Andrew’s comment about mixed spaces in the latest transgender thread brought this to mind
have you ever felt uncomfortable in a mixed steamroom or sauna? I have for sure, but still use them, at least at my gym, where there’s usually a few people in there.
It’s not that i fear assault, but the perving vibe can be there for sure. I won’t go solo into a hotel spa facility for this reason.
is this a woman thing, (or maybe a me thing)
The Finnish girl who lived with us said if its family the though of it being weird doesn’t enter their minds. Even extended family. Outside of family not so much
I can’t say I have ever been in a mixed spa situation. Except for when the little fleet of hispanic cleaning ladies appear unexpectedly in my old gym’s male locker room to collect towels and such. Just standing there naked exchanging pleasantries.
“Exchanging pleasantries” huh? Is that what the kids are calling it these days?
the mixed spa does tend to be a Euro and/or high $$ situation
so maybe a decent equivalent is transition, where people were getting naked or close to behind a car door or towel.
In those situations the sheer numbers/impulse to get outta there/personal exhaustion definitely lifted any charge
Before we moved off grid and built our own personal wood fired sauna, I used to use the sauna at the gym after swim practice. I would sit in the sauna in the women’s locker room for 15-20 minutes 3 weeks before a triathlon especially if I knew it would be hot and most are these days. It was my heat acclimation strategy since I live in a cold climate 6 months of the year.
What bugged me was a few older ladies doing annoying shit in the sauna. The worst was one woman would brush her teeth in the sauna and her toothpaste smelled terrible. I love my wood fired sauna and looking out into the woods and no one around within at least a mile. I just don’t like the general public these days. There is something luxurious about solitude and being free from other people. Especially annoying people lol
well this is a whole thread in itself
i may have posted this before but my biggest skeeve was when a woman was vigorously grating her cracked heels in the steamroom. Particles of dead skin for everybody.
I’ve never been in a mixed sauna. I can see how that would be an uncomfortable environment. Are they common?
Most new spas that have saunas and steam rooms are mixed, at least up here in Victoria and Vancouver. Only been to one in the US, a very fancy one in New York City, and it was also mixed.
The one at the University rec center that I’m familiar with is mixed.
Yeah that might be a different topic!
So GROSS about the feet! That’s almost as bad as people clipping their fingernails on a flight. ugh.
I’ve never been in a mixed sauna. Only the ones in the women’s locker rooms.
the sauna seems better behaved generally than the steam. Maybe because it’s less murky in there
thanks for sharing, not! Pink.
As for sharing, 1993 IMH race morning and the line for the mens room was way too long while the line for the women’s room was nowhere to be seen. A knock on the door and a question made “would any occupant take offense were I to occupy one of the three stalls?” Response: “No worries mate.” Seems context matters, pre -race requirements trump gender sensitivities and pride.
I won’t go into a sauna if there’s a woman in there by herself.
Unless of course it’s my home sauna and the woman in question is my wife.
It’s very typical in much of Europe.
I lived for a while in Austria where it was the norm.
I had a gym membership in Innsbruck where not just the sauna was mixed but the showers as well. They were not even separated (just a single multi-head unit in the centre of the room). Weird for a few minutes, but you adjust quickly.
When I studied in Sweden there was a sauna for the dorm I stayed in. It was clothing optional. There were a few times when there would be mixed naked sauna-ing happening. We Americans seemed to be the ones who had the most initial hesitancy about it. It wasn’t a big deal after a while.
What bothers me more, mixed or not, is when people I don’t know well want to get chatty in the sauna. It’s not uncomfortable, it’s just annoying. Leave me to my thoughts.
The time I was most apprehensive in a sauna was at a large public bathhouse in Moscow. They divided available times by gender so it wasn’t mixed, but it felt a bit like the bathhouse fight scene in Eastern Promises. Lots of big, very serious/borderline scary looking Russian men sweating out hangovers before doing a series of cold water plunges, taking a few shots of pre-lunch vodka, then (literally) rinsing and repeating. I was a bit intimidated.
ETA: I don’t understand how there weren’t multiple heart attacks at that place just in the hour or two I was there. I was 27 years old, in great shape, and still the transition from scorching hot sauna to 39 freedom degree cold water plunge almost made me pass out. How those middle-aged, overweight guys pounding booze were able to do it without having a coronary, I have no idea.
most unique sauna situation I’ve been in was (unsurprisingly) at burning man.
a group of finns had brought everything they needed to make a proper sauna, which of course was free, because everything at burning man is free.
but the wait for the sauna could be quite long, as they sent people in in groups to prevent any heat escaping during each session.
so there was an undressing area, and then a line, and then the sauna. nobody had towels.
made for an interesting half hour getting to know our line neighbors.
Like me, my wife travels a lot for work, and one experience in particular made me reflect on how differently men and women experience the world - especially in these kinds of vulnerable situations.
I was in the hotel gym, doing incline dumbbell presses, when a hand suddenly came across my chest mid-rep. A woman, who I hadn’t seen before, was making more than flirtatious comments and touching me. I laughed it off awkwardly, changed station and tried to just carry on with my workout.
Later, I went to the hotel spa - they had an ice shower, steam room, and sauna. I was in the steam room when the same woman walked in wearing the world’s smallest bikini. She had a butterfly tattoo right above her pubic area - I know this because she pulled her bikini to the side whilst sitting opposite me, and then grabbed my crotch as I got up and left.
Now, I’m a big guy. She was petite. At no point did I feel physically threatened, and honestly, I found it more absurd than anything. But it did make me think: if the roles were reversed - if a man walked into a steam room where a woman was sitting alone, pulled his trunks aside, and groped her - we’d all (rightly) consider it sexual assault.
What struck me was how not unsafe I felt, and how much of that has to do with being a man. It made me think of my wife - how even though we’re quite relaxed about sex in general, I can’t imagine she would’ve felt anything other than violated if it happened to her.
It was a weird, eye-opening moment that gave me a better understanding of the kinds of things women have to consider all the time that we, as men, often don’t even consider.
For what it’s worth, I don’t mind a mixed sauna or steam room. I’ve been in enough of them around Europe - fond memories of buxom German women wandering around without a care in the world - and there’s a kind of healthy, relaxed attitude to nudity that I really appreciate. But there’s a big difference between shared spaces and unsolicited sexual contact. That’s the line.
Sounds like you’re taking a page out of the Mike Pence playbook: never alone with a woman who isn’t your wife.
But, I do get it. While the risks men face in these situations aren’t the same as what women deal with - we’re not worried about being assaulted - there is another kind of jeopardy. The potential for misunderstanding or even false accusation is real, and it can make something as innocuous as sharing a sauna feel loaded.
So while it’s easy to poke fun at the hyper-cautious approach, there’s a certain logic to it in today’s world. Still, personally, I’m comfortable enough taking the chance - just maybe not if there’s a butterfly tattoo and a glint in her eye.
Yeah my thinking is quite similar to yours. I think there should be some kind of privacy between men and women that aren’t soulmates