I recently watched an episode of the TV show “Mystery Diagnosis” that I found truly extraordinary. For those of you that have never seen the show, it’s a sort of detective show for disease. They feature one or two hapless individuals per episode that have symptoms that cannot be readily diagnosed and chronicle the patient’s journey to find answers.
What struck me about this particular episode was not so much the peculiarity of the subject’s symptoms, though they were plenty unpleasant, but the story of how her life progressed during this tumultuous period. Our subject was a single woman in her late 30’s or early 40’s who, until recently, had been in perfect health. She began to experience increasingly uncontrollable episodes of explosive diarrhea to the point where she was a virtual shut-in in her home. In an attempt to regain some normalcy and freedom in her life she had resorted to wearing adult diapers.
Now, despite the fact that her time was divided between working as best she could, attending numerous doctor visits in an attempt to find an answer to her medical woes or pooping uncontrollably she managed to find and begin dating a man. Since she was fairly smitten with him, she made the decision to hide her problem from him and was able to do so mainly because she had developed a survival tactic; that of knowing where every possible accessible public restroom was located wherever she might be. Things began to get serious between them and he invited her on a trip to Paris for the weekend. She was over the moon; however, she was also reticent. How would she hide her problem from him in such close quarters? She put her reservations aside and went on the trip.
For the first day or so she was able to employ her survival tactic with much success, however that evening as they were out enjoying the romantic evening in Paris her love had planned for them things went awry. Part of the evening was a romantic walk along the Seine. She slowly began to panic as she hadn’t had the opportunity to scout the area for accessible restrooms though not wanting to tip her hand, she followed along with him. They walked along until a short time later she felt the familiar rumbling in her lower gut and before she knew it had soiled herself right in front of him and any passersby as she stood helpless in her beautiful dress. She was mortified.
She revealed to him the secret she had been hiding from him all this time and he very sweetly helped her get cleaned up enough to get back to the hotel where he did his best to make her feel at ease despite the awkwardness of the situation. Not long after arriving back home in the states following this nightmarish journey, he proposed to her and she accepted.
Now, as an almost 42 year old single woman, I get a lot of advice from people on what it is that they think I’m doing wrong in my personal quest for love. Some of these theories include that I don’t socialize enough, that perhaps I have my attention devoted elsewhere and am just not “open enough” to the possibility, and that I just don’t “put myself out there”. To them I offer the story of explosive diarrhea woman. Here is a woman who love found despite the embarrassing secret that kept her shut in. While I may not be out every night trawling the city for a man, I certainly lead an active enough life that love can find me when it’s ready to. And while I mercifully don’t struggle with an explosive diarrhea problem, I hope I’m lucky enough that when love does find me, it’s a man that would marry me even if I did.
What struck me about this particular episode was not so much the peculiarity of the subject’s symptoms, though they were plenty unpleasant, but the story of how her life progressed during this tumultuous period. Our subject was a single woman in her late 30’s or early 40’s who, until recently, had been in perfect health. She began to experience increasingly uncontrollable episodes of explosive diarrhea to the point where she was a virtual shut-in in her home. In an attempt to regain some normalcy and freedom in her life she had resorted to wearing adult diapers.
Now, despite the fact that her time was divided between working as best she could, attending numerous doctor visits in an attempt to find an answer to her medical woes or pooping uncontrollably she managed to find and begin dating a man. Since she was fairly smitten with him, she made the decision to hide her problem from him and was able to do so mainly because she had developed a survival tactic; that of knowing where every possible accessible public restroom was located wherever she might be. Things began to get serious between them and he invited her on a trip to Paris for the weekend. She was over the moon; however, she was also reticent. How would she hide her problem from him in such close quarters? She put her reservations aside and went on the trip.
For the first day or so she was able to employ her survival tactic with much success, however that evening as they were out enjoying the romantic evening in Paris her love had planned for them things went awry. Part of the evening was a romantic walk along the Seine. She slowly began to panic as she hadn’t had the opportunity to scout the area for accessible restrooms though not wanting to tip her hand, she followed along with him. They walked along until a short time later she felt the familiar rumbling in her lower gut and before she knew it had soiled herself right in front of him and any passersby as she stood helpless in her beautiful dress. She was mortified.
She revealed to him the secret she had been hiding from him all this time and he very sweetly helped her get cleaned up enough to get back to the hotel where he did his best to make her feel at ease despite the awkwardness of the situation. Not long after arriving back home in the states following this nightmarish journey, he proposed to her and she accepted.
Now, as an almost 42 year old single woman, I get a lot of advice from people on what it is that they think I’m doing wrong in my personal quest for love. Some of these theories include that I don’t socialize enough, that perhaps I have my attention devoted elsewhere and am just not “open enough” to the possibility, and that I just don’t “put myself out there”. To them I offer the story of explosive diarrhea woman. Here is a woman who love found despite the embarrassing secret that kept her shut in. While I may not be out every night trawling the city for a man, I certainly lead an active enough life that love can find me when it’s ready to. And while I mercifully don’t struggle with an explosive diarrhea problem, I hope I’m lucky enough that when love does find me, it’s a man that would marry me even if I did.
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