AIBU to think this is disgusting (needing a poo while on a run)

[Nixen]

Not a poo troll I promise, just ... staggered(!) that one of my friends disagrees with me on this and wanted to gauge opinion!

Don’t ask how the subject came up but my friend H (herself a keen runner) mentioned in response to a news article that her friend J stops for poos during her run ... ‘ She has a stomach issue, running makes her poo 🤷‍♀’ apparantly J takes wet wipes with her but H has never asked if J takes dog poo bags / nappy bags with her, so we’re not sure if she picks it up or just leaves it.

H really really doesn’t see the issue, thinks it’s super judgey to think this is disgusting, says dogs bird etc all poo outside. My view point is that things like this are what separates us from the animals!

Of course if J had an accident and was cut short / poorly I would be so sympathetic, how horrible, but to habitually choose to do this - I think that’s grim!

What do you think mumsnet? Am I really being unreasonable?!

Y'know like the right to walk your kids to school or have them play outdoors without them stepping in human faeces because "no, I can't possibly interrupt my run to find a toilet or heaven forbid pick up my own shit. My running is more important than anything else!"

Have you ever been anywhere that isn't the suburbs?
Are you even aware of the vast, uninhabited tranches of rural land in the UK that is miles & miles away from schools, toilets, or even other people?
Has it not occured to you that maybe just maybe, OP's friend chooses remote areas to run in, because she knows she needs to manage a stomach condition that will occur when she runs? Or that she either scrapes a hole, or bags her poo? And that nobody is around to see her anyway?

Or that this is a giant non-issue?

To be fair, that’s an outlandish example. No one is jobby-dodging on the school run are they?

Acksherly, lots of us are, only it's from dogs. I stepped in some on the way back this morning, even.

I most certainly don't live in the suburbs or a city. But thanks for being so patronising .

disposable incontinence undies and specialist running leggings that hold it all in

Is someone saying they run with shit attached to bottom?

Sounds like a recipe for rash & thrush.
Can someone link to where to buy the special running leggings?

I'm quite a seasoned hiker . You can easily be out in the middle of nowhere for up to 8-10 hours . How can you keep one in for that long ? I'd say nigh on impossible . What you do is walk a fair way from the footpath ( if there is one ) do what you have to do , and cover it up with ferns , or possibly rocks etc. It is also a good idea to take a plastic bag to take your toilet paper home with you.
When wild camping you take a small gardening trowel out and bury it.

Genuinely surprised at how few seasoned runners there are on MN.

You can easily be out in the middle of nowhere for up to 8-10 hours . How can you keep one in for that long ? I'd say nigh on impossible

On that basis, you poop 2-3 times a day. Most people don't.

Er, no it doesn't, it's just the very reasonable chance of your once a day poo happening within that 8-10 hour window.

I know that Mumsnet thinks that everyone shits once a day within a predictable half hour window first thing in the morning before you need to go anywhere but I don't work like that for a start.

@BadSun Go for a 15 mile run, perhaps have a couple of gels en route. Then you might see how daft your comment is

I most certainly don't live in the suburbs or a city. But thanks for being so patronising

You're welcome.
The defensiveness doesn't explain the hysteria & wild imaginings, or how you are so horrified by natural functions though.

Go for a 15 mile run, perhaps have a couple of gels en route. Then you might see how daft your comment is

We were talking about a hike. Fortunately for me, a 15-mile run doesn't take me 8-10 hours!

Agreed with Barbara. Not that I have ever pooed outside.

Can't get het up about joggers pooing in the bushes when far from home though, due to the sheer volume of dog poo covering the ground in the suburbs, in the countryside, and dangling in plastic bags from every tree in sight.

Er, no it doesn't, it's just the very reasonable chance of your once a day poo happening within that 8-10 hour window

TBF, the post I was replying to did not say "there's a reasonable chance of your once a day occurring in that time".

It said "How can you keep one in for that long ? I'd say nigh on impossible"

the sheer volume of dog poo covering the ground in the suburbs, in the countryside, and dangling in plastic bags from every tree in sight
I know:( everywhere you go there are lumps of dog mess oozing out of black plastic bags, as if the whole of the outdoors is just a toilet for dogs:(

I walk my dogs in the woods and have come across human poo at the side of the path - I know it’s human as there are a few tissues next to it and as far as I know a dog has never wiped it’s own arse. It’s vile, I pick up my dogs poo or at the very least if it’s in the brambles I stick and flick, at least that way it breaks down. Hope she takes her wet wipes home at the very least!

Badsun

To clarify, if you are away from a toilet , ie. 8 miles away, where you have walked and not met another person. If you need the loo , you need it. I feel I am not the only person in the world that could you hold myself be it a pee or what the post is about so if you have to go , you do .
Because I am in the middle of nowhere it is buried , hidden etc .

Not read full thread but I have heard that long distance running affects people in this way. Paula Radcliffe had to do one at the side of the road.

I have, today come across two full, discarded nappies in the middle of the pavement on both sides of the road. I find that much more disgusting than a random poo in the woods from a desperate jogger/hiker.

I threw them in the bin because the dirty bitch/dirty bastard parent could not be bothered to walk two metres to a public bin to throw them away.

I hope all those poo hunters out in the woods/forests etc find their treasure.

My dogs will both seek out and eat human poo left by whoever - even if you think you've flicked it off the path out the way they WILL find it.

I run too and if I am going on a long distance I'll make sure I've had a tactical clear out first thing (glycerin suppository!) or run circuits past my home until the deed is done.

If you run in the woods frequently and poop in the woods frequently, are you not concerned that one day you will run through your poop?? Stinky

To clarify, if you are away from a toilet , ie. 8 miles away, where you have walked and not met another person. If you need the loo , you need it. I feel I am not the only person in the world that could you hold myself be it a pee or what the post is about so if you have to go , you do .
Because I am in the middle of nowhere it is buried , hidden etc

I never disagreed with that. In fact earlier in the thread I said that if nobody sees you and you clean up after yourself then I don't see any issue with it.

it's just the very reasonable chance of your once a day poo happening within that 8-10 hour window.
Is this “once a day” poo a thing? I can’t fathom going every single day! I suppose that means I’m ideally suited to being a long distance runner.

Atholplace, google tells me that three times a day to three times a week are all within normal range.
Life must be endlessly surprising for you if you cannot fathom other's toilet habits being different from yours!

You know those threads with titles like "What have you learned from MN?"

For me it's
... how obsessed some people are with bowel habits.
... that some people have bowels of steel. You get those threads about folk who can't 'go' even once while on a week's holiday or anywhere away from home, never at work, and certainly couldn't get caught out in the countryside. They can literally retain & release it only at convenient times. Regardless of activity or diet.
... that some find it so surprising that not everyone else has predictable 100% under control bowels of steel like themselves. May insist that people not like themselves must be lying selfish mingers or severely medically screwed up.

I think the running addiction has gone too far if someone thinks it's ok to take a shit outdoors and dump a plastic wet wipe with it. Take a shorter bloody run. Or run past a toilet.