Pee Shivers

Cecil's Columns/Staff Reports
1

Hey Cecil,
Just thought I would put forward my own theory on what causes “pee shivers” as well as other causes of shivering.

Shivers are used for at least two purposes in the body. One as we all know is to produce heatwhen the body is cold as well as to initiate the goosebumps that would, if we had more hair, help to trap air next to our skin to help keep us warmer.

The other purpose to a shiver is to dissipate excess energy (i.e. sugars, adrneline, and other chemicals) that have been released into the bloodstream.

After a good scare or other event that causes adrenaline to be released into the blood stream, uncontrollable shivering is common as well as the “shaky knees” syndrome. This is the bodys way of dissipating all those chemicals, hormones and sugars that were released as part of the “fight or flight” response.

These chemicals are released in varying amounts throughout the day for all sorts of reasons. When we have been “holding it” for awhile our suffering alone can lead to a rise in blood pressure as well as general agitation. When we finally pee we tend to “force” it out in an effort to attain quick release from our discomfort. This straining as well as the emotional release of putting an end to the discomfort both cause the release of excess amounts of these blood products that subsequently need to be dissipated when for instance you suddenly stop straining as hard or finish altogether. Shivers are common when defecating also for essentially the same reason.

Now as to why women do not experience “pee shivers” as often as men, Men and women have very large differences in outgoing plumbing. The distance from the exit of a womans bladder to the outside world is often only about 1/2 of an inch. In men obviously the distance is much greater. even the distance from the bladders exit is much further up into the body on a male. The prostate also works as a kind of clamp around the urethra and if a male is at all aroused can put a LOT of pressure around the urethra. All of this means that a man has to do significant work in order to void his bladder. A women by contrast really only must release a valve and gravity does the rest. A woman CAN push and often does to speed things along, but even at full power does not produce the same kind of stresses from straining as a man will.

Hope you find this useful…

Gene McDaniel
Yakima Wa.

2

Link to the original column

Rhapsody, I am not a urologist, or anything else biological, and I’ve no idea whether your idea has merit. If it does, though, let me just be the first to congratulate you. This is the question which Cecil acknowledges as having given him the most trouble, while remaining essentially unsolved. Finding something that even Cecil can’t is no mean feat.

3

Although this is an interesting theory, my guess is that at this stage Cecil has collected plenty of theories, and would be more interested in the results of formal studies which have appeared in peer-reviewed medical journals.

4

hee hee. “peer-reviewed”

5

I am sure we all would be if such existed.:rolleyes: :wally

6

It’s a damn good theory! I’ll ask my girlfriend (who is a nurse) and see if she can get some ideas from any urologists she knows.

7

I always thought that pee-shiver was an obvious and expected result of the fact that as the warm urine leaves the body, the total heat contained in the body diminishes accordingly.

8

I can see where you might think that but you don’t lose any heat by voiding. If you think of the bladder as a rigid structure where the warm water would be replaced by cooler air you might have some basis to work with but the bladder collapses it doesnt fill with air or anything that needs to be rewarmed.

9

But there must be something around the bladder, other organs, bodily fluids, or whatever. If the bladder contracts, doesn’t whatever surrounds expand into the space made available by the shrinking bladder? And if that stuff is cooler than the urine was, my point still holds.

10

You lose heat, but you don’t lose temperature, which is what you would feel. Urine inside your body is the same temperature as everything else inside your body.