Biology question, I suppose. May be TMI. Why is it that I can consume no liquid in the hour or so prior to going to bed, other than the minimal amount ingested when brushing my teeth, then empty my bladder before turning in, yet still have to get up several times during the night to go to the bathroom? Where does the urine come from??
It really pisses me off. (And first person to point out that joke is officially the Least Clever Person on Earth [sup]tm[/sup].)
Need SMI - Some More Information
Are you a normally healthy person? Frequent nighttime urination can be signs of diabetes, prostate problems and other such health problems.
If you’re a guy, you need to see a doctor tout de suite. Sounds like prostate trouble. Getting up once in the night is something that just happens sometimes, but multiple times is a sign of a problem.
& if you’re a woman, you need to be doing your Kegels!!
to answer your question in a non-alarmist way, it is water from your cells that gets into your blood and is filtered out through the kidneys, stored in the bladder and eliminated through either your wee-wee or hoo-hoo, depending on gender. This process takes a while. you are peeing out now what you drank HOURS ago.
screech-owl: I’m a normal, healthy person, except insofar as I’ve had semi-frequent nighttime urination for years. Oh, and I’m 25 and male.
So far it could be diabetes, prostate trouble, or normal elimination (“hoo-hoo”??). I will see my doctor. Anyone else have any information on how alarmed I should probably be?
I wouldn’t be alarmed, but it wouldn’t hurt to ask your doctor about it. But you do realize that the fluid is not going directly from your stomach to your bladder, right? It is absorbed from the intestine into the bloodstream, distributed to your cells as needed, and excess pumped through the kidneys where it is drawn from the blood, filtered, and dumped to your bladder to await your evacuation.
A question: how frequently do you go during the day, and what is your typical volume per piss? In other words, do you go once when you get up, once around lunch, once right before bed, then suddenly need to go 6 times before dawn? Do you piss bucketloads a time, or is it more of a trickle? Quantifying how much fluid per piss and how frequently you go all day can show if it is a continuation of your normal pattern or something different. Maybe you just have a small bladder?
Be forwarned - one option the doctor may suggest is doing a urine collection to determine your typical volume. This means for a 24 hour period you must collect all your urine. (I had to do this for a kidney stone test.) They give you a bucket (in this case a plastic canister with a lid and some preservative chemicals in it) and tell you that you have to use it for the whole day. I actually bought a second smaller bottle for the actual collection so I could measure the fluid content each time myself - out of curiosity. It can be a little awkward carrying the bucket around at, say, work. If it is just to check volume and not to collect for a chemical analysis, they may just ask you measure and record your volume for a set period - maybe a day or 2, perhaps even a week. You wouldn’t have to turn anything in, but you’d still have to carry a collection device to measure it. (I used a water bottle bought at a grocery store that had measuring marks on the side.)
Irishman, I’m going to hijack for a sec here, based on your post.
I had to do a 24-hour urine collection for tests about 2 years ago. I went by my doctor’s to pick up the container - it was clearly marked “Biohazard: 24-hour-Urine Sample” on the side. I rather snottily asked the receptionist for a bag to put it in, shoved it in the bag, and left. I spent the rest of the afternoon Christmas shopping, running errands, at the grocery store, on the bus and metro, saw a movie, all with the bag in tow. After I got home, I went to pull the canister out of the bag and that’s when I saw it. On the side of the bag, in even BIGGER letters:
CAUTION! BIOHAZARD!
Hmm. I may have a small bladder, or simply low urinary tolerance. I usually have to go frequently in the day, as well–and I’m sure the caffeine I drink to stay awake at work doesn’t help. I go maybe eight times, give or take, during the day. The volume varies, though at night (when I’ll get up normally once or twice, usually twice) I tend to piss like a sleepy racehorse. My urine is very often very nearly clear in the daytime, which isn’t the case at night.
Thanks for the biological explanation, Irishman. Certain drinks also do tend to go right through me.
Isn’t sharing fun?
FWIW, Caffeine is a diuretic.
Back to the OP – although I realize that liquids don’t go directly from stomach to bladder, I, at least, have an almost immediate reaction to taking a drink of water. Not that I have to pee right away but I frequently break into a light sweat.
My guess is that it has to do with my body’s regulation of its water content. I take a drink and my body recognizes that it now has a surplus and excretes some to bring the water level back down. So although it’s not the same water I drank it can seem like it. Sometimes I feel like Yosemite Sam – he gets shot full of holes but doesn’t notice till he takes a drink and water gushes out everywhere.