# What's the longest you've ever gone without taking a shit?
**URL:** https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650
**Category:** In My Humble Opinion
**Created:** [March 23, 2012, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650 "2012-03-23T23:21:07Z")
**Posts on this page:** 20
**Page:** 1
### Author:  [@Stelios](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stelios)
#### Post date: [March 23, 2012, 11:21pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/1 "2012-03-23T23:21:07Z")
I’m suffering a mild bout of constipation and…well, enquiring minds want to know. I’m currently five days without. How about you?
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### Author:  [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)
#### Post date: [March 23, 2012, 11:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/2 "2012-03-23T23:26:14Z")
I have never taken a shit. What would I do with it?
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### Author:  [@drewtwo99](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/drewtwo99)
#### Post date: [March 23, 2012, 11:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/3 "2012-03-23T23:52:28Z")
> [@Boyo\_Jim](#):
>
> I have never taken a shit. What would I do with it?
I don’t take no shit from no one, ya hear!?
To answer the OP… when I was a kid and had a leg in a cast, for some reason I was deathly afraid to sit on the toilet. I guess I thought my leg was going to fall off or something. By sheer willpower, and utter horror at the thought of what might happen if I had to sit on the toilet, I was able to hold in my shit for a week or so, I think. Eventually, my mom had had enough, and asked my dad to just pick me up and sit me on the toilet. After screaming bloody murder and struggling to get away, he got me on the throne, and within mere moments, well you know what happened. I was only 3 years old then but I still remember that moment thinking to myself “what the hell was I so afraid of? I feel SO much better now!”
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### Author:  [@Rachellelogram](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rachellelogram)
#### Post date: [March 23, 2012, 11:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/4 "2012-03-23T23:57:25Z")
5 days without a single poopie? I’d be feeling very backed-up after that much time. I don’t think I’ve gone more than 2 days without a bm for as long as I can remember.
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### Author:  [@heathen\_earthling](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/heathen_earthling)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 12:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/5 "2012-03-24T00:15:15Z")
A week, but it wasn’t uncomfortable because I barely ate anything either.
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### Author:  [@Slithy\_Tove](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Slithy_Tove)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 12:17am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/6 "2012-03-24T00:17:48Z")
It was common in boot camp to not shit until well into the second week
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### Author:  [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 12:21am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/7 "2012-03-24T00:21:12Z")
One of my patients is going on 4 weeks. (Yes, his doctor knows.) Poor guy. He has a closet full of poop medicines: docusate, psyllium, polyethylene glycol… We haven’t resorted to mag citrate or lomotil yet, but if he doesn’t go soon…Good gravy, I hope they don’t expect me to pick out a fecal impaction at home. They’d admit him to the hospital for that, right?
One of my first patients as a nursing student hadn’t \*peed \*in 8 years and counting. I had no idea “end stage” renal failure could go on so long!
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### Author:  [@Stelios](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Stelios)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 12:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/8 "2012-03-24T00:30:13Z")
Just had a poo! Boy, oh boy, it was grim. Seriously. It was one of those movements where you find yourself wishing you’d weighed yourself beforehand. Still, feel better now 🙂
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### Author:  [@thelurkinghorror](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/thelurkinghorror)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 12:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/9 "2012-03-24T00:44:23Z")
TMI: I just went a week plus without a single real crap, but the first four days of that were a solid 7 on the [Bristol Stool Scale](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_Stool_Scale). Then nothing. The liquid phase was paired with another liquid coming out my other end. Thankfully these were never simultaneous.
**Boyo Jim** , let me guess: you daintily “go potty” instead?
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### Author:  [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Jackknifed_Juggernaut)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 12:45am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/10 "2012-03-24T00:45:25Z")
> [@WhyNot](#):
>
> …One of my first patients as a nursing student hadn’t \*peed \*in 8 years and counting…
:dubious:
Not doubting you, but how do you really know?
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### Author:  [@astro](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/astro)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 12:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/11 "2012-03-24T00:48:32Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#):
>
> TMI: I just went a week plus without a single real crap, but the first four days of that were a solid 7 on the [Bristol Stool Scale](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_Stool_Scale). Then nothing. The liquid phase was paired with another liquid coming out my other end. Thankfully these were never simultaneous.
>
> **Boyo Jim** , let me guess: you daintily “go potty” instead?
There is a stool scale! Ignorance fought.
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### Author:  [@Little\_Nemo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Little_Nemo)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 12:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/12 "2012-03-24T00:53:19Z")
I was fairly ill in 2008 and they had me hooked up on an IV. I didn’t eat or drink anything for a few weeks. And with nothing solid going in, there was nothing solid to come out.
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### Author:  [@SeaDragonTattoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SeaDragonTattoo)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 12:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/13 "2012-03-24T00:59:48Z")
I can’t remember not going at least once a day. I’m sure a day has been skipped here or there, but I don’t remember it.
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### Author:  [@WhyNot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/WhyNot)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 1:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/14 "2012-03-24T01:14:29Z")
> [@Jackknifed\_Juggernaut](#):
>
> :dubious:
>
> Not doubting you, but how do you really know?
I asked him. Is this a trick question? I mean, the ESRD (End Stage Renal Disease) was in the chart. When (like a good nursling) I asked, “When was the last time you urinated?”, expecting to hear “a few hours ago,” he glanced at his wife, made a face and said, “Two thousand and…one?..two? Yeah, two thousand two,” as she nodded confirmation.
He was on dialysis, of course. But this was before I knew dialysis patients sometimes don’t urinate.
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### Author:  [@cochrane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cochrane)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 1:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/15 "2012-03-24T01:15:03Z")
> [@thelurkinghorror](#):
>
> TMI: I just went a week plus without a single real crap, but the first four days of that were a solid 7 on the [Bristol Stool Scale](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bristol_Stool_Scale). Then nothing. The liquid phase was paired with another liquid coming out my other end. Thankfully these were never simultaneous.
>
> **Boyo Jim** , let me guess: you daintily “go potty” instead?
I’ve never taken a shit either. What, is there someone going around handing shit out? I do leave a shit. Always in the toilet.
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### Author:  [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 1:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/16 "2012-03-24T01:19:12Z")
Christmas 1997. all that holiday food…through new years…I was pregnant.
I didn’t poop for about 10 days. And when it happened I was in a traffic jam on the highway.
YAY me!
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### Author:  [@Mr.Accident](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Accident)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 2:30am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/17 "2012-03-24T02:30:28Z")
6 days. Two days I didn’t eat anything because I was in too much pain. (Appendix ruptured, didn’t realize it for 2 days.) 4 additional days in the hospital where I didn’t poop either. In fact, they held me so long because I hadn’t had a bowel movement.
I had to point out several times that I wouldn’t have one considering I had had exactly 1 bite of food in 6 days, so there was nothing to come out. (On an aside, that was the best damn bite of chocolate cake I ever had. To this day I don’t know if the cake was really that good, or if it was because I hadn’t ate in 6 days.)
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### Author:  [@TurboNuke](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TurboNuke)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 3:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/18 "2012-03-24T03:09:32Z")
9 days.
Someone mentioned it earlier… boot camp.
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### Author:  [@Napier](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Napier)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 3:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/19 "2012-03-24T03:47:40Z")
> [@Stelios](#):
>
> Just had a poo! Boy, oh boy, it was grim. Seriously. It was one of those movements where you find yourself wishing you’d weighed yourself beforehand. Still, feel better now 🙂
Check out thelurkingehorror’s post. You don’t have to weigh yourself before. There’s a scale just for poo.
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### Author:  [@Boyo\_Jim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Boyo_Jim)
#### Post date: [March 24, 2012, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-longest-youve-ever-gone-without-taking-a-shit/616650/20 "2012-03-24T04:03:38Z")
> [@WhyNot](#):
>
> …Good gravy, I hope they don’t expect me to pick out a fecal impaction at home. …
For future reference, it is bad form to make reference to “gravy” in a thread about shit.
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