the "p" word.

Have you ever dated someone who you did everything with? And I mean, everything. It’s almost embarrassing to talk about with your friends. You’re all sitting around having lunch and one of them admonishes, “I mean, who in their right mind would let their boyfriend do that?” You laugh outwardly and take a large gulp of your wine because inside you are thinking, “I let mine do that last night”. You thought everyone let their boyfriends do that. Wasn’t it normal to be comfortable with your significant other? Weren’t you supposed to feel like you could do anything with each other?

I dated that guy – the guy I was that kind of comfortable around. We’ll call him Boyfriend X because I don’t want to name names. Boyfriend X and I were crazy about each other. We were the annoying couple who took pictures of ourselves kissing back when people had myspace. We held hands all the time. We had inside jokes. We got matching tattoos. I was more comfortable around him than I had ever been around anyone in my life. And yes, that even includes myself. I have to say that Boyfriend X’s sense of humor and utter devotion to me lent itself to our comfort level. There was never a situation we encountered that he couldn’t get us out of with fits of laughter that had me in stitches.

Boyfriend X and I had been together for quite some time, and I was staying over at his place on this specific night. I had yet to go Number Two in front of him, and I had no intention of starting now. When the urge overcame me, I quickly thought of a reason to leave immediately. I had forgotten my toothbrush. He had an extra one I could have. I meant tampons, not toothbrush! Silly me! He was staring at the panic-stricken look on my face, and suddenly he realized what I was doing. “Stef, do you have to poop?”

I was mortified. NO I DIDN’T HAVE TO POOP. Who was he to accuse me of such a thing? I was on the verge of starting an extremely dumb fight when my somersaulting stomach got the best of me. “Yes!” I cried. I was almost on the verge of tears.

Let me tell you something about myself before I finish. I’m not the girl who talks about poop. I’m not the girl who burps loud or is overly comfortable with her bodily noises and functions. I don’t make poop jokes or talk about my bowel movements. This is common knowledge to anyone who knows me. Boyfriend X knew this well. He had once teased me about farting in my sleep for weeks because he loved the fact that I pretty much crawled out of my own skin every time he brought it up. So, like I was saying, mortified.

There was no time for arguing. My window of opportunity to drive to my own apartment less than a mile away had closed. I could not get around this now. I desperately wanted to punch Boyfriend X in the face, irrationally so. I turned on my heel and darted down the stairs. If I had to use the bathroom here, I was using the one furthest away from him. I could hear him chasing after me, “Don’t be so embarrassed! What is wrong with you?!” He was trying to hide his laughter. He was laughing at me.

I stopped on the stairwell. “Don’t follow me! Ugh! Just let me go. Stop talking about it!” My face was 15 shades of crimson, and I was in real pain at this point. I put my hand to his chest and gave him my best puppy dog eyes. “Please?” Then I fled. I made it inside the small hallway bathroom and prayed that it was over fast and peacefully. I was halfway to relief when I heard him outside the door.

“Stef?” He said softly.

“OH MY GOD!” I screamed. “OH MY GOD GO AWAY!” I was dying. This was it. I was going to die on the toilet of sheer humiliation. And then the door cracked open. I had forgotten to turn the lock in all my haste. His arm slid through the small opening, and I could see him sitting on the ground outside of the bathroom. “WHAT ARE YOU DOING? GET UP! FUCK!” I was letting out obscenities that I had made up at this point. “I HATE YOU!”

He was laughing quietly. I wanted to kill him slowly. “Stef, hold my hand. Hold it. After this, it will never be weird again. If you hold my hand while you are pooping, then pooping without me this close will be nothing.” He was still reaching out towards me with his arm hanging through the crack in the door. “Just hold my damn hand.”

I grabbed his hand. He squeezed it and giggled. Suddenly, I couldn’t be mad anymore. I couldn’t even be embarrassed anymore. This guy loved me so much he could hold my hand while I shit, and how could I be mad at him for that? I was laughing so hard that I peed a little, which was okay considering my current location. We sat there laughing together for awhile longer, and I thought to myself, this is one of those things none of my friends do with their boyfriends. I realized I was totally okay with that. I’d rather have this guy on the floor holding my hand while I pooped than the guy who pretended my body didn’t do the same things his did. I was lucky, even.

“So, hey…can I have my hand back?” I said between giggles. “Because, ya know…”

Boyfriend X peeked his head through the crack in the door. He tilted his head to the side and smiled at me the way he did when I was being ‘cute’. “Of course, baby. And light a match, would ya?”