'Why are women too scared to poo?' blog discussion

A question about : 'Why are women too scared to poo?' blog discussion

This is the discussion to link on the back of Martin's blog. Please read the blog first, as this discussion follows it.

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Best answers:

• What a lovely thing to blog about! I also have this problem - toilet noises aren't pleasant and I'd be mortified if someone was in the cubicle next to me while I was doing a number 2. Same way I'd be horrified if I had to pass wind in front of anyone else, while men seem to fart freely - I'm sure holding that in can't be good for the body either!
  Not to mention the fact that the toilets where I work are horrible, I'd rather just wait until I was in the comfort of my own house!
• My DH believes after 8 years that women don't poo. For some reason, whether I am stuck in one Freud's psycosexual stages, I am very sneaky when I go and wait until Mr Always is out of the house, mad isn't it. I don't know whether I am being ladylike or a complete psycho
• No idea why women are scared to poo. I'm a woman, and I'll poo anywhere. Well, not anywhere, just in a toilet, but I wouldn't wait until I'm at home to do so if my body's telling me I need to poo now. It's just silly. And why is a pooing sound worse than a tinkle tinkle weeing sound? Weird.
• I think the problem with poo'ing at work is the chance that, as you leave, one of your colleagues chooses that same moment to go .... And they'll smell the residual smell. Or worse, they'll enter while you're mid-motion and hear you go. You have to face that colleague afterwards, and they've been in close proximity to you while you poo. It's embarrassing.
  Well, I find it embarrassing.
  Didn't used to bother one of my colleagues, she'd quite happily go at work. And she was a vegetarian with digestive issues. And she never checked the pan afterwards ..... yeuch.
• I wonder if this goes back to school days where the toilet cubicles had gaps under the partitions and kids would look over the top.
  I know that even to this day my sons have never used the toilets at school to poo unless they really couldn't not hold on any longer.
  I guess that as it doesn't generally interfere with peoples lives too much, then they don't do anything about dealing with this issue.
  I work as a hypnotherapist and have never had somebody come to me with anything like this before
• unfortunately i dont have the option of waiting being a sufferer of Chrones but i would love it to be talked about more cause it would make me feel less embarressed
• Whats interesting about this is withing ten minutes of exporting to my facebook page (where people tend to write more but shorter) there were about 10 commetns of "so glad its not just me!"
• When I'm out I tend to use the same loos, as I know they are cleaned regularly etc and not going to be too naaasty. Anyway, more often than not there is a healthy nasal passage clearing honk when I go in, despite the little time sensor air freshener. So there is no fear of doing a No. 2 up here. Although, I do admit that I dislike going when I'm out, it's a germ thing, I'm also a compulsive hand washer. The thought of sitting on a loo where millions of other bums have been fills me with disgust. I'm a hoverer. Loos in the States have those disposable paper loo seat covers which flush away afterwards or in Germany it's even better, you just wave your hand in front of the sensor and a disposable cover which completely covers the loo seat shuffles round so no fear of any contamination and then when done, wave your hand in front of the sensor again and it flushes it away. Why can't they do that here.
• I prefer the comfort of my own bathroom if given the choice. I don't like overhearing others having a dump either! Certainly don't want to smell it, especially those with the poor diet that makes the eye watering stomach churning stench we have all had to follow at some time or other. Maybe that's why everyone used to have outside toilets...
  I haven't been in normal work for a few years and I'm sure the stress previously encountered in that work has given me IBS. If it's poop time it's poop time and it's turtling time if I even consider holding it in!! Not sure how this is going to work in a normal workplace. Makes me gassy too so I'd be leaving any open plan office regularly for a sneaky fart as I wouldn't like to inflict them on co-workers. Some days they'd be classed as chemical warfare.
  Noise cancelling technology seems sensible. Men are more down to earth with their ablutions than women anyway. There are men that won't pee in urinals. Think the women no pooing is the same....
  I also wonder if the obsessive break monitoring and call centre management philosophy is making these issues worse? Being restricted on break times could be tricky and I also wonder whether lack of hydration during the day and toilet fuhrer is a) making constipation worse as there are loads of laxative ads and b) contributing to urinary infections as people feel they can't go when they want and will drink less as a consequence. Has there been any research into this?
• I don't think this is just something that is a problem for women, I know plenty of guys who do the same, the general state of mens public toilets put me off, I must confess I didn't get over this until I was in my mid twenties after having endured the Glastonbury festival toilets everything else seemed civilised by comparison.
  I do think that public toilets are often badly designed, whilst nobody expects them to be soundproofed I really think the partition cubicles are no longer acceptable and given that most public buildings have air conditioning there is no reason why it cannot be extended to the toilets.
  Maybe the real issue is that we should be demanding better designed toilets.
• As a sufferer of Crohn's or Ulcerative Colitis (docs aren't 100% sure which one), I am afraid I don't get the option of 'holding on'.
  One thing that really bothers me though is toilets without windows. Every bathroom should have a window so that fresh air can circulate. There's nothing worse than somebody going in the morning and then still smelling that awful smell later on. Lord knows what some people eat to get it smelling like that ...
  I also regularly walk back out of toilets where there are ... skidmarks! For 2 reasons - firstly it turns my stomach and secondly I don't want anybody else to think it was me!
  This isn't just a female thing either - my father was (and still is) very funny about where he 'goes' and would always wait until home from work.
  I think it's still very much a taboo subject and it's a shame to be honest for those, such as myself, with bowel diseases. I sometimes think that people I have told about my illness for whatever reason would prefer I had a 3rd nipple or an STI rather than a bowel disease.
• A friend of a friend(honest) had her fairly new fella over to stay and needed to go in the middle of the night. She was so terrified he would hear/smell it she did it into a carrier bag so there were no plopping noises! He woke up when he heard her going downstairs to put the offending bag in the bin - not sure what would have been more embaressing -the noises or explaining why you were going to the bin at 0400!!
• It's not just the workplace or in a public toilet, I will not go at home either if my husband is at home, I don't even have a wee in the ensuite loo, if my husband is in the bedroom - poor insulation.
  He announced yesterday that he is home working from October, I got to get over the "issue" by then, otherwise I will have to keep sending him to the shop at lunchtime just to get him out the house....not very MSE!