Everybody Does It

If you haven’t already noticed, I’m quite long winded.  I just go on and on and on…I don’t know how to edit.  That’s why I have a crappy job instead of being the editor of a newspaper.  Duh. 
Oh, also, I talk like that too.  I just go on and on and on and on and on……..



I’m not pregnant, but thanks for asking.  There’s nothing more miserable than broken down food being congealed and lodged within your intestines.  Now, before I begin, I would like you to know if you are squeamish or easily grossed out, you’d better hit the back button with a panic.  Why?  Because I am going to talk about poop. 

Now, if you are reasonable person, a reader of integrity, you will realize that we all poop.  You can’t stop it, you can’t hide it.  We just don’t talk about it.  And I’m not sure why because we ALL DO IT!  We can easily discuss what funny noise our car made last week but we cannot so easily disccuss what funny noises our belly made.  It baffles me that in our society it’s so easily to look at a billboard, the TV, pretty much everywhere and see disgusting symbols of sex--yet, nothing about pooping.

Because it’s so gross, ew!  Oh, grow up.  What are you, twelve?  I’ve been pooping since I was ripped from my mother’s womb and I have no problem discussing my issues.  Issues I’ve had since my mother put me on solid foods, that is.

You see, I’ve been constipated since I could walk--at nine months old, thank you  very much.  Once, when I was fourteen, I had a pain in my gut so bad that my crying prompted my dad to drive like a maniac to the hospital thinking I had a burst appendix.  Dad speeds for no reason.  Even at the age of fourty-five he drove like an old man.  This was one of very few exceptions.

No, it was nothing like a leaking appendix.  It was just poop, literally backed up within me.  The doctor suggested Dad get me an enema.  Id heard of these enema things, but I wasn’t quite sure what it was.  I later found out.

I sat on the bathroom floor of my parents home for about two hours, staring at this little plastic tube and bottle of saline, water, whatever the heck was in there.  And as I stared at this thing and read the instructions for the thirty-seventh time, I cried.

Occasionally, Dad would rap on the door gently and softly ask if I was OK.  “I can’t do this, I can’t do this, I can’t do this!!” I cried from the other side of the door.

This was my sacred area!  You just don’t put things up there!  How could I do this?  I wouldn’t do this.  I once read the side of a shampoo bottle with the words, “Use Externally Only”.  I asked my dad what this meant.

“It means don’t stick it in your ***hole,” he said.  See?  Even Dad knows you just don’t put things there!

Fast forward to fourteen years later and I still have this problem.  I’ve always known that “not going” is bad for you.  It’s got to be.  You can’t just walk around with dirty, digested food products in your body for a week and expect things to turn out OK.  It’s the equivalent of leaving dairy out in the hot sun and expecting it to be eatable.  Things are going to grow there, bacteria and bugs…  No, I would not eat cheese left out on the sidewalk.

And then there’s the pain.  I’m not only talking about the act of buttoning blue jeans when I am so bloated, but the pain of just being bloated itself.  It’s like my body doesn’t want to poop so instead it tries to push out the waste in a form of deadly vapors.
My stomach gurgles and gives off the appearance of a woman carrying around a six month old fetus.  In my young years, I’ve tried everything from peppermint tea to downing laxatives on the weekends.  I’ve gobbled down vegetables and cut out most processed foods, added fruit, and still carried around a volleyball.

A friend told me to get a bottle of pear juice in the baby aisle and drink the whole thing.  This produced nothing more than a gas that could easily be classified as a Weapon of Mass Destruction.  I tried to blame the dogs.  That sort thing just doesn’t fly anymore when you’ve been married to the same man for nine years.  And it certainly doesn’t work at my job.

Speaking of the men we’re married to, I don’t think it’s at all fair that my husband downs two gallons of Pepsi a day, eats frozen French fries like they’ll go bad, and still manages to poop EVERY SINGLE DAY WITH EASE.  If he ever gets constipated, he simply get s a hotdog at 7-11 and smothers it with that gross cheese that’s been sitting there for God knows how long.  Does the trick every time.  But I can’t eat those things every day.  Or....ever.  Ew.

My mom has always had the same problem and became dependant on laxatives.  I urged her to get off those blasted things.  She finally began bragging on some rat pellet cereal called All Bran.  “Misty, we’re talking EVERY DAY!  I eat one-third a cup with milk each day and it’s like magic!!” she says.

I tasted this cereal and told her it was like eating a box.  “You gotta put milk with it!  Here, have some with milk, it’s sweeter!”  Ah, Mom.  Still trying to get me to eat right after all these years.

I didn’t go with the All Bran, which yes, does in fact look like rat pellets.  I did, however find a cereal called Fiber One and I got it in the Caramel Delight flavor.  Who doesn’t like caramel?  I could eat a big bowl of melted caramel right now if I had it.

At the risk of sounding like a total commercial, this works.  That yogurt on TV with the active bacteria--that doesn’t work.  Tried it, been there, didn’t send me flying to the bathroom.  The problem with this cereal is that it tastes SO GOOD.  Like crunchy caramel flavored sugar squares.  A serving gives 25% of daily vitamins and 35% of daily fiber.

For the first time in my life--in my life!--I am proud to say that I have pooped EVERY SINGLE DAY for almost two weeks.  Sure, it’s a little sad that is a major accomplishment for someone in their late twenties, but a mountain that has been climbed none the less.  So lets see, I'm approaching my twenty-ninth birthday and so far I've quit smoing and became "regular".  Look at me go.

At work, I bragged to the girls who have been telling me to drink pear juice and swallow bits of cut-up prunes like a pill.  “I have pooped!” I announce loudly.

“Good!  Good for you!” they laugh.
“And it wasn’t a thirty minuet struggle, either!  I was in there, like five minuets and lost three pounds right there!”  This has been a long time running gag at work.  My poop issues, I mean.  My coworkers are genuinely happy for me.  Or maybe they’re just happy they’ll no longer have to discuss my issues with me.  Either way, we’re all happy about this amazing feat.

I can’t say if eating this cereal will work long term.  In the past, anything that I tried that worked, only worked for a little while.  I’m sure fiber is really good for this sort of thing, but I may look into a pill form of fiber.  This cereal is kind of expensive and I’ve been eating it like a glutton.  Coupons allow me to do so.  It’s also got a lot of sugar in it, which I’ve been trying to take in with a bit discretion these days.  I've actaully had to start measuring it out so I don't plow through half the box in one sitting.  And I will, too if I take the box with me to the TV.

I’ll leave you with that.  As with my coworkers, don’t be afraid to talk about poop.  We all do it; it‘s as natural as taking the trash to the curb.  Some of us clean up other’s poop.  Some of us develop foods to help others poop.  The point is we all do and we should not be afraid to talk about it.  Go on, now.  Don’t be scared.  Just don't ask anyone to look at it.  Remember, it's alright to talk about it.


Don't live a little, live on fire