In Which I Write About Exercise, IBS and Pooping

Lately, I've been experiencing diarrhea fairly regularly on the weekends. Looking at what I typically eat on the weekends, I've made a decision to stop eating cheese. I typically have grits and eggs on Sunday's, and have been adding cheese to it because cheesy grits and eggs are delightful. But having to poop a lot is not delightful, so no more cheese. And a conscious reduction of dairy, though not an elimination - not yet.

With that change in place, I was surprised to be experiencing the weekend diarrhea on Saturday night, and less happy than I usually would have been, because I was going to re-do the CrossFit Open workout on Sunday morning, and I had committed to a specific time to do so, 9 am.

I went to sleep at a reasonable time, before 10 pm, and got up early to make breakfast so I could eat by around 7 am and have plenty of time for my stomach to settle before the workout. The breakfast was good, even without cheese (I added chicken soup base to the grits, which is super tasty). I felt mentally good, but physically, I wasn't feeling so hot.

There was a coldness in my tummy, a rushing and wooshing that I did not trust. I thought about cancelling, about changing my plans, about showing up just to cheer... But I knew I could improve on the score I posted on Friday, so I got my stuff together, visited the toilet one last time in vain, and walked over.

I volunteered to judge someone in the first heat and had to take a bathroom break before it started. Just pee. Then I managed to last the entire twenty minutes of the workout without needing a bathroom break, which was a relief, because on Friday I hadn't lasted (but the person I was judging wasn't in the Open so didn't need to be judged).

During the second heat I started to warm up by getting on the rower, still wearing my sweatpants and sweatshirt over my workout clothes. I felt freezing cold, I even still had a hat on. I planned to row for five minutes, but I only made it two before my bowels informed me that I had about 30 seconds to get to the bathroom or else.

The diarrhea was back. I got out what wanted out and went back to warming up. I went to the bathroom twice more before the workout, but it seemed like the worst of the poop had past. I was worried about having to go during my twenty minutes of working out. I was worried that I would never feel warm again. But I told myself that once I started working, my body would focus on that and not on pooping. It was too late to switch heats with someone, I told myself.

I did the workout, and hardly thought about the chance that I might have an accident during it. I ignored the cold rush in my stomach that fluttered up when I did the row. I got through it even though my stomach felt awful by the end.

I've been having more instances of diarrhea lately, to the point that I don't know if I can really be said to have IBS with constipation anymore. I don't know what's going on with my bowels other than they give me pain and frustrate me. And I'm going to figure this shit out.