried to tell me we had to go down two floors to menswear.

They saw sense in the end.

The swimming is different as at swimming there are changing rooms clearly designated for MEN and WOMEN and to go in the wrong one to make a point is just obnoxious.

Changing rooms in shops are not gender segregated. Just because it is in the women's department does not mean it is exclusively for women.

SD - YANBU at all.

Fair enough OhMyGod. I have forgotten what it is like to be a girl .... . Defensive hackles rose a bit there

Tbf JamieLee I think I had forgotten how shit it could be till reading that article this morning! I think the OP just needs to remember that it isn't an attack on her son at all, he probaly is lovely (and of course we and the women in the changing room don't know him at all to judge either way) it is more to do with making the girls who may be in there feel comfortable and secure

I think Gap changing areas are for everyone, aren't they? With sep cubicles? Totally different from communal swimming change areas where people are buck naked! These sensitive eleven year old girls will be seen by boys in the street in these clothes surely? it's not like they are naked or in underwear...they are fully dressed by the time they come out of the cubicles, or at least, they should be!

... Boys don't feel all comfortable and secure ... But I do think we live in a crappy pornified culture (anyway, I digress)

Agree CCF. Gap have multiple cubicles for everyone. I don't think anyone complains about it. maybe they do.

Whenever I am in the GAP it is full of girls and youngish teens not looking at all mortified. I, however, at coming out and comparing my bumpy 40 year old body compared to their lissom 14 year old ones, do feel mortified. Perhaps we should have 35plus changing rooms to avoid this unpleasantness?

If the changing area was designated women only I wouldn't have taken him in.

If it were communal I wouldn't have taken him in.

You wouldn't have seen him because he was in a cubicle. He tried on, he got dressed, he came out.

Everyone had their own private space because they were cubicles. If they want more private then perhaps they shouldn't go out in public where a fully clothed boy may see them whilst they are fully clothed

As for his sensibities, I didn't take the poor lad through the lingerie dept, we detoured round it and i didn't take him to this changing rooms.

If he ever gets in trouble for inappropriately physical contact at school I'll be worried as he goes to a boys school

Incidentally, none of the women who were there when we were batted an eyelid. one, clearly a mother, said how good I was getting him to try stuff on.

I didn't parade him about... We went in, he went in the first cubicle off the corridor and came out when he was done. I sat outside his cubicle in the corridor. Nothing to make it women only at all, no mannequins with underwear on or anything.

Yes to that. Preferably dark ones with no mirrors

NO gorerenewed, with FUNHOUSE mirrors. The ones that make you 6'2 and a size 8

Yes, and certainly no horrid rear view or side view mirrors in which to spot cellulite and sagging jowls, and Strong Drink to make everything look nicer. And a comfy chair. And a nice lady to say, 'oh you look LOVELY in that! Have a biscuit!'

No, i want trick mirrors that make me look like a slender 18 year old girl.

" I think the OP just needs to remember that it isn't an attack on her son at all,". Er... I do know that. Besides, as he goes to a boys school so getting hauled up for groping at school is a whole different can of worms :o Thankfully, he has several good long standing female friends so can view them as people rather than girls IYSWIM.

SoupDragon try new look, I lost a stone in their mirror [hgrin]

Yes, but their clothes sizes aren't generous so I'd be a size larger...

(iPad now down to 4% battery so disappearing.)

Mmm - interesting conundrum. Would the perceptual trickery of the skinny mirror override the psychological trickery of shops that undersize their clothes ?

Soup, don't think you made the 'separate cubicles' point clear enough

Hmm YABU because

1. Women do peek out with just bra on to call the assistant / their DH and they have a reasonable expectation of a female-only space

2. Girls of a similar age would be mortified if they saw him coming in

It wouldn't bother me in the slightest however, i think i can be pretty sure my dds (10 and 12) would be mortified to find an 11 yr old boy in the girls changing room.

I had forgotten that at 11 I was constantly mortified. Very tiring it was. Thank God I am 41 now

I think you're also being a bit naive mentioning your son having female friends and therefore 'seeing them as people rather than girls'

It's natural and nothing to be surprised or ashamed about that at his age he is likely pretty interested in female bodies!

It's not a girls changing room though, is it? It is a series of separate cubicles which happen to be on the same floor as womenswear, so they wouldn't see him as they came in anyway. And he wouldn't see them either. As I say, small shops have one changing cubicle and the GAP has cubicles for everyone, and this doesn't seem to put anyone off, judging by the bloody queues!

my ds at 11 had an extremely healthy interest in girls/women. he also had hairy legs and a mans willy. Not acceptable to use the ladies changing room at 11, IMHO

"I think you're also being a bit naive mentioning your son having female friends and therefore 'seeing them as people rather than girls'"

LOL! Of course i'm not being naive.
The point i was making is that he sees them as people, as equals. Of course he's going to want to snog them at some point. That doesn't mean he doesn't grasp the concept respecting them as people which is a risk of being at a boys school.

Would you like an 11 year old boy in the ladies changing room at the swimming pool? To me it is the same thing. YABU.