Kids in changing room at gym

[Snowypony]

Yesterday I was running late for my aqua gym class

i already had my swimming costume on under my clothes

i I ran in the changing rooms and there was a boy in there who was taller than me

i didn’t have time to question the Mum - he had clearly started puberty. He watched me get changed which left me very uncomfortable

i I got in the pool and my friend saw I was a bit upset and asked why. I explained and said the boy was about 12. There are no changing rooms at my gym - it’s just benches so you have to get naked when changing

my friend went over and spoke to the Mun who got really angry and said he’s entitled to be in there he’s only 11

when I got out they’re left but I still went and complained to the gym staff.

I don’t have a ds only dd so I’ve never had this issue. But is it reasonable to expect an 11 year old to use their own sex changing room?

I’m happy to inconvenience the men, that’s why I wrote

Yes, and that’s a fine idea, I’m not against it

Sadly they don’t all have to jump to attention and obey my commands- and since they would only be doing me a favour I won’t have a foot to stand on if they refuse.

This.

Please stop making up these lies about me! As I've repeatedly said, I do not take DS into female changing rooms and have not since he turned 9!

My posts have simply been pointing out that boys are children too and we need safe family facilities rather than having children sent alone to undress with strangers, which is what a lot of people are insisting on here!

I can't believe there's no cubicles.

Where?

Facts fall on deaf ears here.

@Mrbumpssmile 11 year olds are fine getting changed in a male changing room.

Nobody is insisting that boys are sent alone into male changing, merely that it's one option when they are too old (and thus not allowed) in female changing.

Please don't speak for others. I was definitely far to shy and scared around rooms full of strangers to change alone in a room full of adult females (or girls, especially teenage girls) when I was 11; my DS would burst into tears if someone tried to force him to undress alone in a room full of strangers!

Why not simply provide family changing rooms, with cubicles, so children have privacy and don't have to go alone to change?

So you would still inconvenience the women and girls?

Why should women and girls put up with your sons presence? What if we protested and said no sorry we dont want a male in our bathroom. Would you listen to us or ignore us and do it anyway?

Sorry but you are out of order.

ok, what should I do?

If I can’t get in the men’s, because it’s full of men and boys who don’t want to leave, and don’t want me in there? who don’t want to wee in front of a woman who is at penis hight to them all?

And the women are worried about a 10 year old boy in their toilet?

Let me guess- Stay at home or find and pay a man to escort me everywhere.

A lot of posters on here have had such a different life experience to me. Which is understandable, but so so different.

I'm a competitive swimmer. Have been since I was 7. Still am. I'm in a pool changing room every day. We all just ..get changed. No fuss. Clothes off clothes on. Out on the communal benches. Males in one changing room. Females in the other. All just chatting, chatting, and getting changed. From 7. No parents although many of us are masters swimmers. The idea that someone would be too scared to join a swim club and do this perfectly normal thing is not something I've ever experienced. Which I guess I wouldn't, cos they're not there.

Sorry but you need to plan better. You have no expectation of the men accommodating your son to use the correct toilet but you do expect women to accommodate a male using theirs. Why?

Plan where you are taking your son.
Ensure they have the correct facilities.
Have a back up plan that does not involve ignoring the boundaries of women & girls.
Scope out the facilities when you arrive to ensure they are not ooo and are accessible.

I’ll bend over backwards to accommodate the rights of women like you, while you think I should be perfectly happy to be crotch level with a room of pissing men?

And you will pat yourself on the back for being such a good feminist?

I need to plan better?! How the fuck do I plan for the situation where, after reading all the accessibility information on every single venue we ever go to, we get there and the information was wrong? Someone has put the sound desk in front of the radar key door? Or the accessible toilets that are listed as present are inside the gendered toilets? Or the accessible toilet isn’t accessible to wheelchairs whereas the gendered toilets are? Or the accessible toilets are down 2 steps and round a tight corner? Or any of the millions of circumstances I’ve faced?

And again- the mens are full of men who won’t leave?! Apparently that means I am refusing to inconvenience them?

We definitely need more family changing areas with cubicles. Friend is a risk management officer with the police and said mens changing rooms/hanging out at the pool is a prime spot for offenders for obvious reasons. At 7/8 my kids were happy to run around naked so it’s just unfettered paedophile heaven in a male changing room

I’ll bend over backwards to accommodate the rights of women like you, while you think I should be perfectly happy to be crotch level with a room of pissing men?

Stop making things up. I said nothing of the sort.

If there is no accessible toilets at the venue then you will have no choice but to leave and make a huge complaint. Why would you stay somewhere that cannot accommodate your sons needs? That's not fair on him.

And again- the mens are full of men who won’t leave?! Apparently that means I am refusing to inconvenience them

Yes you are because you accept they won't leave so instead will ignore womens boundaries and use the female space.

@MaterialGirlAllDay valiant attempt but you cannot convince people who just believe men are more important. I agree with pretty much all of what you have written.

There are many alternatives which do not include using the female space but they appear to have an excuse for every one.

My father was in a wheelchair for 8 months before he passed. More often than not the accessible spaces were adequate however on the few occasions they weren't and the men's was not suitable for his wheelchair we had to leave. I made a huge complaint and it ruined what was precious time with dad but at no point would I have taken him in to the female bathroom.

Many 7 year olds and older children would be far to shy or nervous to go alone, unaccompanied by family, to swimming clubs and/or changing rooms. Of course some are more extrovert or less anxious about going to places alone than others.

Meanwhile in actual polite society, people understand that disabled people might need to take precedence for a short period of time.

Its all well and good saying they should leave... but if they need the toilet then they need the toilet.

In 'actual polite society' people understand that females always take precedence over males in female spaces, even if the male is disabled. Lack of adequate disabled facilities is not a reason to impinge on female only spaces. Stop telling yourself it is.

Stop making things up. I said nothing of the sort

Yes you are because you accept they won't leave so instead will ignore womens boundaries and use the female space.

I mean, what other option do you think there are?

You said I should be going into the men’s, and not accept them refusing to leave- so I should go in there while they are pissing at face level?

or what? ‘Not accept’ them leaving and drag them out by their hair?!

Yes, disabled people have to leave places all the time because of the attitude that we are an inconvenience and not worth accommodating properly-

but if a kid with my sons disability needs a toilet and none are available to him, he will shit and vomit across the floor on the way out.

Not much fun for everyone else when the venue has to shut/swimming lessons are cancelled/other children are scared/people get vomit and feces on them/people are eating their meal amongst the smell and the germs/stock is ruined.

A 7 year old is allowed in the opposite sex space.

Disabled people's needs are excluded and ignored even more than women's and children's, so as a disabled woman with a disabled child you experience a lot of marginalisation like this, I imagine. All this should be addressed at a societal, legal, institutional level rather than the finger-pointing we sometimes see on here at people just trying to get by. :(

My son is 10. No way is he changing alone in the male changing area. However. And it's a big however. It is not constantly the place of women and girls to cede over their protected spaces to the comfort and convenience of males. Their needs matter too.

Some of DS's female school mates attend lessons at that gym. They are entitled to their privacy and dignity. DS is over 8; his presence in that changing facility is now no longer appropriate. The onus is therefore on me, as the mother of a son, to work around this predicament in other ways. I want my DS to learn from an early age that a female's place isn't constantly to be in the way of a male person's convenience, and that boundaries are there to be respected.

AFAIC, the more men who learn that lesson as boys, the better.