the to doo-doo list.

so as some of you know, i recently started a new job.  i'm verrrrily excited about it and feel good about the place i'm working for and the balance of clinical and management skills i will be utilizing.  it has been a fairly smooth transition, save for one aspect: i now work for a large corporation (300+ employees) and am used to working for organizations with under 30 people.  this is not the primary issue.  the primary issue is that at any given point during the day, someone is using one of the bathroom stalls in the girls' bathroom.  i am used to stopping into the bathroom in my former company and having my space to take care of business, check my cell phone, put on some makeup, do my hair, take a nap.... wait what?

moving on.  i never realized how much i took that luxury for granted.  it is a serious issue in my opinion that this luxury is now obsolete.  now i have severe bathroom anxiety, or should i say performance anxiety, which of course makes everyone in the other stalls think that i have to take a number 2, but i do NOT do that in the first place! come on!  but really i can't even pee because there's so much dang activity going on.  it has improved a little bit over the last week, but still is difficult.  add that to the fact that i know almost nobody, and you can see how awkward this gets.

so i thought i'd put together a little list of "DOs" if you are in a similar boat, or actually if you're ever in any type of shared bathroom.  these things have become very clear to me since starting my job...please feel free to add to this list as you deem appropriate:

- if you go into the bathroom to simply wash your hands or touch up your make up, and you hear frantic foot work, sudden coughing, and frantic pulling of toilet paper rolls while coughing loudly coming from a stall, do your sister a favor, turn on the water really loudly, start humming, and maybe pretend to dry your hands at the same time with the automatic hand dryer.  do whatever you can to assist in pride maintenance for your fellow female in the bathroom stall who is mortified and irritated and anxious that someone just walked in mid-poo.

- if you do have to do number 2 (again, i don't know what that's like, so please let me know from your experience), do NOT, i repeat do NOT, do the things i mentioned in the item above.  you are SO OBVIOUS.  what you need to do is hold your ground, keep your feet close to the bowl so the person next to you can't see your shoes and ID you later in the day as you cruise past their cubicle, and wait until the person who came in after you has done their job and left.  they don't know the difference.  the alternative is that you suddenly start coughing, suddenly are finished and flush, and suddenly end up side-by-side at the sinks, trying to make small talk about work and pretend that you didn't just stop yourself midway through taking care of business.  which means you will inevitably have to return to the bathroom and deal with this problem all over again.  please do everyone a favor and just ride out the storm.

- do NOT laugh out loud when you hear someone sit down, start to pee with intensity and let out a toot at the same time.  it is true that it is one of the funniest things in the entire world when it happens, but it happens to the best of us, it's quite common when you have to pee really badly and have held it in while in a meeting with people you don't really know yet and are stomping your feet under the table and clutching your note pad till your knuckles turn white and laughter between stalls can be awkward as hell...i would know...i've laughed out loud before.  it's rarely smooth and you don't make a new girlfriend because of it.

- do not, as one lady in my building did, start grunting and rocking.  i can see the shadow on the floor rocking and the sounds of your grunts make me unbelievably uncomfortable.  so please, for the sake of everyone involved, do not do that. 

and so - i ask that you heed my advice, wish me luck on my  new job, and hope my performance anxiety decreases. i've gotta make it through the probationary period!

xo
peoplewhoknow.

ps - gentlemen, i'd love to know some of the ins-and-outs of your respective bathroom experiences.  it's a foreign world to us ladies (except for when at the bar, and you have absolutely no line, and sometimes we end up using the stall for just a quick tick).