Is it okay to pee in the shower?

Be honest now, who gets an overwhelming urge to pee when it starts raining or you hear water gushing from a tap?

According to psychologists and urologists, this completely natural response to running water has got to do with sound association and stimulus, much the same as with Pavlov’s theory.

Pavlovian theory is a learning procedure that involves pairing a stimulus with a conditioned response. In the famous experiments that Ivan Pavlov conducted with dogs, he found that objects or events could trigger a conditioned response.

But science aside, what do you do when you get an urge to pee while you’re in the shower? Do you step out, get water all over the tiles and possibly slip, bang your head and wait for your naked self to be resuscitated by perverted paramedics, judgemental neighbours or family members – or do you take the advice of Princess Elsa from Frozen and, well, let it go?

Even if you do pee in the shower, you are not alone. According to a 2016 survey on shower habits, published by Angie’s List, nearly 80% of adults (and that’s just in America) admitted to taking a tinkle under the sprinkle.

And it’s not as disgusting as you may have thought. In an interview with Shape Magazine, Philip Werthman, an urologist and director of the Centre for Male Reproductive Medicine in Los Angeles, said: “It’s true that our pee is filled with bacteria, but no more so than our other bodily fluids, like sweat and snot, that get washed down the drain every day.

“And you’re rinsing it off so it’s not as if you’re stewing in it, like, say, if you peed in a hot tub, which no self-respecting person would ever do, right?”

Peeing in the shower can also help you save water. If the average adult urinates four to six times a day and a common Western-style toilet uses six litres of water per flush, 42 litres of toilet water per person is used to flush away urine. Now, multiply that by 365 days (a year) and you’ll see what I mean.

So the next time someone turns their nose up at you for proudly declaring that you pee in the shower, tell them that you’re doing it for the planet.

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