AIBU to take my son into the female changing room?

[JustKeepSwimmingAlong]

I’ve taken my kids swimming tonight, both have separate swimming lessons and I swam with one while the other had theirs. Eldest is male, 9 and has multiple additional needs including ADHD, ASD and some physical disabilities which means he struggles to change himself. Youngest is in nursery so can dress herself but does need supervision. We got out the pool and realised all the changing rooms were full. There were 8 classes on over multiple pools, as well as general swim on at the same time. There’s only two family/accessible changing rooms and the others are all individual. There were literal queues for the large changing rooms.
I then noticed people going out of the group change. I’ve not used it before, but there was a male and a female changing room, so we went in the females. There was no one in it so started laying out the kids clothes and getting them to shower. Got them out the showers and started to get them dressed and people started coming in. There were a couple of mums with young girls and boys, and then a teenager looking girl came in by herself. She immediately came over to tell me that we were in the female room. I explained my son needed help getting changed and the changing rooms were full, but this room had been empty so we’d used it rather than standing wet and cold waiting for a changing room.
We were nearly Finished and my son was fully dressed when she arrived. He sat next to me, facing the wall and we left within a few minutes. During this time, she did get changed, so we didn’t delay her. Now I’m wondering if I was unreasonable?
I don’t want to make anyone uncomfortable, but I really don’t know what else I could have done in the situation? There’s too many classes and too few changing rooms, and we need a larger/accessible one, but they’re the only ones with baby change so they’re really
Popular. The lessons are every week so now I’m wondering what I can do next week? Would I be unreasonable to keep using the group change if there are no other options available?

I think they would have certainly. I would feel uncomfortable undressing in front of a boy over about 7. Not that I would see a child as any threat to me as a grown woman, but it would feel like he shouldn't be in that situation. I imagine it would be worse for men with a female child.

We changed separately from year 3.

You actually raise a good point. I've always gone to the swimming pool with my swim suit on already under my clothes so I only needed to take them off. Then when I get out I have my towel wrapped around me while I get my clothes back on.

@Leah5678

It may not be the same in all primary schools, but my kid’s school (state school) has PE uniform and normal uniform. On PE days, they were shorts under their school
joggers and a white t shirt with the school PE jumper. They can slip off their joggers in class or just do PE in the joggers. If they need to fully change because they’re wearing shirt and tie and not their PE uniform, then right from P1, they went into the single sex changing rooms.

You don’t change in the classroom in front of each other anymore. And no child should have to be naked in front of their peers after swimming, and no woman or girl should have to be naked in front of a boy. I’m sorry but you’re just wrong here. You’re just wrong.

YABU

It doesn't really matter if some or even most adult women see 9 or 10 year old boys as small children and don't care about getting changed in front of them. To girls of around that age, they are peers. Those girls may be dealing with puberty changing their bodies. They may feel uncomfortable getting changed even around other females (I know I did for a few years!) In front of a male peer? Absolutely not.

I once returned to a communal gym changing room to find a couple of women and two teenage boys in there. Those boys may have had additional needs. I don't know. I saw the boys first, was startled, and went back outside to check I had the right room! Definitely the women's. Then I had to just grab my stuff out of the locker and leave in my gym clothes. I was excluded from that space because males were present.

Family change facilities are there for people who can't use the single sex provision. If there's a queue for them, that's unfortunate. It is not an excuse to bring older boys or men into female spaces, even if they're vulnerable in other respects. Women's spaces aren't safe spaces for anyone who might need them for any reason. They're single-sex spaces. For women.

Leah5678
Why is the solution to an issue with male behaviour in male spaces for women and girls to lose single sex spaces?

Why is it the responsibility of girls to budge up, not voice their discomfort, not complain about lack of dignity and privacy and get over their single sex space becoming mixed space rather than the parent's responsibility to either use appropriate family changing/unisex changing in the venue or choose to swim at a venue that has unisex/family changing facilities that suit their family's needs?

Regarding Pe changing which doesn’t involve getting naked so different anyway.

Before covid boys and girls where separated from the start of year 4 for changing after covid no changing happens at school they wear Pe kit or main uniform no changing in front of even each other.

At my school we changed separately for PE from year 3, so age 7. In the 1990s. I'm not necessarily assuming my experience was typical, but I wouldn't assume yours was either! Both are anecdotal.

At school swimming in Yr1 they separated the boys and girls. 5yos...

(I hope the children with disabilities are given appropriate help for school swimming. )

Yes this. I appreciate it's difficult for you but most pools have an age restriction of around 8 for very good reasons.

You will have to wait for a more suitable space than female only, or take them home to shower.

Haven't read the whole thread but I'm saying YABU. There's a notice at our gym that all children over the age of 8 need to be in the correct changing area for their gender.

It's not appropriate for anyone - women might feel uncomfortable and young boys might also feel uncomfortable as my gym there's generally naked women in the changing room.

It doesn’t matter one jot that some of you are happy to change in front of a 9 year old boy, the majority of places have a rule that means you are wrong and if you took a boy in you would have to leave if asked and you don’t get to consent for other girls and women anyway.

Why is the solution to an issue with male behaviour in male spaces for women and girls to lose single sex spaces? my assumption was that if the men’s group changing had been sat empty and the females full, OP would have used that. It’s a bit like you wouldn’t normally wipe vomit up with your jumper or puss in a bush but sometimes you just do the best you can. It sounds like OP hasn’t had to think this all through yet. It’s really important to OPs ds that he doesn’t go into female places where he will be very vulnerable. He has to learn this now because our society is not kind or accommodating to men with learning difficulties or behavioural problems.

The risk of a woman feeling uncomfortable because of a nine year old boy being in the women changing room is nothing compared to what could happen to a nine year old boy being in the men's changing room alone

Whilst many women likely wouldn't be remotely troubled or threatened by the presence of a 9 YO in their changing facilities, younger girls might. Their discomfiture and right to dignity in a space intended specifically for them is not 'nothing'.

Sending a 9 YO boy unaccompanied into the men's is not something I would even consider an option, let alone viewing this as the only alternative available. There are several others. As the mother of a boy the onus is on me to find these, rather than foisting that responsibility onto other women.

That includes disabled women. Commandeering hard-won disabled spaces is even worse than expecting it's always going to be women who give up theirs. (The suggestion of fourth spaces upthread was a good one). I'm not comfortable with these being co-opted as changing spaces, either.

As to the suggestion that 'inclusion comes at a cost', that cost is invariably women and girls. Women and girls who did not consent to their spaces becoming mixed sex by default and who, as we've seen in at least one example mentioned here, are self-excluding as a consequence.

The message is inclusion for all - unless you're female. This is why women are wearying of it and many are already angry. This is why they are not being good little women, and staying silent about their discomfort. This is why increasing numbers of us are saying 'no'.

Yeah sorry OP I wouldn't be happy with that either.

It's not just womens rights to a private space, its girls too. Would you be happy with your 9 year old daughter having to change in front of a boy the same age? I wouldn't and she certainly wouldn't, she'd be mortified and probably refuse to ever go again.

We already have trouble with PE refusal because of communal changing, I'd be furious if someone forced her into that situation at swimming too.

I would be very uncomfortable myself but would probably force myself to ignore it due to him being a child with difficulties but you can't expect young girls to.

It’s also a total fallacy to suggest the options were to put the boy at risk by making him change alone or cause discomfort to the teen girl. OP chose not to wait for a suitable facility to become available. Of course a 9 year old boy should not be alone in the men’s room either. That’s why there are other facilities. Seems to be news to some here but a disabled boy is still a boy and he doesn’t belong in a women’s only room just because OP had to wait otherwise.

Would you be happy with your 9 year old daughter having to change in front of a boy the same age?

OP’s poor daughter was there and had to witness her mother trampling a young girl’s boundaries to prioritise a son. I find that the most shocking part of it all. Horrendous example to her own daughter

TomeTome
I agree in the OP's that situation is probably what happened and she hasn't thought it through, but hopefully will in future.

My questions there were more to a poster who seems determined to argue that girls should get over losing single sex spaces so that than parents who take their child of the opposite sex swimming don't have to make appropriate arrangements or wait for family changing.

As to the suggestion that 'inclusion comes at a cost', that cost is invariably women and girls. Women and girls who did not consent to their spaces becoming mixed sex by default and who, as we've seen in at least one example mentioned here, are self-excluding as a consequence.

The message is inclusion for all - unless you're female. This is why women are wearying of it and many are already angry. This is why they are not being good little women, and staying silent about their discomfort. This is why increasing numbers of us are saying 'no'.

OP is female her daughter is female think more deeply about who is being excluded

Of course a 9 year old boy should not be alone in the men’s room either.
Surely it's rare that this would be the case at swimming lesson times? My older DS went in the men's from 6, there were other boys in there too from lessons, it wasn't him alone or alone with a man or men.

OP and her daughter are related to the 9 year old.
Other females are not.

Oh come off it. Inclusion doesn’t mean include all women even if that means they have to bring their sons. Is everyone missing that there were family facilities at this place and Op chose not to wait? If they need more of those or a special facility for those with disabilities then call for that, not for women to bring boys into a women’s only facility because ‘inclusion’. What nonsense.

I go with my costume on too, mostly, but us choosing to make practical adaptations in order to make our lives easier doesn't mean that there's no issues having males in there. It's still a female only space.

Might have been what happened at your school, but at the 2 schools where I'm a governor, the boys and girls change separately. And they never get naked.

YABU to bring a male into a female changing area.
Effectively you have placed your desire to avoid queueing above the needs of females who want to change in single sex spaces.

And if waiting is not an option due to disability?
And while there aren’t disabled facilities suitable for this family?

oh those difficult mothers making us have to think about them, how rude of them! How unladylike! They should stay home with their awkwardly needy children and politely complained in a way that doesn’t inconvenience the most important women in the world. I mean honestly they want to be able to change and piss when our and about how VERY entitled of them.

Just because some women have more freedom and safety doesn’t mean all of them do. Female rights are for all women, not just the most privileged.