04 Dec Well Would Ya Look at That…

Last night I stumbled across an episode of Tosh.0

For those who have never seen the show, Daniel Tosh selects videos off YouTube and cracks jokes about them to an audience. As my boyfriend put it, it’s an updated version of America’s Funniest Home Videos… Well, it is if you add in 50% more inanppropriateness.

Anyway, as my boyfriend and I flipped to his show, I noticed that the topic of the current segment was on ostomies. Daniel had found a YouTube video of a girl explaining how to change her bag.

Oh god.

As I always do when I hear the word “ostomy” on TV, I cringed, not knowing what would be said. I mean, the media has never been nice when it comes to the concept of an ostomy, and Daniel Tosh is widely known for not being nice to anyone. This could be a disaster.

It turns out, I was wrong. And I have never been happier to be wrong.

Daniel began the segment by showing Laura’s video to the audience. As she demonstrated how to change her bag, the audience made some expected “grossed out” noises. Instead of giving into the audience, however, Daniel Tosh immediately started cracking jokes, not only about poop, but how much he wished he had an ostomy.

“..so having a portable toilet attached to my belly button would be great. I’d rather BM in a bag than a gas station any day.”

Daniel – I couldn’t agree more.

Tosh made a few more poop jokes before he began on to interview Laura. In the interview, she explained what an ileostomy is (the same thing I have) and Daniel, obviously, made more jokes. Laura then proceeded shows her stoma to the audience, and Daniel… he touched it. Then, in normal Tosh.0 fashion, Daniel reenacted  a Magic School Bus episode and went through Laura’s digestive track, cracking more jokes along the way.

All in all, Daniel Tosh put a very positive spin on the ostomy through his intuitive questions, his jokes, and his willingness to.. well.. put his finger on it.

While I was happy to see this incredibly positive segment about the ostomy, I did want to clarify a few things. Just from my point of view:

1. For one, in reaction to Laura’s videos, it really only takes me under 30 seconds to change a bag. I stand, I don’t use a towel, and it’s never that messy. I get she was trying to explain how to do it, but I don’t think I’ve ever done it like that in my life. To each their own, I suppose. 
2. I don’t wear a see-through bag like Laura did in her video because, well… I don’t think anyone needs to see it.
3. There were a lot of poop jokes made. While this, again, is obviously in Tosh.0 fashion, I’ve never really been huge on too many poop jokes. I’m not even talking about ostomy jokes- I’m talking about straight up poop jokes. There were definitely not enough ostomy jokes. Maybe that’s just me.
4. Laura let him touch her stoma, and when she did, it was, well… messy. I’m not sure, exactly, if the writers had asked her to make it that way, but if it had been me, it would have been clean as a whistle. I did, however, agree that it was like touching someone’s butthole. (And no one gets to touch mine. Stoma, I mean. Well, maybe both.)
5. At the end of the Magic School Bus reenactment, Laura emptied her bag in the sink. Again, not sure if the writers asked her to do that, but I would never empty mine in the sink. It’s too close to where I was my face and brush my teeth..

I wanted to clarify these few things because, well, as an ostomate who was watching the show, I was a little grossed out at how it kind of went. I mean, I literally said “Oh My God” out loud when she emptied her bag in the sink, to which my boyfriend laughed at me. (I guess boys enjoy poop humour a lot more than girls do. At least more than I do… haha). I worried that if I found it a little gross, others would too – hence my  personal clarifications. I had to keep reminding myself, however, that this being Tosh.0, it made perfect sense for it to be a little bit gross. I just never found that kind of humour funny. Again, that’s just me.

Nevertheless, as I said, overall this was a great first step for ostomy awareness in the media. Daniel Tosh put an extremely positive and humorous spin to something seen so negatively. Daniel encouraged Laura to talk about it, he joked about it, and he let the audience know he wished he had one too.

Great job Laura, and thank you, thank you, thank you to Daniel Tosh.

Feel free to model an ostomy bag for me, any day.

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Please, please, please, feel free to comment on this post here, on the Facebook page, or on Twitter using the hashtag #UncoverOstomy ! Let’s get some discussion going on what you thought about the segment, my comments, and how it’s finally making it’s way into the media!

Oh, and feel free to let Daniel Tosh know how much we appreciate his willingness to talk about ostomies by tweeting him here.

You can watch the segment from the show here. In Canada? Watch it here