Shit-phobia sucks

I have a friend that can't take a crap in public restrooms.

I found this out the hard way, when we were out eating dinner with a few friends at a Legal's Seafood Restaurant and one of them realized he had to go to the bathroom. I told him where the restroom was but he insisted on going home.

Long story short, I had to cut short a fun evening hanging out with some friends I hadn't seen in a while to drive a friend back to his house so he could take a crap. It's kinda funny that that happened to me because I don't like driving and people don't like me driving because I think speeding isn't worth it and I always bitch about how they're lousy car passengers.

Anyway, as I was driving, all I could think to myself was 'What the fuck?'. I tried to ask what was wrong with him and why he was afraid to take a crap in the restaurant restroom to basically rub it in his face (the unfounded fear, not the crap) that he basically screwed me out of a fun time hanging with some friends just so he could take a crap.

"Sorry, I just can't" was basically his constant reply to my pestering. Me, being a typical asshole friend that I am (not in a mean-spirited way, mind you) that tends to find humor in everything, felt obligated to riff on him so I simply made fun of him and his shit-phobia.

While I may seem a bit insensitive about this phobia, I can't help but wonder how a fear like this could actually be some realized that it could cause someone to change the plans in their evening JUST to take a crap at home, away from a public restroom. I probably have MORE of a reason to fear crapping in a public restroom than most people. When I was in middle school, I went on a field trip for three days to this place called Frost Valley. I was in a group that all shared a cabin. I was in the group full of 'wall' kids. That meant I was basically in a group of neither unpopular nor popular kids. I was neither a 'nerd' nor a 'jock'. I was considered part of the 'wall' group that was between those two groups.

Anyway, on the first night, late at night, I heard a scream coming from one of the other cabins. I remember hearing it because I was up that night and had trouble sleeping because I had been suffering from a slight asthma attack. Back then, I suffered asthma and I never learned of the benefits of an inhaler until I was in high school. Anyway, I heard a scream. Not a shriek of terror, but something along the lines of "Holy fucking shit!!!".

The next day, I found out what had caused one of the kids from the 'jock' cabin to scream like that. That night, while he was taking a crap, he saw a rat run right through his stall. That following night, I saw rats around my cabin. It doesn't take a genius to figure out how much that freaked me out, especially at the thought of having to take a crap and finding a rat run by my stall just like it did for someone else. To me, it's kinda like watching Pet Cemetery where you see this evil child slice into the Achilles heel of this old guy with a scalpel. It makes you want to raise your feet from off the ground while sitting like it's probably doing to you right now, provided you actually know what scene I'm talking about. Anyway, the rat incident is something that definitely made me squeamish about crapping in a public restroom.

Now, coming from a background like that and still not having developed an irrational fear of crapping in a public restroom, I guess you can understand why I might seem a bit insensitive on such a subject. I never developed a phobia over something that could be very traumatic like seeing a rat and knowing that someone had a rat rub by his stall while crapping, yet there are people with phobia's because they are scared of either germs of someone entering the restroom while they're doing their business and overhearing them crapping up a storm.

From what I determine, assuming that people don't suffer from a traumatic experience that can lead to such a phobia, it seems like this shit phobia stems from two fears, the fear of germs and the fear of someone being in the restroom while they're doing their business.

There should be no reason to be afraid of germs. Most people are scared of placing their ass on a toilet seat that had been shared by thousands of other asses. What you need to understand is that it isn't the ass that's dirty, it's the actual asshole. The butt cheeks are what rests on a toilet seat. A butt cheek is no dirtier than basically any other part of your body, like your stomach.

Now, if you associate a person's butt cheek with the filthiness of an actual asshole, I really wonder what kinda form of ass-wiping you're thinking of. For the seat to be as filthy as an asshole, that means a person needs to somehow managed to get crap on the portion of the butt cheek that touches the toilet seat. I dunno about you, but I find that unlikely. The only time I ever get crap even remotely close to that portion of my butt cheeks is when I'm holding a magazine with one hand and using the butt check to fold the toilet paper one handed after having wiped once before in order to wipe a second time. Sometimes one accidentally wipe crap from the toilet paper onto the butt cheek while attempting to fold the toile paper one handed.

Assuming you're aware of this and simply don't want to sit on a toilet seat where people have pissed on the actual seat. Well, if you do a bit of research, you'll find that the average car is crawling with more germs that a toilet seat. Basically, germs should not be an issue if you have shit-phobia.

Perhaps you're scared of getting some kinda disease. Well, unfortunately, it's a general misconception that one can get some kinda venereal disease from simply sitting on a toilet seat for most germs will have perished before it could spread. Most sexually transmitted diseases, like Gonorrhea, Syphilis and Chlamydia, can't live outside the body long enough to be contracted from sitting on a toilet seat. Sure, while it is possible to contract herpes (since they can live outside the body for up to four hours) you basically need to contract it through an open sore on your ass. Basically, to contract herpes, you need to sit on the same toilet seat and have an open sore in the same spot where the person that has herpes had a sore as well in order for it to be transmitted. This is highly unlikely but not impossible. But if you're still paranoid, just slap some toilet paper on the seat before you sit. Problem solved.

Another reason a person could have shit-phobia is shyness. They're worried that someone might enter the restroom and hear them while they're doing their business. This is what truly confuses me. Why would someone even care? I especially ask this because of what I had to go through. Think about it. I had to drive a friend home because he didn't want to take a crap in the restaurant's public restroom. How can you possibly use this as an excuse? It means you're more worried about what a total stranger thinks of you doing your business than what I think of you, a person who constantly sees you. If anything, I figure you would rather have strangers think less of you than someone you constantly see, like a friend. It just doesn't make sense.

I definitely suffer from no fears of what other people think of me so I guess I should not be one to tell you shit-phobics to just suck it up and not care about what others think. But this is what I find really strange, even though it DOES bother you what a stranger might think or hear when you're doing your business, why would it never cross your mind to what I, a friend of yours, would think? How can what a stranger thinks of you take matter more over what a friend thinks of you?

As I drove the friend to his home, that's something I had trouble understanding. How can it bother you to do your business in front of a stranger, a stranger who has no idea what you look like as well as will probably never see you again, yet it not bother you to have a friend cut short a dinner get-together with old friends just to drive you back to your place just so you can take a crap, something that can be easily avoided if you just used the public restroom in the first place? To me, it seems like you need to get your priorities straight.

Then again, maybe I'm a bad friend for not understanding.

Shit-phobia sucks.

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