11 Jan Time Management: The Toilet Edition

TO DO:

• Eat dinner
• Spend time with family
• Complete homework
• Have flush 

With a cecostomy comes a daily routine, an hour on the toilet flushing my bowels. It doesn’t seem like a big deal it’s just an hour out of my day, but that’s 456 hours since I’ve had my cecostomy.

Coming home after a long day at school is tough enough when you have so much to do and so little time to do it. That’s why I’ve figured out a way to just make it work… Even if that means doing homework on the toilet.

So, yeah, poop and pee is not a topic normally on the forefront of people’s conversations, yet is a common topic amongst those with ostomies and their network. Many find poop and pee talk a private conversation, which is why there is such a large stigma behind ostomies… even though fecal removal is a normal process of the human body! So I fully recognize that some people reading this may find it disturbing to do homework while in the washroom, but all I say to that is how many of you scroll through your phone or read the newspaper while on the john? So what difference is it to type an essay or read lecture notes?

I call this time management: the toilet edition!

For those who don’t know, a cecostomy requires me to flush my bowels on a daily basis in order to release the build-up of waste in my system, as I am unable to do this on my own. I insert a tube into the cecum with fluid and let it do its thing. My doctor made butthole isn’t perfect!

I’ve been doing a lot of things on the toilet ever since I can remember. When I was younger, my cousins and even some of my friends would bring chairs into the washroom and play card games or color with me to keep me company. Thinking back, I probably should have offered facemasks or nose plugs, but instead I offered juice boxes and granola bars, which they took (that’s true friendship!) Don’t worry, we had deodorizing room spray near by and would spray whenever necessary.

Something I discovered when I used to attend ostomy camp from talking to other campers with cecostomies was how they spent their time flushing. Many told me that they did everything from knitting to game boy playing and reading – the list was long. It seemed to me, though, that studying was the common trend.

Some may be wondering what my set up looks like, so here’s a staged picture.

PS: a TV dinner table, the kind that folds out, acts perfectly as toilet desk. Available at Wal-Mart. (Best $20 I ever spent!)

If you had an hour a day on the toilet every day for the rest of your life, what would you do?