Trigger warning : anus and poop talk.
So I am nearly asleep when I get the vague feeling something unusual is happening in, on, and/or near my asshole.
It feels weirdly warm back there, and it itches and/or stings a little.
So I sleepily reach back there to give the itch a rub and feel something wet. I pull my finger back and open my eyes and lo an behold, poop.
I grab a Kleenex and clean off my finger, then explore further, and there is a lot more. I end up needed around ten more Kleenexes (Kleenices?) to get enough of it that I feel secure enough to go to the bathroom to get the rest in a more normal fashion.
I end up having a proper shit in the toilet, and it burns and aches a little bit, and like the rest of it with the Kleenex, it’s very soft.
It occurs to me that I am very, very grateful that I sleep on my front. Better to clean my butthole than my bed.
Then again, sleeping on my front might have contributed to the incident. All that pressure on my delicate digestive tract.
Needless to say, I am pretty worried about this incident and really hope it was a one time only thing.
I would hate to add night time incontinence to my list of ailments. The only cure for that would be to sleep in an adult diaper and my lord, I have so precious little dignity in my life that I don’t think I could take a loss like that.
Luckily, I am fairly sure it was brought on by having far too much of my beloved artificial cheez flavoured products like Cheetos lately coupled with some leftover (free) pizza.
My beloved cheez has been known to irritate my system in the past, and coupled with some Italian sausage and pineapple pizza, must have proved too much for my poor delicate digestion to bear.
So I am not too worried about a repeat incident. Not yet anyway. I will avoid all cheez (and cheese) for the time being and give my system a chance to calm down, and hopefully be able to put the whole thing behind me (so to speak) and file the memory away under “minor health weirdness” and forget all about it.
I will remain alert, though. I will pay close attention to how my innards are feeling for the next little while, and try to stick to soothing, bland, low-impact foods until I can be sure the coast is clear.
Anything that violates our boundaries on such a deep, private, and taboo level as pooping oneself is bound to be highly upsetting, and believe me, I am feeling rather scared and insecure right now.
If it happens again, I will have to go see my GP, with all the minor annoyances that entails, not to mention the humiliation of having to describe it all to him.
I pride myself in not being squeamish about things, especially when they are important, but even I have my limits and telling an authority figured I shat myself tests them.
More after the break.
This one life
Another side effect of being as in tune with the myriad manifestations of life like I am, besides the crippling option paralysis, is the feeling that it is somehow unfair that we only get one life and one identity when there are so many other possibilities out there that we will never get to experience.
We only get to be this one human being. I am Michael John Bertrand and that’s it. It is all that I am and all that I will ever be.
And that just seems so… limiting.
And yes, I know how crazy that sounds. Most people do not think that way. Most people, in fact, aren’t even aware that they even are who they are. They can’t imagine being anyone else. Their identity is the core of all their perceptions and they can no more see it than you can see your glasses when you are wearing them.
Not oh so lucky people like me, though. I have always been adept at seeing things through the eyes of others and putting myself in their place and imagining what it would be like to be them. So I am keenly aware of all the sorts of people I am not, and part of me – the deeper part, the part that is the essential indivisible me – resents that.
That part of me wants to live a million lives. It wants to truly understand things from the point of view of other identities and add that understanding to its own greater wisdom.
It wants to see everything from every perspective. That’s the only way you can truly understand what is going on.
I sometimes think of it like reality is a play done in the round, and we are all looking at it from our own particular seat in the surrounding galleria.
Each of us sees the play from our own point of view, and it is easy to convince yourself that you really know what is going on in the play even though you are by no means seeing the whole thing.
But when you start wondering what it looks like from other people’s seats, you realize that all you are seeing is one thin slice of the action, and that if you want to really understand what is going on, you are going to have to get up and move around.
Thus, my life long obsession with gathering perspectives. I never feel like I understand something if I have only ever seen it from my particular point of view.
I always want to see things from other people’s POV, and if those aren’t available, I look at things from as many points of view as I can imagine.
This all happens subconsciously, of course. But it still happens.
And that is also how I compensate for the fact that I will only ever get one life and one identity and one pair of eyes to see through.
I use my mind and my empathy to see through as many pairs of eyes as I can.
I will talk to you nice people again tomorrow.