The more I see parents with their kids, the more I'm convinced if I had a kid, I'd be arrested for neglect. No way I'd be allowed to raise them the way my mother raised us. Can someone please tell me exactly what age a boy can be before his mother can let him use a public restroom by himself? I swear to God, I ran smack into a kid who had to be at least 11 or 12 coming out of a ladies' room bathroom stall. I was about to tell him he was in the wrong restroom when his mom at the sink said, "Step back and let her out Chris." As far as I can tell, he had no "impairment" that I could see. Seriously. This is ridiculous. Can't these people trust their kids to NOT get molested or kidnapped for the 2 minutes it takes to pee? I swear, next time I see an inappropriately aged boy in the ladies' room, I'm going to start stripping. See what his mom thinks of that!

What do men do when they take their daughters out? They let them go it alone, that's what. Or at least that's what they did when I was growing up. I think it's only the overprotective mothers probably still breast-feeding those 12-year old boys who take them into the ladies' room with them until they graduate.

Wow 11-12 is a little old. Kids do get kidnapped and molested in public restroom all the time. Things are scary these days but at some point you have to teach your kid to scream for help if something is happening.

Parents just don't want to take responsiblity these days (for anything). Makes the rest of us look like a bunch of a-holes.

My son was about 7 when I felt comfortable with him going on his own. Before that he didn't seem to understand how to scream for help if something happened. It's not something that is easy for them to learn.

I know tons of guys who take their girls into the men's room too cuz you never know what kind of freaky kidnapper beeotches may be lurking in the ladies room (especially here in AZ, we have the highest rate of kidnappings in the entire country and it's often done by women).

Having your son in the ladies is not convenient for anybody but I would rather get dirty looks from some hater than have my son kidnapped or abused by some freak and if you stripped in front of a kid most kids would just laugh at you so you might want to try another strategy : )

I have no issue with married no kids. Just another POV for you to ponder when feeling totally irked by breeders.

I can't even imagine a dad taking a ten year old girl into a men's room with all those penises around. If you are THAT worried your daughter will get kidnapped, WAIT OUTSIDE for her. Sorry ExerciseEditor, I don't want a 7 year old boy in the ladies' room. I don't know the solution to the paranoia parents have these days, but if your kid can wipe his own butt I don't want him in my restroom. I didn't call anyone a "breeder." I called them "paranoid."

You are right: 11-12 is too old. The solution is "family" bathrooms, unisex, single room, lock on the door. However, realistically speaking, the boy-child in your ladies' room is more embarrassed than I presume you are. I would definitely take a boy-child in with me if I were at all concerned about the dodgy surroundings, and I'd expect the female adults in the room to be understanding and, well, grown-up.

I'd like to say I have lived in 5 cities in 5 different countries, and in none of them kids were kidnapped and molested in bathrooms ALL THE TIME. The only thing that is worse theses days is that we live in an over-informed society, we are always over-exposed to every little piece of bad news that happens somewhere in the world by the media and we end up becoming kind of paranoid. Most kids who go pee by themselves survive and most of the time they don't even need to scream their lungs out.

I survived childhood going into the bathrooms alone when my dad took me out. I guess I was lucky. I think being surrounded by penises would have scarred me for life. Some parents these days do seem overly cautious to the point of paranoia. The world is full of dangers but you can't keep kids in a bubble.

[quote=Daisy67] I would definitely take a boy-child in with me if I were at all concerned about the dodgy surroundings, and I'd expect the female adults in the room to be understanding and, well, grown-up. [/quote] Dodgy surroundings?! I was in ikea!

I used to worry about this with my niece and nephew when I babysat them. It's really hard when you have a boy AND a girl, and they're a year apart.

I rarely went anywhere with them unless I had my mom with me. She'd stand outside the bathroom and ask folks to wait just a second because my nephew was in there. Most people were really nice about it and understood. Some people didn't mind him being there and went on in. But it was comforting to have my mom outside warning folks there would be a young boy in addition to his sister.

It's frustrating, and it's hard. I think as long as the mom (or whomever) keeps the kid from crawling under the stalls and peeking at people, then it's all right.

My beef is with grown men in the ladies' room for no apparent reason. I've opened the door to the ladies' room in several places only to see a man in there (and not one who works there either). When I step back out after apologizing profusely for being confused, I double-check the sign on the door. Yes, it has a woman on it. Yes, it says "Ladies" or "Women". Yes, there is a men's room right next to it. No, the door isn't locked because while I'm standing there in a perplexed state, another man walks right into the men's room proving it's really a men's room that can be used. So that bothers me. Why on earth are men going into the ladies' rooms?

So kids are no big deal to me. I'd be worried too if I were a parent. Esp after seeing so many men using the ladies' rooms. I wouldn't want my child in a public bathroom by himself. I'm sure by age 11, they're going to be fine, but I'd probably still worry while the kid was in there.

happy one - I've never seen men in the women's room, but I'm not surprised I've been to many places where women use the men's room because of long lines. I've never heard of a line in the mens room though...lol...
As a parent I think 11 or 12 are definitely too old to use the ladies room (or mens room). A few places have family restrooms now. Thats good. There are so many crazies in the world today (as we read the headlines of kids disappearing) that most parents would worry about their kid being out of their site. The best they can do is station themselves outside the restroom until the child comes out. There was an article in the paper yesterday where a father who was standing a little off from his 6 yr old daughter see a man walk up to his child, put his arms around her and touch her inappropriately. Scary...
but at a certain age you do need to let them go in the restroom by themselves.

Those men lurking outside the ladies' rooms might just be fathers waiting for their daughters, ya never know! I "lurk" outside the restroom when my husband is in there and he probably "lurks" while waiting for me too. I just have to stand by my paranoia comment. It's not only parents though. We're all as a society paranoid out of our minds because we have access to news instantaneously and it's always bad and crazy things happening in that news. The odds of bad things actually happening haven't changed much in most places but our perception is out of whack because we're so linked in nowadays.

Okay, these men were not lurking outside the restrooms. It's a bathroom with one toilet. Just one. The door locks from the inside. The door was not locked and it was ajar (on the most recent occasion), so I pushed open the door and entered just like I would any bathroom door that is ajar when I am going to use it.

So it's not like I'm walking into a bathroom with several stalls. It's a single toilet bathroom. The men's room is right next to it (with signage), and apparently it is free because someone always enters it while I'm standing there trying to figure out if I have opened the wrong door or not.

This has happened on three different occasions (different places), and it's starting to concern me. I now knock loudly no matter what and enter with caution.

Anyway, that's neither here nor there. They're not lurking. And they do come out, so I don't think they're in there waiting for someone to enter (gosh, I hope not).

If they'd just lock the door, it wouldn't be a problem. I just feel so embarrassed when I walk in. And I shouldn't be embarrassed, but I am.

I agree with the previous posters about how we are so overly-informed that we are starting to become paranoid. I'm all for getting as much information as possible, but I think sometimes we need to step back and consider that what we see and hear on the news is not the norm thankfully. If it were the norm, it wouldn't be news anymore. It's sad that there are people who will hurt children, and it's sad that parents have to be so worried about it. I wanted children and was unable to have them, and I honestly think I wouldn't have been able to rest easy if I were a parent. I'd worry constantly and probably make my kid wear a helmet while playing in the back yard on the grass. I'm one of those people who would buy knee pads for my kid as it learns to crawl.

Innocence is gone now, and it is kind of sad that it has to be this way.

I totally Agree! I went to the movies the other day, and while I was in the ladies room there was a young boy and his sister running around probably looking in the stalls. I couldn't even relax to go to the bathroom waiting for them to come around and look in my stall. The thing is.. I wasn't so much ticked off at the kids as I was at their adle brained Mother. What was wrong with her? Granted the boy wasn't 12, but he was at least 7! If you have to take your sons into the ladies room, at least have enough respect to keep them under control. Is that too much to ask?

I understand a parent not wanting their young child to wait outside while you use a public restroom, but, parents also need to understand my desire, as a child free adult, to not be peeped on when I need to use a public restroom....yes, this has happened to me. I asked the mother TWICE to please stop her child from looking through the crack in the door on my stall...and only got an apathetic "Stop it. Don't watch that lady pee."

swearbear , it would have been soooo hillarious if you would have had a squirt bottle of water to spray the little bug*** through the crack in the door. (Something to think about).


cp