Showering with Junior Highers

In My Humble Opinion
61

Showers: yes, required. So was changing into gym clothes in an open locker room… but wait, there’s more.

Here was the situation for boys in my school, 4th through 8th grade, early seventies or so, when our PE classes used the school swimming pool (independent school, part of a large K-12 complex)–about 3 weeks a year.

You were not allowed to bring a suit from home, so on the first day, you went to the gym teacher, who asked you your swimsuit size. (I never knew; embarrassing enough.) Okay; you got a suit, put it on in the locker room, went to line up in a long steamy corridor leading to the pool, waited for the teacher to unlock the door and let you all in.

Then after class was over, you stripped off your suit poolside, dropped it into a poolside basket, and went naked through the corridor and into the shower room. You only got a towel after you were done showering.

Difficult enough? Sure, but that was only the first day. Because each night the custodian took the basket of suits and washed and dried them, and then the gym teachers put the basket poolside for the next day. So you went into the locker room, stripped nude, put your clothes in your locker–and went to line up naked in that corridor. It was…unusual, to say the least, thirty or so boys pressed up together in a long line trailing through the corridor and into the locker room.

When the door opened–which was never right away–there was a mad dash to get the swimsuits; but of course something usually went wrong and someone ended up with a suit that was way too large or too small. I will never forget the day the odd one out was me, left with only a far-too-small suit in the basket, and the appalling laughter that arose from the other boys as I walked across the pool deck frantically trying to pull the fabric up as far as my butt. (When it was someone else, of course, I was all too happy to join in; ah, middle school.)

Only about thirty years ago, folks, but I’d be shocked if any school does anything remotely like this today. I sure hope they don’t, anyway. While I am actually quite relaxed about nudity as an adult, I think that is no credit to this system. A great deal of it seemed designed, not for hygienic reasons, certainly not to get kids to feel comfortable with their own bodies, but to make them feel humiliated. It certainly worked well enough.

62

Hmn, everywhere I’ve been in Europe (sorry how often I mention that place :D) this is commonplace.
People of the same sex showering together after physical exercise or before going into a swimming pool is no big deal imho.

And it was compulsory in my school, both for swimming and pyshical ed. class.

— G. Raven

63

We were required to shower after gym starting in 7th grade and it continued through high school. (I graduated in 1970, for time frame.)

There was some self-consciousness at first, clutching towels, etc. but it faded fast. We simply didn’t have time to make a big production of it in the rush to make the next class.

In junior high the showers were open cubicles along one wall of the locker room. In high school the shower was a U-shaped tunnel affair with shower heads at varying heights along both walls. It was a nice facility and worked well, actually. Grab a towel before entering (and a spare to wrap your hair; no shower caps or hair dryers), get clean, leave, then pitch the used towels in the bin on the other side. And, yes, the gym teachers checked to make sure we had showered.

I never remember anyone taking the least notice of other people–and certainly no comments during or after. It was all very matter of fact. They stressed hygiene and I DO remember a few kids whose general cleanliness improved drastically from the school experience–which only helped their popularity and prestige, y’know?

My guess? How it’s handled matters a lot but it’s a prime opportunity to learn some valuable lessons: cleanliness is just as important as exercise and putting body issues into perspective. Bodies are just bodies; everyone has one. To take too much notice (critically, sexually, etc.) is just as tacky clothed as naked. Helps teach context, if handled well.

Veb

64

Certainly no matches for some horror stories here. It was awkward at first, but the awkwardness was pretty much equally spread out. The major concern was which of the showerheads would be afflicted by Random Temperature that time around.

65

When I was a kid I went to school in a small town, where P.E. classes and facilities would be used by more than one age level. The whole high school had only 200 or so students. So basically I had the indignity of having to strip my scrawny 13 year old self around 16, 17, and 18 year old guys.
In general I remember seventh and eighth grade being EXTREMELY awkward. Not only do pre-teens have different rates of development into puberty, but in my school there would be kids who had failed a few grades (there was no “social promotion”). So I would be there in 7th grade, with my life revolving around video games, going to the store to buy candy, and running toy race cars; and in the desk next to me there would be some flunkie with facial hair who chain smoked, already had a kid, and drove a 79’ Buick to his job at the paint store after school.

66

I do energy and water conservation audits, so I’ve had the opportunity to visit lots of schools (mostly in eastern NC) and discuss their showering habits.

In several of the middle schools I’ve visited, the showers are obviously not used — I’ve seen sports equipment stored in them. Most of the time, the person showing me around just says that kids that age wouldn’t be caught dead showering together.

In the showers that are used, most of the time I’m told that they’re just used by athletic teams after the games.

In my high school (only Freshman year PE required), showers were optional. Seeing as how we freqently didn’t even have that much time to change clothes, I only remember seeing a couple of people who ever opted to shower.

67

I remember this swimming pool I went to when I was 11 or 12, and I used to get all kinds of snide comments about the fact that I had hit puberty long before anyone else. Didn’t really bother me that much, seeing how I pointed out the fact that I had a schlong three times their size, and word quickly spread around the girl’s lockerroom :smiley:

— G. Raven

68

I stealthily avoided showering after gym class all the way through high school except for a couple of times. Each time I failed to involved major angst and agony on my part. Making people shower against their will without separate stalls is fucking uncivilized and that’s all there is to it.

69

It was not required in grade school or middle school; high school (private) we had dorms with showers, which still weren’t fun. I hated hated hated being half-naked around those guys (nearly any of those guys, really).

Junior year I figured out how to shower when nobody else was around, which was nice.

70

The only time i ever had to shower in gym class was after swimming in 10th grade gym, swim class was mandatory.

i never showered in junior high’s gym class, and did not shower much after gymclass in HS

71

I guess times have changed. Northern California starting in the early '70’s, my JH was 6,7&8th grades. We showered in all three grades. Likewise in High School.

I remember being slightly apprehensive the first day, but by the time I got stripped down there were already 10 guys in the showers.