Posted by Walt on 11/10/2009, 6:57 pm, in reply to "Re: Disabled toilets"

Thank you for the help there, appreciated. Do you think this phobia is similar to being fit? E.g. If you don't go to the gym you lose your fitness, if you don't keep up the techniques you learn for Paruresis, you will reverse? At the point I am at now, it has developed to me having to be 100% sure that other people are far enough away, the sound levels are right, and that my body wants to actually push enough to go. I would say it takes me 25 seconds minimum to go when I am home alone with no one else around. That turns into about 2 minutes or so when I am out. I would say it is 50/50 I can actually go when I go out to pubs etc. Sometimes I actually get through the first point of trying to go, and I actually start to go, but then I feel my bladder tighten up again to the point where I just cannot go within a reasonable time. Part of me wants to stay in the toilet until it happens, that isn’t always practical so I leave and go back later. Going back isn’t always practical either though, so then the pain of holding it starts, and if I can’t go the next time I visit, then there is a problem, which is what happened to me once and I had to get out of there. Why can’t they just build toilets the right way, where people have enough personal space to go, without knowing they may get splashed from one urinal or the other, and if using a cubical it is private enough to get people like us through our problem? I swear it is the design, location and environment of the toilets most of the time.

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