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AIBU?

Share your dilemmas and get honest opinions from other Mumsnetters.

Original poster

To ask a slightly disgusting question re. your toilet habits?

211 replies

MattDillonsPants · 07/05/2016 01:01

Don't read if eating.

Well DH and I have a disagreement.

I say if you need a poo, you need a poo...well I do anyway...there's no waiting about it. Personally I have to go immediately.

He says he can decide when to go...he knows "I need a poo" but can choose to wait sometimes for hours.

I say he's caused himself issues in this department by waiting habitually...which he does regularly.

He has all kinds of digestive problems including wind, diarrhoea and constipation.

He says these issues are simply because he has food sensitivities...he MAY but won't get that checked out...I say if he would listen to his body and poo when it wants to...then a lot would be sorted out.

OP posts:
TheCrumpettyTree · 07/05/2016 07:05

But I can only poo when there is one there! I can't just decide to go for a poo. That's the bit I don't understand.

Ditsy4 · 07/05/2016 07:05

Yeah and I don't get the reading in the toilet bit either! Can remember my dad taking the newspaper but thought it was to have a bit of peace from mum and the kids.
It is funny how none of us like pooing in public loos but I agree much prefer my own toilet. I agree with OP and luckily I go every morning unless I have upset tum and then I might have to go at work too which is embarrassing as very few loos to people. We have enough trouble finding a free one for a wee!

Wilding · 07/05/2016 07:07

If anyone is interested in this sort of thing you should read Gut by Giulia Enders - it's totally fascinating!

As far as I can remember the poo thing is down to the fact you have two sphincters - when your body wants to do a poo it releases a small amount out of the internal sphincter which is what triggers the urge to 'go'. Your brain, which controls the outer sphincter, then decides whether it's an appropriate time or not - so if you're nowhere near a loo you can hold on until you find one. The inner sphincter will then contain the rest of the poo and try again later. But if you continually ignore this urge and always 'hold on' then you can damage the relationship between the sphincters and that can cause problems.

FoxyLoxy123 · 07/05/2016 07:14

I can choose when to go too but it's not a regular thing to ignore the need to go. Usually I don't ever need to go at work. I did the other day and didn't go because the loos at work always have queues and things. So I went when I got home instead.

If I go away I often don't 'need' to go until I get home. It's like my body knows I'm not home!

VulcanWoman · 07/05/2016 07:22

I have shy poo's, they don't come out in public. It's probably some kind of daft challenge your husband has with himself. I think you should go as soon as you need to where possible. Gives me a headache holding on, it's the toxins I reckon.

VulcanWoman · 07/05/2016 07:24

Foxy I'm the same if I go on holiday, it's horrible, I can go for days on end and not go. I wonder where the heck all the food is Shock

YoJesse · 07/05/2016 07:32

I had friends that could literally survive a 3 day festival and not poo because they didn't want to use the rancid toilets!
If I need to go I need to go.

monkeysox · 07/05/2016 07:35

I once waited a week to poo (school trip) and would never have gone on a public loo.
French toilets with a hole and foot plates left me traumatised.

Since dc when I gotta go I gotta go!

JonSnowsBeardClippings · 07/05/2016 07:40

I can hold it. I won't poo unless I'm confident I have privacy. I have no digestive issues

Patterkiller · 07/05/2016 07:44

I poo 20 minutes after I wake up so mostly always at home. However if I'm in a hotel or staying at friends my body gets poo averse and just won't go. Family's houses are fine unless it's ILs, I won't go there.

So I suppose I'm with your DH, I'm just rarely in a situation that I need to hold.

BeauGlacons · 07/05/2016 07:53

Only if I were desperate could I poo on a less than clean loo. I shall never forget the horror if the public toilets in Rhodes Town circa 1989.

Apart from that I go when necessary. Usually after my coffee at work.

I could not go at school and did hold on there. That was because of the hard toilet paper.

hmcAsWas · 07/05/2016 07:55

I remember shadowing a district nurse and we had to visit a teenage boy with constipation and give him an enema. Apparently his problems were related to him refusing to use the school toilet for a poo and developing a habit of not going.

Umbongo - I actually find attitudes like yours towards using a public loo really quite annoying. Hang ups like this lead to some people in public loos actually censoring you if you dare to take a crap (I do think however that it is a kindness to others to spritz some perfume around in the toilet cubicle afterwards!)

Original poster
MattDillonsPants · 07/05/2016 08:04

Hmc me too! I also find it strange that so many people....particularly women I think, are very coy about defecating in a public toilet. Saying it's "gross" is silly! Of course it is!

If you stand there and look at it!

OP posts:
BaboonBottom · 07/05/2016 08:08

I can hold it for entire weekends if dh is home. I know it's not healthy but if he's there I just can't go.

hmcAsWas · 07/05/2016 08:20

Maybe we should organise a mass 'poo in' at a public loo with some like minded people MattDhillonsPants Wink

Notso · 07/05/2016 08:27

I just go when I need to at home but find it really difficult to poo on holiday etc. I feel the urge but I just can't go, it gets pretty uncomfortable.
We had terrible trouble potty training DC3, he had a 'poo place' behind a toybox in our house when in nappies and would only poo if the potty was there. It took ages for us to get him to poo on the toilet. I think my own bathroom is my poo place!
DH goes anywhere there's a loo and cannot hold it in, he has been known to start driving somewhere for work and then have to turn round and come home for a poo.

Toddzoid · 07/05/2016 08:27

I've never been able to poo anywhere but home, for as long as I can remember anyway... I just feel far too self conscious to do it in a public toilet and wouldn't want to do it at a friends house because it's so obvious when someone's done one. I have had pretty bad constipation over the years probably as a direct result of holding it in. I mean when staying at a friends house for a few days as a teen I held it in the whole time Shock.

I was seeing someone a while back though that was pretty gross about poo. He'd film himself crapping every day and send it to his best friend, they sent each other poo pictures and when he was at my house he just openly did one whilst I was in the next room so I could hear it all going down. Grim. That didn't last long. I'm really weird about it all though, I'd rather pretend humans didn't do it all together. I hate looking at someone really beautiful then realising they shit Grin.

MumUndone · 07/05/2016 08:27

It's the same as a wee isn't it? Feel the urge, and unless you have incontinence issues you can hold on until a suitable time and location... except the timescale for wee-holding much shorter than for poos.

I'm with you though OP, why would you hold on if you don't need to? Does your DH also hold on when he needs to wee? I think that can definitely cause problems.

Oysterbabe · 07/05/2016 08:28

I can wait if I'm out or visiting mil. I can and will wait hours to go at home.

oldjacksscrote · 07/05/2016 08:32

When I have to go I really have to go, having ibs I've had to perfect the art of popping discretely.

SuperFlyHigh · 07/05/2016 08:33

Oh yes I certainly don't wait (unless out and hard to find a public toilet). Yesterday I had to do one after work and some drinks but had left the pub and was on my way home. Nipped into department store and used their free toilets.

ArgyMargy · 07/05/2016 08:34

The technical/medical phrase for wanting a poo is "the call to stool". You ignore the call to stool at your peril.

SuperFlyHigh · 07/05/2016 08:35

The only other person I know who has to poo at home is a teenage boy on the spectrum and he's been known apparently to not go at all whilst away on holiday with school etc.

He had sensory issues re wiping his bottom and his mum had to do it for many years until my mum who is her neighbour explained how to wean him off it. But I still am not sure if he poos at home or not!

thisisnotausername · 07/05/2016 08:39

This reply has been deleted

Message withdrawn at poster's request.

MiddleClassProblem · 07/05/2016 08:40

My bowels protect me on planes by by never presenting a poo.

But sometimes I can feel a poo brewing, so I know in 30 mins/1hr I will need to go