Where do we stand on girls not being allowed to go to the loo?

[JandamiHash]

DD is 11 in year 7 and I reckon she will be staring her periods soon. Lots of signs and some cramping. Shes really nervous because her lessons are an hour long and they aren’t allowed to go to the toilet. She says everyone is always told no.

My periods were so heavy when I started mine aged 14 that I would have leaked everywhere if my lessons had been any longer than the 35 minutes. Even now when I get my period one days 1 and 2 I need to change sanitary towel at least once an hour.

What is the consensus about this? DD is my eldest so secondary is all new to me. Is this standard? I do get that gen school will have piss takers but do they think about girls in these situations at all?

oh @sonnunny that's horrible.
after all the hard work youngsters and parents put into the 11+ to get into grammars (including moving) you would expect better.

I’m a secondary school teacher. We can let students go if they’re desperate and you get pretty good at telling if they just fancy leaving the classroom or whether it’s an actual emergency. I usually say they can go but need to stay to make the time up at break/ lunch - say 3 mins or similar. Those that really need it agree and 9/10 I wouldn’t enforce the 3 mins but it does sort the desperate from the trying it on lot.

I think it's unreasonable. I also had ridiculously heavy periods when I first started too and really struggled to manage them at school. I think you do have options like properly pursuing it with the GP and doubling up products available: period pants with tampons or a cup.

We have had to close our newly renovated toilets this week after someone stuffed toilet paper so thoroughly into each toilet and then flushed them that they flooded the whole toilet and the corridor. So that's why we don't have unfettered toilet access. Because noone wants piss and shit in their classroom.

Agree period pants might give her some relief from worrying too much as well as a pad. I am so glad I didn’t have this problem in the 80s when I was at school. We didn’t have the issue of smoking and vaping then, we went off site to smoke 😀.

It’s all very well saying they need to say why or it is a woman’s issue which is fine for an adult but I remember the first time I went to buy pads on my own and spending ages in the shop plucking up the courage to pick them up and go and pay as I was embarrassed and a young teen.

School should be preparing them for adult life, most jobs will not need them to prove why they need a bathroom break. It is just unfortunate that some people ruin it by vandalising etc when they are at school.

The presence of other pupils hanging around in the toilets is one of the reasons I've been given about why a child couldn't possibly have gone at morning interval time.

What, you aren't allowed to go to the toilet now during class? I was always allowed to and this is only back in 2010-2014?!

No because I can't leave my class unattended.

There's no great solution. Nobody wants to stop kids who genuinely need the toilet from going to the toilet. But kids will ask to go just because they fancy a break from the lesson, want to go on their phone or want to vape. All kinds of trouble can happen. And it's very disruptive when a constant stream of kids are in and out of your lesson.

If you think they can't be totally convincing about needing the toilet or having their period, then frankly you can't have met many teenagers. At my school we are supposed to let anyone go who asks, but we are suposed to log it on the system. My Y9s are the worst. I reckon 8 of them per lesson ask to go. Often straight after lunch or break. I've been a teacher for 30 years and have never once left a lesson to go to the toilet (including during pregnancy and perimenopausal heavy periods). Imo they don't want to waste break time, so they wait and ask in the lesson.

Period pants are pretty good now.
If you haven't already done so then stock up on a few varieties and styles. Even the primark ones are good for lighter days.

Agree with this but also, you should seek medical advice for such heavy periods - not only inconvenient but will deplete your iron levels

As a teacher, I let anyone go to the loo when needed. Obviously, if there’s a pattern (ie they go when I'm about to go through work they should have done or always go when someone else needs it, it’s a no.

My daughter 12 is so shy and quiet. She struggles to ask to go to the toilet in class. She has a lot of noisy, her words annoying boys in her class. She has just started her periods. Also the toilets are full of other girls vaping.
I have ordered her period pants .
I have also said to her, if she feels like she’s leaked. I’ll come along and get her at lunch time. Take her home. So she can get changed, then take her back to school.

I can see both sides. As a teacher I have witnessed girls arranging to meet up , smoke, do drugs fight, bully, vandalise etc

Voice of reason right here. I'm a teacher of girls and I would never deny anyone from going to the loo and we provide completely free sanitary products

Just seen a really disturbing tik tok about this issue with a young girl having her period and been stopped from going to toilet then teacher broke her fingers by slamming her hand in door

The toilets are a chaotic place at the best of times. My daughter has found the gender neutral ones down some quiet hallway and goes there exclusively.

She has a toilet pass as she's ND and could never ever ask. She also got her period at 11 right after starting high school and has had it on and off since - it's been a bit overwhelming for her so am glad she has the option. She doubles up on protection and wears something pretty much every day as it's so irregular.

Im a secondary school teacher and I’ve no idea why 11-16 year olds feel the need to trash toilets at any opportunity but they do. I don’t remember it being an issue when I was at school not sure when it became a problem, but our poor site team spend so much time sorting out toilets, now with vapes kids get together in the loos and vape and then put the vapes down the loo! So much bullying goes on in toilets too. In my last school we had some new design toilets that were basically open except for the cubicle so the basins were in the corridor and that was a bit better but they still tried to crowd in the cubicle, left vapes in them hidden for others to pick up. They ask to leave lessons of they are bored or don’t want to do the work. We just can’t let hundreds of kids wander whenever they fancy it.

Of course we let kids with needs access when they need, part of the reason we have to police it is so the toilets are kept in order for the kids who need it!

The trouble with all the rules about going to the toilets is that it's the quiet kids who suffer. DS is Y7 and came home from school in wet trousers last term because the teacher in the last class of the day was rationing how many kids could go. DS said he didn't ask because there was no point. I raised merry hell with the school. DS is my youngest, both his older sisters said everyone avoided the toilets at breaktime because they were full of the troublemakers vaping (this is a decent school) and so it's impossible to actually use the toilet. They all minimise what they drink during the day so they don't have to go. My eldest said it gets easier as you go up the school and the teachers get to know you and know who is genuine and who just wants to skive. I remember similar issues with toilet access when I was at school.

I've been a teacher for 30 years and have never once left a lesson to go to the toilet (including during pregnancy and perimenopausal heavy periods).

You have acess to safe toilets during breaks.

You have access to safe toilets during breaks.

sorry toilets in all public buildings (and yes this includes schools) need to be safe 24/7, just like accessing a toilet in a library or city hall, as a tax payer (and by default my children) should be able to access a toilet ad lib.
the trouble makers need to be weeded out to more appropriate settings to help treat their antisocial behavior.

I was at secondary school in the 80s. We avoided lots of toilets due to the anti-social behaviour that went on. I can remember flooding at school due to not being slowed out of class during lessons.

My oldest DD had an irritable bladder so needed a toilet pass. Pastoral care staff sorted this without any issue as soon as I contacted school when she started. Made her period management so much easier.

Where should we weed them out to?

Teachers tend to know who genuinely needs to go and who is (pardon the pun) taking the piss, judging on past behaviour.
I would be telling her to be very mature and quietly and subtly talk to the teacher as they enter the classroom (not while the lesson is underway), excuse me, but I may need to go to the toilet during class. I hope that will be ok. Or words to that effect. Unless the teacher was born in the dinosaur age they will know what that means, especially as it would not be each lesson.

There are so many kids being
‘weeded out’ that there’s no where for them to go anymore, I’ve got children who absolutely need specialist settings still waiting for a place 14 months after the decision was made that they can’t access mainstream. Local PRU used to offer restbite which was sometimes really effective, but they can’t anymore because they don’t have any spaces.

Say what now?

i think you are confusing two separate issues. Are you saying if she doesn’t drink a lot of water and wears jogging bottoms she'll be able to stop her period leaking every where for an hour during lessons?