I Tried Using A Squatty Potty To Make Pooping More Comfortable And Learned A Lot About My BMs

In the simplest terms, the Squatty Potty is a stool for your feet to go on while you use the toilet.

The thing that makes the Squatty Potty unique and different from just a normal stool is that it fits perfectly around your toilet, making it look better and function better than a regular stool.

So here's how the Squatty Potty works, according to their official website:

The modern day toilet is convenient, but has one major fault; it requires us to sit. While sitting to do our business may be considered “civilized”, studies show the natural squat position improves our ability to eliminate. Squatty Potty toilet stools help you simulate a squat position for a faster and more effective elimination.

Your body relies on a bend in the colon (where your poop lives) and the anus (where your poop says hi) to keep everything stored until showtime.

Your Puborectalis Muscle helps keep your poop in place by kinking your colon (like a garden hose) while you’re standing or sitting. This is helpful when you are sitting and don’t want to poop but unhelpful when you do want to poop. If only there was a way to tell your body to unkink that hose…

Your colon’s sweet spot comes with the squat. This is the only position in which the Puborectalis Muscle fully relaxes which straightens the kink and allows for complete elimination without straining. Bombs away!

I was really excited to try out the Squatty Potty — and super stoked that they sent me a pooping unicorn plush to encourage me!

I legitimately hoped the Squatty Potty would revolutionize the way I pooped.

And I'll be honest — I (like everyone else) get constipated from time to time, so I was hoping the stool would help me pass my, well, stool.

But first, let me make something very clear.

I know a lot of you out there will think that the fact I'm writing about pooping is gross. You're right. Poop is gross. But guess what? We all do it.

And you know what's worse than pooping? Not being able to poop properly.

Women already have enough body stigmas to face as it is, let's try to get over the idea that "women don't poop." Everyone poops. It's part of life. We do it from the day we're born until the day we die, and gender has nothing to do with it.

I got both the Adjustable 2.0 Squatty Potty and the Tao Bamboo Adjustable Squatty Potty. I kept the 2.0 version at work and took the bamboo one home.

When it came time to relieve myself for the first time with my Squatty Potty, I felt a little apprehensive. I set up my stool in front of a toilet in a stall, and got going.

When I sat down on the toilet and put my feet on the stool, my legs felt kind of uncomfortable.

After taking a couple of pictures, I put my phone away and focused on the task at hand: pooping.

I was fully expecting to be blown away by my first BM experience, but I was a little disappointed. It didn't feel any different than usual.

The first few times I used the Squatty Potty, I didn't notice any changes in my bathroom experience.

Here's why I think that might be. I have always tried to practice good "pooping posture."

How you align your muscles impacts how easily you pass stool and gas, according to a Spanish study. If you're having problems pooping, the best thing to do is lean forward, letting your chest droop toward your knees.

What I realized when I got the Squatty Potty is that this essentially does the same thing — it adjusts the angle of your Puborectalis Muscle, letting it relax to straighten out the kink in your colon.

If you're already in the habit of doing this, like I am, you might not experience immediate benefits.

Despite not noticing much difference at first, I decided to keep using the stool when I pooped.

According to the Squatty Potty website, some people may not feel the benefits until after a week or so.

And they were definitely right — after about a week, I went to the bathroom and finally had that "aha" moment I'd been waiting for. I had a "faster and more effective elimination," like the website claimed!

That being said, the only times I felt the real benefits of the Squatty Potty were when I used it at home.

I already hate pooping at work, so making it even more obvious by carrying a large white stool into the stall with me was less than fun.

Because of my discomfort with pooping at work in general, I think I was always too tense to feel the Squatty Potty benefits.

So, how do I feel about the Squatty Potty now that my experiment is over?

Good. I don't think the Squatty Potty changed my life or revolutionized the way I pooped, but I definitely felt some of the benefits of the unique stool.

I think in order to use the Squatty Potty effectively, you have to be willing to give it a chance — and not be tense when you use the toilet!

If you don't think it will work, feel tense when using the toilet, or feel awkward about pooping in general, the Squatty Potty may not work as well for you. You actually have to commit to using the stool and letting it work.

Will I continue to use the Squatty Potty? At home, definitely. At work, probably not.

Would I recommend the Squatty Potty to a friend? Sure! I don't see any reason why people shouldn't use the stool. If you've been thinking about trying it, just bite the bullet — your colon will thank you!

If you've used the Squatty Potty or are thinking about trying it, please SHARE this article with your friends!