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I wrote an article awhile back for goodmenproject.com on the joy of peeing standing up. I concluded the article with the promise that I would follow it up with a piece on the manly art of the dump, that is the joy of having a satisfying bowel movement. I have been reluctant to fulfill that pledge for fear that the article would be a piece of shit and my editor at goodmenproject.com would flush it. I thought about writing it on toilet paper in brown ink and sending it by snail mail. I reconsidered when I thought about how how much time and care this would take and decided it wasn’t worth the effort. I do not think that there was been enough written about the pleasure many men take in pooping. So this man has to do what this man has to do.
Now, don’t worry. This article is not about anything kinky. This will be a clean piece on shit. If you want kinky I’m sure you can find plenty of that. I don’t know. I haven’t done the research, but once while I was working, I and a colleague did do some looking into the toilet bowel.
I was working at a medically supervised drug abuse withdrawal program in a public hospital. One of the very difficult problems with stopping alcohol and other forms of drug abuse is how bad people can feel when they stop taking the drug or drugs that are causing them so much misery. Suddenly stopping drug abuse can even be life threatening when the body, can’t adjust to what it is used to having.
Addiction to heroin or opioid based pain medications seldom causes death when an addict stops, but the feelings associated with opiate withdrawal often makes addicts feel like they would rather die, then feel that way.
We made the mistake of Googling human feces to see what might be available in the way of images.
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Where I worked, a little methadone medication was seen as going a long way to help take enough of the edge off of an addict’s withdrawal symptom misery to allow them to focus on what could be done to stop their abuse of drugs. Problem is that methadone can be abused too.
Sometimes patients came to where I worked lying their ass of as to how much heroin they had been abusing in hopes that they could get as much methadone as they could. Sometimes the amount of heroine they had been using was just enough to test positive on a pre-admissions drug screening test. Other tests needed to be utilized. One of the signs that a person is experiencing heroin withdrawal symptoms is loose stool, diarrhea, the squirts. It is the opposite of what you get from heroin use, that is constipation. When a heroin addict told a nurse that they had been experiencing diarrhea, the nurse went looking for proof. As a social work counselor I was part of reminding patients that if they experienced diarrhea while in treatment, to not flush, because a nurse would need to see it for it to count as a reason for giving the patient methadone.
I was doing some bad joking with another counselor as to how we could be of more help to the nurses if we were given feces identification training. I joked that probably field guides to human poop existed. I imagined that they would be like books that give names for various cloud formations in the sky. I speculated that knowing how many, if not most people, like checking out the results of there having done their business by sneaking a peek into the toilet bowl, such a field guide could become a best selling book. People could comment on their poop of the day by name. Like the weather, crapping is something nearly everybody can relate to. I could imagine how exiting it would be to discover a piece of shit that here – to – fore had gone unnamed. What an honor it could be to have a variety of human scat named after you.
Well, we made the mistake of Googling human feces to see what might be available in the way of images. We quickly realized that we wished that we hadn’t and went back to work.
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One reason why it is easy to get a laugh out of a a reference to poop has to do with potty training. Becoming toilet training can earn the highest praise from loving parents who celebrate the beginning of the end of dirty hands and expensive diapers, there is a good deal of self esteem on the line for children who are just starting to get the hang of it. This means that there is anxiety involved. Where you have anxiety, you have humor. Furthermore kids learn that adults don’t want them to talk much about this business, including using certain words to describe the products involved. It is tricky socialization to get into the know, about when to talk about this shit. It is the same with sex. It is why we get a chuckle sometimes hearing the words fuck or shit and sometimes get real pissed off from hearing the same words.
I am not a proctologist, just some random guy on the internet, who had to admit that I had been doing it wrong.
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My father never changed a diaper that I am aware of. I never saw him help my mother out in this way with my younger siblings. My father was a very good man, but he became a father in an era when wiping up what babies do naturally was women’s work. I changed many a diaper, when I became a dad. I willing endured the mess and the stink and was proud to be of service. As I get closer to the age of perhaps being in need for a return on this service from my, now adult, sons, I hope they come to realize this path to pride should it become available to them. I of course hope that it will not.
I believe that many women have started becoming more comfortable with what men have enjoyed since the dawn of time. For too long, men have kept control over being able to talk about the deep satisfaction of taking a good dump. Technology has helped with this. This article is not sponsored by “Squatty Potty,” I am endorsing the product for free. I am not a proctologist, just some random guy on the internet, who had to admit that I had been doing it wrong. My toilet training had not been complete. I was never taught how to squat. Thanks to the “Squatty Potty,” men and women have had their enjoyment in life increase on a , if they are lucky, daily basis. If you buy a “Squatty Potty” and it doesn’t work for you, you aren’t going to waste more than 30 bucks. If you want an endorsement, just ask someone who is using one and watch them smile.
In may be past time for me to conclude this dump of opinions on pooping. I guess I won’t go into the satisfaction many men get from farting and my hope that women will come to better understand how this could be so. Now that I have warmed up to this fertile subject you can expect more form me in the future via goodmenproject.com. I bet you can’t wait.
Nothing in this article is meant to make light of the plague of opioid addiction that is spreading across the globe. Nothing in this article is intended to stereotype those suffering from drug addiction. It was not the purpose of this article to inform on methods for treating substance abuse disorders. It is dedicated to those who skillfully and tireless strive to help people who have difficulty stopping their abuse of drugs, to families of individuals affected by drug abuse and the courage of those who seek treatment. All of the above need so much more in the way of support for their dedication.
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Photo Credit: Getty Images