# Peeing upside down? **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [May 22, 2000, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239 "2000-05-22T22:25:52Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 15\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Robt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7ba0ec/32.png) [@Robt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robt)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2000, 10:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/1 "2000-05-22T22:25:52Z")
Peristalsis is the name for the muscular contractions that force food down our throats, and permits a person to overcome gravity and drink water even while standing on their head. See: [http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1\_081.html](http://www.straightdope.com/classics/a1_081.html) My question is this: Can a man pee while standing on his head? Or does gravity win this battle? I’d try it myself but, you know… ---
**Author:** ![Kilgore\_Trout\_1](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/6de8d8/32.png) [@Kilgore\_Trout\_1](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kilgore_Trout_1)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2000, 10:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/2 "2000-05-22T22:35:36Z")
**How would you feel if everytime you had to take a piss you had to do a fucking handstand?** -Nice Guy Eddie it has to be possible. see? ---
**Author:** ![handy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5a626/32.png) [@handy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handy)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2000, 10:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/3 "2000-05-22T22:42:58Z")
Robt why don’t you try it? How would a guy keep the pee from hitting his head? ---
**Author:** ![Robt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7ba0ec/32.png) [@Robt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robt)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2000, 10:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/4 "2000-05-22T22:55:35Z")
I’d think it pretty obvious why I don’t try this myself. Aside from the noted risk of peeing on myself, I don’t have anywhere in the house I really could do this if I wanted to, and I’m pretty sure I’d have great difficulty doing the headstand part. In any event, I’m not interested in whether I can do it. I want to know whether it can be done at all. That is, can a man who is upside down (whether hanging from gravity boots or doing a handstand) pee at all? Or is peeing a function of muscle (like peristalsis) or gravity? ---
**Author:** ![Vestal\_Blue](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/v/5e9695/32.png) [@Vestal\_Blue](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Vestal_Blue)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2000, 11:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/5 "2000-05-22T23:24:00Z")
Peeing is a function of muscular contraction of the bladder. Therefore, you _can_ pee upside down; however, unless your hands are free, I wouldn’t recommend it. It would have the same results as pissing up a rope! ---
**Author:** ![Slithy\_Tove](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/slithy_tove/32/18248_2.png) [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)\ **Post date:** [May 22, 2000, 11:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/6 "2000-05-22T23:51:12Z")
At the San Diego Zoo I once saw an orangutang hang from his feet and pee into his mouth. As his no-too-distant cousin, I don’t see why we couldn’t do the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Robt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7ba0ec/32.png) [@Robt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robt)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2000, 5:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/7 "2000-05-23T05:48:31Z")
> [@](#): > > At the San Diego Zoo I once saw an orangutang hang from his feet and pee into his mouth. As his no-too-distant > cousin, I don’t see why we couldn’t do the same thing. At the Lincoln Park Zoon in Chicago, I one saw a monkey hanging by one arm from the top of the cage (about 30 feet up), swinging like a pendulum, and pissing out onto the crowd. He wasn’t upside down, but it was still one of the funniest things I’ve ever seen. By the way, that orangutang you saw sure had good aim! ---
**Author:** ![Silo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/ac91a4/32.png) [@Silo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Silo)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2000, 7:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/8 "2000-05-23T07:17:12Z")
Don’t you think you should have spanked that monkey. ---
**Author:** ![ChiefScott](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/58f4c7/32.png) [@ChiefScott](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ChiefScott)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2000, 8:11am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/9 "2000-05-23T08:11:13Z")
While turning this conundrum over in my mind, it ocurred to me – why in the Hell would anyone ever **need** to pee whilst standing on his head? For the life of me, I couldn’t come up with one situation. ---
**Author:** ![notquitekarpov](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/71c47a/32.png) [@notquitekarpov](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/notquitekarpov)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2000, 1:25pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/10 "2000-05-23T13:25:25Z")
> [@](#): > > \*\* > At the San Diego Zoo I once saw an orangutang hang from his feet and pee into his mouth. As his no-too-distant cousin, I don’t see why we couldn’t do the same thing. > \*\* I would have thought the orangutang concerned would quickly get pretty jacked off if we all started peeing in his mouth… ---
**Author:** ![SingleDad](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9e8a1a/32.png) [@SingleDad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SingleDad)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2000, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/11 "2000-05-23T14:18:47Z")
In his book _Surely You’re Joking, Mr. Feynman_, Richard P. Feynman describes undertaking this very experiment. The results: You can indeed pee upside down. As Dr. Feynman was a Nobel Prize-winning physicist, I believe we can accept his results as authoritative. ---
**Author:** ![Robt](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/7ba0ec/32.png) [@Robt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Robt)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2000, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/12 "2000-05-23T14:21:28Z")
> [@](#): > > While turning this conundrum over in my mind, it ocurred to me – why in the Hell would anyone ever need to pee whilst standing on his head? For the life of me, I couldn’t come up with one situation. ChiefScott: Maybe if someone lost a bet? Torture? The column that provoked my initial question was the one about drinking water while standing on one’s head. I can’t think of too many reasons for that either. ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2000, 2:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/13 "2000-05-23T14:21:53Z")
I guess the OP just wants to know whether gravity is vital to the pissing process. I think we can say definitively that pissing in zero-gravity is indeed possible, what with all those astronauts not racing to the john immediately upon landing. So, yep, it’s a muscle-contraction thing. Standing on one’s head shouldn’t affect it in the least, especially for males, for whom gravity tends to keep things pointed to the south, so to speak. ---
**Author:** ![handy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5a626/32.png) [@handy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handy)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2000, 3:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/14 "2000-05-23T15:54:23Z")
Oh, come on, surely on of you guys have enough balance that you could try it in the shower…I don’t see any scientific reason why someone could not pee in that position. I just posted a story here about a guy peeing with a hard on & he got his penis caught under the toilet seat 🙂 ---
**Author:** ![handy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/b5a626/32.png) [@handy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/handy)\ **Post date:** [May 23, 2000, 11:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/peeing-upside-down/20239/15 "2000-05-23T23:30:05Z")
Go swimming, swim down, pee, see if it works.