Child at the gym

[CosyScentedCandles]

I go to a local leisure centre gym 4-5 times a week. Because it is only a leisure centre, I accept that it has to be available to meet a range of needs and part of that is that they allow kids from 15 to use the gym at specific times. This doesn’t bother me, I generally avoid the teen-gym slots and if I don’t it is usually one harmless 16 year old girl using a cross trainer.

What is really winding me up is that there is a woman who seems to regularly sneak her 10-11yo in with her so that she can work out. She plonks him on a machine or a bench and he proceeds too much about with the equipment, preventing somebody else from using it properly. Apart from the fact he his taking up room in what is a small gym, AIBU to think that some places are simply not appropriate for children and to want some time in an adults only space?

I feel like I want to complain but I don’t know 🤷🏼‍♀️

I don’t see what about exercising in sports center gym makes it a legitimate activity to expect to be adult only from a users perspective (though I understand the insurance/risk factors from the Gym’s perspective). So I think that desire is unreasonable. I really dislike this desire to make facilities unavailable to children just so adults can have them to themselves.

However, it would be good to tell the staff because they probably have insurance compliance to worry about and wether he’s a child or not, someone mucking about with equipment in a gym rather than using it properly is annoying and a liability worth mentioning.

Are you sure the teenage gym is for over 15? All the gyms here offer junior gym from age 11. Ours have all regularly used the gym from that age. There are restrictions on weights but other than that they can use the equipment.

"Some of us take health and fitness very seriously, I can't recreate a 140kg deadlift or 100kg backsquat in my living room"

Of course you can. I deadlifting more than twice my weight is a piece of piss compared to a one armed pull up or air flares the latter being intense cardio as well as requiring more strength than just lifting something for a bit and letting it go. Weighted backsquats are are significantly easier than a sit spin because it takes intense strength to move your body up and down on one leg while dealing with the added weight caused by the rotation. You also need to control the rotation, so you are exercising your balance and proprioception at a level few humans ever do. How about learning straddle to handstand? Cossack dance? Nordic curls and reverse nordics? Weighted pull-ups?

Seriously. I lift weights and I do enjoy it but mainly because it's a massive short cut to help build the strength I need to do actual cool shit. But longterm, there is no strength that you can't build with callisthenics and then weighted callisthenics. You mightn't get the same level of muscular hypertrophy but most women don't priorities cosmetically large muscles over real, practical strength.

My DH works as a strength trainer for o elite athletes. They pull the “Don’t you know who I am?” When he tells them to remove their dog/kid/acolytes/cameras from his gym and walks them over to the signs on the door which have very clear pictograms as well as “NO PETS, KIDS, CAMERAS, UNAUTHORIZED ENTRY”, etc written in many languages. Many tantrums ensue… often ending up in the news. Twats. It’s a health a safety issue and a privacy issue as well as annoying af. Go straight to the desk and ask them to remove the kid every time.

Maybe find a new wine bar that doesn't allow children? We do this once a month or so get a bite to eat and then play uno with our pre teens. It's great to catch up, we are no louder than anyone else there. Even had the staff and other customers asking for a game. We wouldn't go if children weren't welcome and there are plenty of other pubs in the area that we frequent without.

As for the gym it sounds like he is doing no harm. If he was causing upset by all means complain but if he is sitting on a machine ask him to move problem solved!

I really don't understand the British attitude to children. Dogs are more welcome in some places.

I've only skimmed, but has anybody actually suggested having a quiet word with the mother pointing out the insurance implications? If she gets arsey about it, then go to the management.

I don’t understand why you wouldn’t just say something so you can use the equipment? It’s not difficult to say “excuse me could I use this equipment please? You’ve been sat on it a while and I’m waiting to use it” child will probably think oh crap I’m in the way as will the mother. Job done.

I don’t understand why everyone has to complain constantly, the mother has as much right to be in the gym as you do and the gym may allow children in over a certain age. She must be walking past a reception with him surely??

Complain. Same thing happened at my gym and thankfully a quick word with the staff put an end to it.

If anyone, child or adult, is just hanging around a gym and not using the equipment for which it is designed, then they need to leave. I wouldn't be happy at all and would complain.

The comments about taking sport and fitness seriously are hilarious, some people need to wind their necks in. 100% serious top of their game athletes aren't a mass with one personality type, you really can't speak for everyone.

Is it all the time, or was it over the Xmas hols? I know over summer, my local gym allowed children 10+ to come in during the middle of the afternoon, with an adult, as it was their quiet time. One long suffering girl used to cycle slowly whilst watching YouTube while her mum did a full session. It was usually very quiet but, if it got busy, her mum would get her to go and sit in the seating area just outside the gym door and keep an eye on her through the window.

It's not that he's doing no harm, it's the harm he could do (to himself mainly) and the gym's insurance won't cover him because he's under age.

Ffs, going to the gym isn't essential, if she can't get childcare she can't go.

An 11yo child does not need childcare. He can sit outside if he cant be left at home, not on the bl** gym equipmnent.

How smug.

A normal person?

Just ask the staff. They'll sort it.

This. So many people seem to be utterly miserable and horrible on here. It doesn't effect your life whatsoever OP, except if the kid is on a machine you need in which case you say 'excuse me'. I read some posts here and genuinely wonder what is wrong with people.

My local gym offers membership for 11-15 year olds so I've signed up my 11 year old DD. They had an induction and we go together at weekends.

Yesterday, I stayed in the free weights area and she was free to use the machines she had been shown to use then we met at the end and stretched together. No drama.

At 11 years of age, the boy should be able to behave appropriately in the gym. Why not just politely ask him to move if he's sat on the machine that you wish to use? Just as you would with an adult.

Gyms are full of other people, we just need to be tolerant of each other.

😂 agree, that guy seems to be a bigger wuss than Prince Harry

The point is that a kid shouldn’t be on a machine in the first place, not in an adults only gym.

if wanting the environment of the gym to be what it purports to be is miserable and horrible then oh well 🤷🏻‍♀️

Oh, and it’s not a ‘British attitude to children’, can confirm the same rules apply in my birth country, as well as at least three others I’ve been to gyms in.

I think you should raise the concern that the child could injure themselves or others. If he sat quietly on a chair somewhere reading a book or being silent looking at a tablet, I would not have an issue personally.

I was semi sympathising with you until this.

It's a public leisure centre so the public are there. If he's on a piece of equipment you want to use, politely ask him to let you use it.
I don't see how this kid's presence is impacting on you in any noteable way. What would you be complaining about?

Have a chat with the mum face to face.
Politely express your concerns for her child's safety.
If she's one of these "what the fuck has it got to do with you" type mums, then tell her you will take it to the manager.

I believe in being upfront about these things.
If people are open and honest then everyone knows where they stand and there is no skulking around behind anyone's back/ assuming this or assuming that.

I wouldn't be speaking to the DM, she presumably knows the rules and chooses to ignore them. Speak to management every single time it happens.
The rules are there to prevent injury, if that means she is unable to exercise in her current format until her DC is older, so be it. Remember OP would be highly unlikely to be complaining about this if the DC was sat quietly in the corner on their device or reading a book.

Fuck me. I've become invisible.