Is it true that some people habitually tighten their anal sphincter muscles even when there is no immediate need to do so, such as one would to temporarily retain flatulence or fecal matter? What would cause a person to do this??
Is the tendency to do this correlated with any other personality traits, such as ‘Type A’ personality or Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder? Can this behavior lead to medical problems such as fissures or hemorrhoids??
To retain flatulence when in a certain social setting is only polite. To retain fecal matter, well, it only makes sense to do so until you can find a restroom. Or do you mean people who do this when they obviously don’t have to?
Ok, joking aside, I’ve never heard of being ‘tight assed’ as anything other than a colorful description of an uptight person. It is an interesting question, and googling ‘tight ass’ is of no help. Tightening my sphincter muscles voluntarily takes a bit of concentration and isn’t very comfortable. If my body did it involuntarily, I guess I would act uptight too.
Clenching your sphincter can also flex the muscles controling flow rate for your penis (if you have one). That are used to improve sexual capabilities for a man. Still after practice you should be able to clench your penile muscles independantly of your sphincter. So called kegal contractions.
Do Some People Habitually Keep Their Anal Sphincters Tightly Clenched?
To answer the title of this thread.
I suspect that doing so continually is impossible.
Try to tighten any muscle and keep that way for any length of time and it will atuomatically relax when your mind drifts or changes to some other task, thought.
A habitual tightening would be a nervous tic, or something similar, when there is no obvious need, would it not?
To answer the OP factually and seriously, yes. Some people clench up unconsciously, and sometimes for long periods of time.
Sample size: One. Moi.
I don’t know why I do it, and I haven’t really noticed a pattern as to when I do it. But every now and then I’ll just notice “Hey! My ass is clenched up and harder to get into than a U2 concert! Relax!” And sometimes I really have to concentrate to stay unclenched.
There was a poster on the SDMB who admitted to doing the tight sphincter thing so much as a child (or infant?) it affected the poster permanently with way above average constipation. That poster’s personality, however, seemed to be the complete reverse of the popular notion of anal-retentive.