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07/23/2008
NST, scheduled C, misplaced pee, and cranky me
The good news
Yesterday's NST went off without a hitch. The baby moved, accelerated, and decelerated exactly as expected, ripping out the necessary three episodes in 15 minutes flat — due, no doubt, to the mysterious and irresistible powers of your collective good wishes. That's my story, anyway, and I'm sticking to it. The two-pound bag of Billington's muscovado had nothing to do with it, no matter what my suspicious bastard of a traitorous FreeStyle Lite tries to tell you.
The "Hahahahahaha, sucker" news
In case I needed a refresher on how exquisitely refined Fate's sense of the perverse can be, it seems I need not have given too much consideration to the C-section vs. VBAC question. With an estimated weight of 8 pounds 7 ounces, the baby is now breech. Head up, feet down. Okay, universe, you win. A planned C-section it is. Friday, August 1, 2008.
A brief aside to those of you who sympathetically suggested I ask for an immediate delivery: When a pregnancy is complicated by gestational diabetes, there's this skittery line to straddle. GD babies are prone to delayed lung maturity, so you don't want to deliver earlier than absolutely necessary. (In fact, you don't want to deliver any baby earlier than absolutely necessary.) But in GD pregnancies, certain risks increase as the gestation lengthens. In insulin-managed diabetic mothers carrying babies of a certain...distinctive size, shall we say, the sweet spot for delivery appears to be right around 39 weeks. I can handle another nine days.
The bad news
On the other hand, I'm not at all sure anyone around me can. I was unpardonably rude to another woman at the OB's office today. The bathroom was occupied when I arrived, so I patiently waited to produce my urine sample. When the occupant emerged, I went in, closed the door, and cast a casual glance at the toilet seat before mounting. It bore the unmistakable splattered hallmark of that despicable scofflaw, the squatter.
I am not the squeamish sort. I sit in public bathrooms. I do not use a paper liner even when they are on offer. And if the previous tenant hasn't flushed, I am never overly distressed; I'll do the job myself. Using my hand. (I digress here to decry another unpalatable flavor of bathroom outlaw, the foot-flusher. I mean, Jesus, I'm not prim. But no one should have to confront anyone's bottom-of-the-shoe-on-the-bathroom-floor germs when performing a simple flush. Foot-flushers, take warning: you are first against the wall of the stall when the revolution comes. Wait, no, second, after the black-hearted squatters.)
Anyway, I'm not squeamish. And I am polite almost to a fault. Normally I would have wiped off the seat, murmured a gentle swear or two, and tended to my own sample without further ado. So I cannot explain what got into me today. I looked at the compromised toilet seat and in the constellation of droplets I saw red. I threw open the bathroom door and said to the woman, who was gathering her belongings before leaving, "Excuse me, ma'am?"
"Yes?"
"Next time will you please make sure to clean up after yourself?"
She stared at me. "What?"
"There is urine all over the toilet seat," I said in a tone intended to suggest that the only appropriate response would be her instant ritual suicide right in front of my accusing eyes. (The preschooler who accompanied her looked like he could, in a pinch, have served as a reliable second.)
And before she could respond — she was probably trying to remember if she had her tantō in her glove compartment or if it was still off at the sharpener's — I swept back into the bathroom, closing the door firmly behind me. And murmured a gentle swear or two as I grudgingly mopped up her mess.
Nine days. Friends inside the computer, I suggest you give me a wide berth. Or at the very least clean up your pee. The life you save could be your own.
Comments (208)
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Yes, I never understood why squatters can't at least pick up the seat (with a piece of toilet paper) and pee over the rim.
First, congratulations on confronting the offender. You are a hero for all of us.
Second, and I can't believe I'm saying this, but you are right on all counts. Holier than thou squatters need to tame that spray. Foot flushers should have all of their lightswitches and doorknobs coated with their shoe gnarliness. And let no one tell you differently!
I will confess to having flushed with a foot before... if I have to flush BEFORE I can pee. I have huge hand washing issues so if I touched the flusher before I peed my hands would be dirty and I would then need to leave the stall, wash my hands and come back to go.
Dribbling... completely unacceptable. I always check to make sure I've left no souveniers behind.
Bravo-I do harbor some of the same hand issues of Elle, but there is no reason not to clean the seat after you have made a mess. I would have loved to be a fly on the wall...
Well, I agree you've been cranky. But I applaud you--APPLAUD YOU!--for saying something to the bozo who peed all over the seat and just wandered blithely off like a cow. That is my biggest pet peeve in life, and it is also my greatest fantasy that someday I might gather up the nerve to do exactly what you did and holler angrily after the offender, like Elaine from Seinfeld. I know I'll never do it, but I love people like you--pregnant or not--who do what I only wish I could do.
That said, I am totally, 100% a foot-flusher. It never, ever occured to me that it might be offensive to hand-flushers. You have opened up my eyes...but to no avail. I have to keep foot flushing, because I can't risk touching what might be on that handle. I am not so squeamish that I use seat protectors or insist on hovering instead of sitting, but I don't touch anything in a public bathroom with my bare hands. I even wipe myself with my foot.
Okay, I was kidding about the wiping part. I'm thrilled to hear the baby's doing great. And August 1 is my birthday, so I suggest you name the baby Karla to celebrate this coincidence. Even if it's a boy.
I simply do not understand the logic of people who insist a public bathroom is too dirty and then MAKE IT DIRTY by peeing on the seat and not cleaning up after themselves. Thanks for the confrontation. She, and all her ilk, deserve it.
Oh dear. Well, frankly, she and her ilk had it coming. There is something unbelievably elitist about leaving copious pee to get all over MY ass just so the SUSPICION of pee doesn't touch yours.
And you know, I would probably feel very guilty if I snapped at someone too, but because you did that.... I bet she wipes the seat from now on. Or would, if she hadn't disemboweled herself.
You've got a couple of chubby baby feet standing on your cervix. You're entitled.
eww, you flush with your hand? most public toilets are designed to be flushed with your foot. aren't they? i assumed everybody used their foot.
(once, when i was little, i flushed with my hand and got my skin caught in the little crack when the lever came back up. i still remember how much that hurt.)
Hmmm. If they were meant to be flushed with the foot, why wouldn't the flusher be...on the floor?
thanks for the giggle! :)
i guess i'm pretty tough (or stupid). i wipe off other people's pee and then sit right on down. swing on by my blog. i'm giving away baby stuff among other things..http://www.nowenteringmomville.blogspot.com
Bravo! I bet she will think twice next time about cleaning up after herself... Nasty.
Potty business aside, holy shit - Nine days!! Ive been reading for a few years, rarely commenting (asshole that I am) but cant resist today. Your last few posts have only made me love you more - I was Bitchy for my entire second pregnancy (and so is my daughter ha!). Keep it coming!
I will be refreshing this page like a madwoman next Friday; give them hell!
I always forget that foot-flushers exist!!! And every time I'm reminded, I am totally grossed out at all the handles I've touched - WITH MY BARE HANDS! I do use a lot of soap after though.
Julie, you are now officially captain of the team—the team of people who are not afraid to park their haunches on a public toilet seat. If only we could all be fortunate enough to be able to identify the perpetrators of the splatters, so that we might all call them out on their idiocy and poor manners.
My husband reports that some men will eschew the urinal and instead use a stall to pee—and splatter the damned seat because they can't be bothered to raise the seat first. I never knew that men had to contend with tinkled seats, too.
And Julie? Don't be talking smack about foot-flushers. Them's fightin' words. Do the sensible thing and join us. Helps keep your hip joints flexible, don't you know.
I'm a new reader and haven't commented yet. I just had to come out and applaud you on this one!
Sometimes, I can kind of overlook the seat peer in a public place. But COME ON in the OB's office!! If there is any ONE place where urine should be cleaned up it's there!!!
This made me laugh out loud!!
And Julie, I really understand your frustration. Exactly what happened with my girl, and I have to admit, even with everything I went through to get her in my belly, and even though I'd had a very happy and comfortable pregnancy till that point, and really felt guilty, I was FURIOUS with her for turning (I felt her do it at 37.5 weeks). I felt awful, but I was soooo mad at her for days.
Well, if pregnancy hormones cause some disgusting pig to be embarrassed enough for ritual suicide, I say your work is done.
(For the record, I am a behated squatter, but I clean up after myself. That's just so rude not to do so.)
Do you hear that? That's applause!
I like cranky pregnancy stories. It makes me feel like I'm in good company (even though I'm cranky even when NOT pregnant.....)
You're in the home stretch now!
To all foot flushers: think about this - you use your foot - the rest of us use our hands and then use those same hands to touch the lock to open the door! And maybe the faucets if they are not automatic - Then the next footflusher touches those same surfaces! HaHa!!!!!
Thanks for saying something to her!
To all foot flushers: think about this - you use your foot - the rest of us use our hands and then use those same hands to touch the lock to open the door! And maybe the faucets if they are not automatic - Then the next footflusher touches those same surfaces! HaHa!!!!!
Thanks for saying something to her!
I don't think you were rude. I think you were assertive and SHE was the one who was rude. Maybe she'll be shamed into being better next time.
I don't understand people who think they're avoiding germs by flushing with their foot. What do you think is on the lock on the door? How do you get out of the cubicle, use your prehensile tail?
Can't speak for the design of US toilets, but having worked in food factories, if things were supposed to be operated by foot, the buttons are generally on the floor, not the wall. Not everyone is a Charlie's Angel, after all.
Reader since you were on RB, never commented .. Just want to give you incredibly GOOD WISHES for the next nine days and all the rest!
The pee story is great.... I'm so glad to hear about others sitting, but NOT in someone else's splatters.
AND I'm in awe of your sewing and writing skills. Thanks for all.
-B
GOOD FOR YOU! I would have done the same thing and I'm not even pregnant.
I am SOOOOO glad you said something! T minus nine and counting...
OMG YES!!! I hate the foot flushers, but by God do I DESPISE the hoverers! Arrogant bitches, ostensibly avoiding pee whilst simultaneously ensuring that my ass gets sullied by theirs! Why it makes my blood boil just thinking about it! REPENT, HOVERERS, REPENT!
Holy moly, only nine days left! I can't believe you're so close to meeting your little guy, because that means that I am that much closer to meeting my little guy! I hope these last nine days of pregnancy treat you well.
And good for you for saying something to the seat-peer. I would not have, and would have been grumpy about it all day! Kudos to you for being braver than I would have been.
Wow, good for you.
Um, do you have enough un-crabbiness left that it would be funny if I helpfully mentioned that I had a successful version at 38 weeks and that yes! you! can! still! experience! labor? Not so funny? OK, maybe I'll just go on to bemoan the fact that, version notwithstanding, after 36 hours of labor (with a midwife! and a doula!) I ended up with a c-section anyway. You're so right: not funny at all, now that I think about it. Here's to you and yours keeping it all together for 9 more days, and I look forward to news of Baby Natalie's arrival.
Oh...I never even knew there was such a thing as a foot-flusher. Dang.
Amen! I too share the wet seat pet peeve. I have no problem at all with germs - the body does a fine job of contending with them for most handwashing clean people - that said I shouldn't have to touch a sprinkler's pee so that I can pee! There is NOTHING more annoying than standing up with a wet leg. It makes me want to throttle someone.
Eeeh, I'm a foot-flusher with SOME toilets...if the flusher is that little, wet, cold metal lever way down in the back level with the toilet seat, then it's getting my foot...because leaning over the toilet bowl even that little bit to reach it really skeeves me. Especially if it's one of those toilets that erupts with that voilent spraying flush as soon as you hit the handle. But I've generally not encountered such vile toilets IN THE OB OFFICE, where I should feel perfectly comfortable plopping down and taking a whiz without gagging.
Also, NINE DAYS! Is that an eternity or a flash? Or both?
I came to you about 18 months ago, and went through a three day reading marathon, catching up on all that had happened. To read that baby number two is arriving in nine days, well, I just have to say that I am very happy for you, Paul and Charlie!
Oh, and BRAVA for calling out the seat sprayer! Too bad it wasn't out in the crowded waiting room! :)
I am not OCD by any definition of the term, but my sister explained to me a couple of years ago how to get through the entire public bathroom experience without touching anything with your bare hand. I definitely flush with my foot (if the handle is too high, I would use a piece of toilet paper to do it) and I grab the paper towel before I turn on the water at the sink (except for those annoying bathrooms that only have air dryers for your hands...argghhh) and use the paper towel to open the door on my way out. I always use a paper seat protector or toilet paper and have taught my daughter to do the same thing.
But, one thing about the "pee on the seat" ordeal. I have walked into bathrooms and been disgusted by the pee on the seat, clean it off, use the toilet and flush, only to discover that the force of the flush is so great that water from the bowl splashes on the seat afterwards! Sooo....it's not ALWAYS pee on the seat, but it probably is most of the time.
that is AWESOME!!
oh, and my oldest baby turns 3 on august 1. great day. :)
Julie, you have lost it! Which should prove for great entertainment for all of us, but only for 9 more precious days.
May this be a sweet time for you, enjoy the countdown.
y, I am a foot flusher for many reasons. sorry everyone.
So there was another paper earlier this year (that I may write up for GITW sometime in the not too distant future) that says 39-40w is actually the sweet spot for the least amount of respiratory complications for all sorts of deliveries, so it makes sense that GD babies fall in there too. 9 days. Best of luck.
Ahem... so I have to confess to squatting. Cause I am paranoid about infections. BUT! I wipe before if there is splatter, and I wipe after. Always. How can one not?
I have a solution to foot-flushing without compromising cleanliness. Grab a little toilet paper and flush with that covering your hand. Throw it in the bowl as the water goes down. Voila!
Also, I have been guilty of suspecting a squatter/dribbler before me in a stall only to be surprised when I flushed (with my toilet paper-coated hand!) that the toilet itself was the spraying offender. That said, I STILL wiped the droplets off the seat but mainly because I didn't want the person after me to think I had peed on the seat.
I think the 08.01.08 birthday is quite lovely and symmetrical. Nine days. Good luck.
That toilet spray mentioned in comment #31 is the reason I'm a foot flusher. I once got sprayed in the face by a flushing public toilet, so now I flush with my foot and leap back hastily to avoid a repeat of that trauma. Ick ick ick.
This "black-hearted squatter" (who happens to clean up after herself), wishes you a healthy, happy, splatter-free toilet seat next 9 days. And don't be so hard on yourself...she was the rude one!
wishing you a peaceful, uneventful 9 days.
well, "uneventful" 8 days i guess, but you get the drift....
best of luck!
karen
Hmmn, gosh, see, I always figured foot flushers contaminated the flushing apparatus far less than those who just wiped their (hepatitis A virus or E. coli shedding) asses. (This is coming from a squatting but faithful seat-wiping toilet flusher who uses toilet paper to unlock the stall and turn on the faucet, followed by a paper towel to open the bathroom door.)
The end in sight. 39 weeks. That's just ... amazing. And awesome.
That said, I was immensely pleased by your telling off the black hearted squatter (who gives seat-wiping squatters a bad reputation).
Oprah Magazine has a great article on this very subject, very cute....
http://www.oprah.com/article/omagazine/omag_200804_kogan
That is truly awesome. I wish I had the cojones to say something when I'm confronted by a splattery seat. Kick some ass if you want to over the next nine days. You're entitled.
Oh wow! August 1st! Will be glued to the computer although it will probably be August 2nd here in Australia before we hear the news. Just keep your legs crossed until then - you can be as cranky as hell but no extra dramas thank you very much :-)
PS. Daily updates on the bodies left in your wake would be handy to keep our nervous tension at manageable levels....
I remember reading that squatters actually have a greater risk of being infected because there is more risk of getting your perineum splashed by toilet water when your pee hits the water at the angle caused by the squat. Unless you have broken skin on your thighs and buttocks, germs from the toilet seat aren't going to enter your system, but your delicate, ummm, well, I'll just go with 'perineum' again, is less resistant to infecting organisms.
I've pretty much given up on the hand-washing facilities at most public loos- I wash, but then use some alcohol hand rub gel. Studies have definitively proven that most people don't wash their hands for long enough and thoroughly enough (with or without paper towel on the taps!) to remove contaminants, so a quick squirt of gel is better than anything else (I'm truly not a major germophobe, and only started carrying around the gel for nappy(diaper)changes where there were no washroom facilities).
Having said all that (I'm manic post night-shift) THANK YOU Julie for standing up to that inconsiderate toilet-splatterer. It makes me cranky that people are so self-absorbed they fail to act with common decency, but I generally just mutter to myself and then sigh and wipe.
Nine days to go! Woo hoo! I'll be checking and checking and checking...
And finally, I was in awe of so many of you being so limber as to be able to flush with your foot until I remembered that your loos have the little flushy lever bit, whereas we contend with a little button way on top of the cistern. If you despise foot flushers, come to the land of Aus where such things are nigh on impossible!
Good luck with your section. I hope your anaesthesiologist is nice (we're nice people, normally)
I'm a foot flusher, but I use the top of my shoe. I hook it behind the flusher and pull it toward me. That way, no bottom-of-the-shoe germs on the handle for the next person, and yet I don't have to touch the handle myself.
All public toilets should be required by law to be automatic flush, IMHO, but then we'd all need to carry Post-It Notes in our purses to protect our toddlers from the unseeing eye.
Amy @ http://prettybabies.blogspot.com
First -- yay for the frequent posting, even if it is coming from a cranky place.
Second THANK YOU -- from another seat sitting, hand flusher.
August 1 -- what an august day to be born.
Also, you black hearted squatters don't empty your bladder completely in that position. You very well may be incubating more UTIs than you should.
When you pull a paper towel before you wash, do you use that same besmirched towel to dry your now clean hands? Or do you use that same towel to work the taps while washing? If so, do you leave it there so you don't have to worry about touching it again? Then get a clean towel to dry without recontamination? Curious minds want to know.
Congrats, Julie. I'm glad things are going so well.
Not to be a party pooper or anything... and squatters who do not follow-up with at least a swipe SHOULD be shot but... it is possible--and I'm just saying it's possible because I have seen it--that the flush of the toilet released a spray that would coat the seat. I am sure that is not what happened here.
That said, I've never understood why people squat. What are you going to catch? Are there cooties that could live on the seat, CRAWL up your thigh and into your va-jay-jay? (answer: no.)
I even asked my doctor once in my teens if it was possible to catch something from the toilet seat. "Yes," he said, "but it sure would hurt. I think you'd notice."
August 1 is my son's birthday! He'll be 3 this year -- enjoy your sweet, attention-loving Leo boy!