Tethered to a Toilet

Okay, so I’m full of shit.

But you knew that already.

Just joshing. This isn’t about poop, it’s about peeing. No, really.

If you’ve ever had a Urinary Tract Infection (for so many of us girls, that means a few days after sex with The New Guy. Which, by the way, is the body’s way of saying “we’re not too sure about this one.” Just saying…) you know the drill. The discomfort. If you haven’t, I suggest watching The Green Mile, which is as clear a portrait of what it’s like to have a UTI as I’ve ever seen on film.

Relief, especially if you suffer from TBS (otherwise known as Tiny Bladder Syndrome — no that’s not real, but it is to those of us who have it) is very real. In the aftermath of the lockdown, among those things that had locks put on them were public toilets. For those of us who pee freely and often, no matter how much we drink, that was cruel and unusual punishment.

With a tip of the hat to Jeff Foxworthy of You Might be a Redneck fame, it isn’t just grandmas who can pee by the side of the road.

These days, people pee in public places because they are pissed about being asked to wear a mask.

I would like to piss ON such people for such puerile behavior, but my plumbing doesn’t allow it. Instead, I submerge my urge to urinate and have found ways to accommodate. I create the “instant commode.”

I travel with towels in the pockets of my car door. Usually, they are to protect my lap and car seat from apple drippings, because I consume at least two or three Honey Crisps a day. I drive to a part of any available parking lot, open both doors on my side of the car, and drape a towel over my lap.

Then I pee, all the while using a wet wipe to clean the inside of the driver’s door to look like I’m doing something industrious while I’m also watering the pavement.

Normally I’d find a bush, but the fires this year wiped a whole lotta those out.

The first time I had to do this after settling into the area to look for homes here in Eugene (which, as I was to find out, has a dearth of public pee places to begin with and then those closed, too), my real estate agent was mortified.

A few days later she was asking how to do it herself. She spends a lot of time in other folks’ homes, and these days, those folks don’t want strange butts on their uber-sparkling toilets. They would also prefer that you not pee in the driveway. Bad enough that deer and turkey shit there.

Can’t blame them.

But folks gotta go.

So when I read this recycled story about water consumption, I had to laugh:

YES, we are a dehydrated nation. And alcohol doesn’t count, for that along with tea and coffee also dry us out. Water works.

But enough of it and we become waterworks.

After having had kidney stone surgery and a pretty awful accident as a result of a second stone, I was admonished not only to drink lots more water this summer but to also effectively double that amount because of the stones that remained.

Like a good military girl, I did just that.

I was tethered to a toilet, whether a real one or the instant commode.

It was miserable.

While the author of the Outside Online story is correct that the body thanks us in every possible language for pouring water down our gullets, how much and how often really does depend, or you and I are wearing Depends for the rest of our lives.

Two weeks ago I did a test for my local urologist. One required that I pee into a bottle for 24 hours. The other required that I note all my fluid intake and all the output.

When I had filled out the initial paperwork I figured I headed to the Porcelain Throne perhaps eight times a day.

Nay nay. How about 23, and four or five at night?

Dude, you could kayak on that kind of water.

Bless my urologist.

During our Zoom call, she said that I most certainly didn’t need to be sucking down the equivalent of Lake Erie every day. The side effects would subside, like the tides, thank you. I wouldn’t expire if I cut my intake in half.

Or more.

However, I still have a tiny bladder.

I’ve considered doing a YouTube instructional on how to set up an insta-commode. You laugh.

You guys think this is rude or hilarious. Try cutting off that garden hose and controlling where it goes, sweetie.

And before you pepper me with recommendations for the ubiquitous She-wee, honey, tried ’em. I laugh too hard and I leak:

At least I don’t do that.

Yet.

I note that such devices are having a heyday as all our loos are closing up.

For my part, my porta-pottie works. Besides, I’ve got the cleanest driver’s inside door in the country.

And yes, I AM a redneck.

But at least I’m relieved.