Parents of Lemmy, looking for insights and advice.

My 4 year old started kindergarten this year and up until now everything has been going great. He's been fully toilet trained since he was 2.5 and hasn't had so much as an accident since then.

Last week he peed in his pants, then again Monday and Tuesday this week. I asked him if something as going on and he kept kind of brushing me off like he was embarrassed so I'd drop it and just move on while keeping a close eye.

Last night he told he's been seeing other kids penises in school and he doesn't like to use the bathroom because of it. He went on to name 3 different boys and 1 girl who he's seen in the bathroom at school. There's a single bathroom in the classroom, just a room with 1 toilet and a sink. From how he tells it, he'll be in the bathroom and the teachers aid will bring in another kid who needs their diaper changed, and he'll see them getting changed and they'll see him going to the bathroom.

From day 1 we always made sure he knew that no one was supposed to see or touch his private spots, and even made a stigma of me and my wife touching him down there once he was old enough to do everything himself. A few months ago we had to put a cream on him down there for an unrelated medical thing, and we made it a point to not do it in a private room and make it a hush hush thing, and instead I'd announce to my wife that i was applying the cream and we'd do it in the living room. He'd ask why we were doing it and I'd explain that the doctors needed us to do this for a little bit. So he's very aware that his penis is private and no one is to see it, and if anyone tries to he needs to tell us.

So he's very uncomfortable with this whole setup at school, he doesn't want others to see his stuff and doesn't want to see others, and there's no reason to, he doesn't need any help in the bathroom.

If this was a one time thing, say a kid had a bad accident and needed to get in there ASAP, sure that would make sense. But my son has said it's a reoccurring situation and it's causing him to have issues going to the bathroom.

Something I just realized while typing this. He stopped eating his lunch, we pack and the past week or two there's been a lot left in his lunchbox when he gets home. He's said a few times when I asked him why he didn't eat that he didn't want to have to poop, then eats a whole meal when he gets home. I chalked that up to him going through a phase since he goes back and forth between eating for an army and not eating much pretty frequently, but now I think it might be connected.

So parents, is this how kindergarten is? Is this something we just have to talk to him about and tell him he's gotta get used to it? This isn't like kids being kids and a kid did something inappropriate, it's the adults putting kids in a situation where they're exposed to other kids.

It's 2 teachers in a class of 15 which sounds like hell, but there's no way I can wrap my head around how this is appropriate.

We did send a message to his teacher explaining our concerns and asking if we could have a chat, in person or on the phone, and try to figure out what's going on, mentioning we weren't sure if this is normal protocol as to try and not come at her too hard since teachers do gods work. We got back a very dissatisfying generic "I appreciate your concern and will keep this in mind" email with no answer to any of our questions or really any indication that she even read the message.

I responded and asked for a proper conversation again a little more stern.

Did I miss the memo on this one?