To be shocked at teacher telling DD to 'hold in' period.

[yaela123]

DD is 15 and her school have a no going to the toilet during lesson time rule, which I completely agree with on the whole as I know how disruptive it can be if people are constantly in and out, and how everyone just uses it as an excuse to bunk off (I am a teacher too - very different environment though)

Only exception is if you have a medical note from a doctor.

Today in one of her lessons DD says she could feel that she really needed to change her pad, she was getting quite worried about it leaking. She eventually asked the (male) teacher if she could go to the loo.

Teacher: No, you know the rules
DD: I really need it.
Teacher: What did I just say?
DD: It's a girl problem...
Teacher: What do you mean?
DD: Umm... I'm on my period
Teacher: Break is only in half an hour, hold it in til then

Obviously those aren't the exact words said but she says it's pretty accurate.
DD is quite shy so did just wait til break (no leakage btw).

She doesn't seem overly bothered but AIBU to be pretty shocked at him telling her to hold it in? Surely even men have some basic idea that it doesn't work like that?

DD is still at primary school. The juniors are allowed to leave the classroom as and when they want for loo breaks.

What's the result? Absolutely nothing. The rule is, if you haven't completed sufficient work by the end of the lesson you finish at break. The loo isn't some "forbidden fruit" that kids aim to wangle a pass to. It's a basic right that the school acknowledges kids might sometimes need despite the best laid plans.

YANBU OP. I would absolutely raise this with the pastoral team.

My the second and third day of my period are always so heavy that if I feel something flowing I need to rush to the bathroom. I have ruined more than one pair of trousers over the past decade. This was even worse when I was still a teenager. I once bled through an entire matras. I will say that I was also growing at a crazy rate and severaly anemic back then.

But seriously, I can't believe that a damn teacher and some posters on this thread think that there is any way to hold in a heavy flow. Shame on you. Go back to school you ignorant morons and try to pass biology this time.

sticky and so they bloody should. Maybe if women were more open in discussing these things, girls / women would know when their periods are not normal, and cut down the obscene average diagnosis times for debilitating gynae conditions.

I was 24 when I found out that periods were supposed to be red. I'd had 2-3 week long periods consisting entirely of black and brown blood for 12 years by then. At that point I'd had two surgeries for endometriosis and my first ever "normal" period following the second had me making an emergency GP appointment because I thought there was something really wrong with me.

In my nearly 25 years of having periods, or rather having horrific long and heavy periods that have been beyond debilitating, it's always women who've rolled their eyes at me and given me the hardest time about time off work, hospital stays, yet more surgeries. Their periods are fine so they think any woman who struggles is a massive wimp. The direct cause of this is periods being a taboo subject that is not discussed.

Sticky, if that's a warning that there may be some hairy handed trucker cracking one out to stories of clots, well, yes, that's possible, but who gives a fuck? I'd rather be able to talk honestly about these things so that women who struggle do get help with awful periods, and perhaps women with light periods who maybe manage other women in the workplace, or teach teenage girls who flood get the information they need to manage the situation tactfully and sympathetically. If some bloke in a bedsit is getting off to this, well, that's his own sad little pathetic problem not mine.

@Missv9591

Have you read the thread?? You can change a pad all you like but if you flood it doesn't matter.

Bravo you on being able to have a uterus that works to schedule

Missv
How can anyone misconstrue "i am on my period" for needing the loo?

If you feel flooding coming out it doesn't matter when you changed your pad and if you have been sitting for almost 2 hours already chances are there is already stuff in the pad and its gonna leak if you flood.
I love these uteruses which empty on demand.

I'm not saying it's not normal or shouldn't acknowledged.

But MN has banned so many people from here who only post period threads because they get off on the idea of heavy bleeding - especially teenage girls who have heavy bleeding/period problems.

I have horrific periods but threads about teenage girls flooding through their uniform is not the place for oversharing ime. Even if the OP is totally above board (which I'm sure she is) this kind of thread is a haven for all kinds of weirdos.

She didn't know if she was going to leak or not, that was the point. Haven't you read the thread and understood the way that some women can suddenly flood? Just because it didn't actually happen in this particular case doesn't mean the child won't be worried about it happening in future.

It's different to Year 2s for the very obvious reason that Years 2s are not dealing with periods and changing sanitary protection.

I find it incredibly upsetting that even some woman cannot get that changing a pad 5/10 minutes (seconds) ago will not always prevent the need to rechange.

It’s not difficult - some woman have sudden floods and clots. Some woman will be generally light other than a sudden flood.

The attitudes in society are NEVER going to change of woman can’t can’t stick together around the subject.

Missv9591 how many of your year class have started their periods ffs? 15 is completely different.

Even having started at 12, she may only have had a couple of periods a year to start with, then be getting more regular/heavy at 15.

Teachers can't have it all ways. Either pupils are mature enough to go to the loo preemptively every time and never get a pad that shifts or leaks between times, or they are immature enough to need to be corralled away from the loo outside designated times. Physiology doesn't work like that.

I have had forty years and counting of heavy periods with flooding. My three DDS are the same. Dds 1&2 have settled down now after trying various pills. Dd3 is on her third type of pill and still no improvement. She could easily flood in a matter of minutes. I can't believe the amount of grown women who can't understand the existence of this problem just because they haven't experienced it.

The secrecy which surrounds menstruation is one reason why it might constitute a titillating, boundary-crossing topic for someone with a weird fetish - as well, more importantly, as causing women to have to cope with unnecessary shame and misinformation as Tammy points out.

If we all lose the shame and humiliation and talk about it as a normal thing that many women spend up to 1/4 of their time doing, that will benefit everyone except those who get off on women's shame.

Once had an hour of filling a super plus tampon in the time it took to walk back downstairs. I just stayed in the bathroom for a while til it slowed again.

I have now had a hysterectomy at 33!

I would say something.

When I used pads as a teen I leaked sometimes and it was so embarrassing... the pad often wasn't full it was just that my pants must have moved or something... dunno but it happened a few times . I haven't had a period for over a year now due to pregnancy and baby, but I still used to leak when I used pads as an adult (moved on to mooncup and never looked back incidentally!!)

Bad choice of words from male teacher. But many do use this to bunk class, especially with a male teacher as they are often too embarrassed to question it.

I had a child who used to inform me that her towel was about to leak (complete with panicked expression) rather regularly. I eventually realised that it was every Friday last lesson. One day I took her aside at the end of the lesson and told ther that I was going to ring her mum and ask her to take her down the doctors as it's not normal to have such heavy periods and it's definitely not normal to have them every week. funnily enough she never asked again.
Turned out she was meeting her mate from another class in the loo for a chat.

Gierg, if you have no pelvic floor muscles (4 DC), how do you keep a mooncup in?

I will be honest. I find it very depressing and concerning that even a number of women are unable to support others who have problem periods. Simply because they themselves do not.

Heavy periods and sudden flooding are a real problem. I personally take medication to help with it every month, and at the age of 51 now I am living in hope that each one will be my last, even getting thoroughly annoyed each time another one announces itself.

I had painful periods as a teenager, with some flooding and leakage. Now I am perimenopausal and without my tranexamic acid for those days of the month I would be housebound. The flooding can still happen when I am taking it sometimes, but it definitely seems to help.

I would never criticise other women or young girls with problem periods and would not dream of dismissing their problems. Calling them liars is totally out of order. Women can be reluctant enough to seek help for this sort of thing, and some of the more idiotic posts on this thread show just why that is.

A lady down our road was blue-lighted to hospital some years ago after collapsing unconscious in front of her then 15 year old DD (who called the ambulance in fright). She was unconscious for a good long time and it turned out that years of this type of flooding had rendered her seriously anaemic, which caused the collapse.

It should be taken seriously. Never dismissed.

Seriously all the pp saying she should know to change her towel more often or that they have never leaked are you for real? Not everyone's periods are the same surely you all realise that? I have a mixture of really heavy periods and light periods. I can have 3 heavy ones followed by 2/3 light. Or 1 month heavy/2/3 light. The point is until I start flooding I don't know which type I'm going to have as they both start out the same.
I would complain and also provide my daughter with a note explaining she needs to be excused during her period when required. I would make it clear to her though that if she abuses that there would be consequences!

I so dislike power crazy teachers who presume they know whether pupils genuinely need the loo.

In fact, I've seen so many bad posts from teachers on mumsnet and experience in rl, I'm actually starting to dislike teachers in general. This is a shame because I used to have a lot of respect for them, it's gradually been eroded by the teachers themselves.

I can't believe how many pp are blaming the OP's DD for not managing her periods better

This is a teenager who is still working out how to deal with the horrors, trials and tribulations of menstruation. Have some compassion folks!

OP - yes, I would complain. Not in a "I want his head on a platter" way, but in a "I understand the no bathroom break policy, but there have to be sensible exceptions and this teacher got it really wrong" way

How can anyone saying they dont believe anyone can soak though a pad very quickly because they dont be so stupid? Do folk really think because they haven't experienced something it doesn't exist??

Going to own up that I assumed that everyone had similar experiences with starting periods that I had where you could go 8 weeks without a period, then have a 2 week period, followed by 10 days and another period. Apparently though some people had regular periods of standard flow from starting... I'm more than a little jealous.