Sunglasses Always Fit

Warning: this story and video are a bit graphic. You need to understand and accept that women poop, even hot, funny ones like me. If you can confidently say “yes” to that statement, congrats! You may proceed. Still – proceed with caution because damn. 

It was a normal, lazy Sunday morning for me. I woke up at the “teacher’s late” hour of 8:00am, with only two or three school-related dreams during the night. I had wanted to sleep in longer, but that’s a bit impossible in Guatemala, courtesy of the all day long roosters and obnoxious dogs and screaming parrot that yells “MOM!” all day long living next door. 

I brewed coffee, put away dishes. Attending to an item on my to-do list since August, I canceled my Amazon Prime credit card, among others, which felt so amazing, as I got to use my big-girl voice to say “You’re not listening to me, I don’t want an account with you, who do I need to speak to that will listen?” Then, as a morning thrill and a coffee and a little bit of lactose will do, I had to do business in the bathroom. 

Before we proceed . . . there are some things one must know: in Guatemala, where I currently live, and in most other countries around the world, you can’t flush your toilet paper. It’s not terrible and you get used to it. There’s a trash can right next to the toilet where you collect your toilet paper and then throw it away and it gets collected twice a week. Secondly: I am fastidious about closing the toilet lid before I flush, having seen way too many studies about how far fecal matter can fly about the bathroom when you leave the lid open. 

So imagine my surprise when I opened the toilet lid and was about to sit down and happened to glance at something at the bottom of the bowl. It was grey and kind of filmy, and I wondered to myself, “did I accidentally drop some toilet paper in there? did something fly in there? have i missed a key event?!” knowing that I would just never. But something looked . . . weird and I don’t know why but I decided to take a closer look. Clogged toilets can be a really big problem here and my landlord is annoying and overbearing and I do everything to avoid involving her and her creepy husband in my life.

Additionally, I have lived and traveled in enough third world countries to stay pretty aware of my bowel movements as a sign of health. After my hospitalisation in Hong Kong during covid in 2020, where I was diagnosed with stress-induced diverticulitis, I’ve definitely made sure to be cognisant of the delicate workings of my system.

And I’ve seen every episode of the Mulder Show X-Files too many times to ignore this kind of mystery. 

So I crouched down and peered in at what, at first glance, appeared to be some sort of wayward collection of toilet paper. But then. Oh friends. But then. I looked closer. I waited a moment. And what I had imagined or hoped was some paper gently swaying in the water from my lid opening popped out some antennae and began to effing move.

I said words. I experienced a full body sweat, for more reasons than one – my urge to relieve myself had tripled. Ironically, our school had just had a “deworming” session on Friday, where the government came and passed out pills to students and staff to enjoy six month’s protection from intestinal parasites. I have had a rather hectic few weeks so had forgotten to go get my own pills. Was the evidence of my neglect waving its antennae back and forth at me now?!?

My workmates that live in the same building were all out of town on an adventure, so I had no one to call for backup to confirm or deny what I was seeing – a giant butt worm taking up residence in my toilet. And the Coffeemate additive I had sprung for that morning coupled with local cream cheese on my bagel was stirring up a mighty response. I had no choice but to film a short video and then use the toilet to relieve myself, scared as I was. He didn’t look like a jumper, but then again, they never do. 

Now, all I had accomplished that morning so far was your typical just-woke-up pee, and I felt fairly confident I would have noticed something of his size exiting that particular site. But had he exited the day before without me noticing? And made a home in my toilet since then? This led to a Google search the results of which I don’t wish upon my greatest enemy, whoever you might be. Did I have a parasite? An infectious leech? Had I unknowingly been sharing my meals with a squirming slimy being? 

There are some home remedies or ways to determine if you do in fact have an intestinal parasite. You can put scotch tape, ah, exactly where you think you might, and then check every few hours for evidence of the larva trying to make an exit. You can do a little personal scoping, which made me realize I need to do more yoga and stretching and the lighting in my house is terrible. 

There was no one around to sympathise or offer advice. And kind of like how after you spot a spider in your home but then before you can kill it, he scurries away, and now everything tickles and is probably that spider? Now every slight twinge in my belly is the worm’s mate or close friend, calling out for him. 

I sent the video of my body snatcher to my mom, a nurse, who after a lot of “oh, my God what IS that?!” and nervous chuckling (probably wondering if I needed a rescue or a funeral planned) assured me there was no way it would have gone through my system without me noticing. 

Despite her vote of “that’s something that’s crawled up the sewer,” I did a lot of nervous prodding of my organs, googling “how to self-palpate for disease” and “where are my intestines exactly?” and “interior slugs as a sign of perimenopause” but, as you can probably imagine, nothing really made me feel any better except eating pizza and drinking wine and watching Disney movies and studiously ignoring my hyper-active inner monologue. I can talk a kid off any kind of ledge but it turns out I don’t have a lot of personal coping skills besides mixing a weird cocktail of childlike and adultlike self-soothing behaviours. I am not yet able to gentle-parent myself.

With my travel history, this is not by any means my first crazy toilet story. There was that time I unknowingly peed on top of a bullfrog. And the snake. And the crab. There were those ten days stranded on an island off Panama with no flushing toilets and living in a hostel with 50 plus other people, where we drank beer for water and showered and etceteraed in the sea. There is the endless list of public places I’ve ignored my lactose intolerance or laundry list of allergies and made everyone around me pay for it in audible and smellable ways. I recall that time I lived with a family in Guatemala with a decades-old drop toilet that you had to kick before using to allow time for the various creepy-crawlies to fly out of before you hovered delicately above to do your business. I ended up peeing in a bucket for weeks while I lived there. And I’ve been to India and Morocco and Egypt and most of Asia. So. ahem. So. I have seen and felt some things. Full stop.

But an effing SLUG?! Ready to look up at me and have a chat from the bowl?

After vigorous bleaching and flushing and examining and scaring the literal sh*te out of myself multiple times over the last few days, I think the nightmare is over, and something that, had I not filmed it, I would be questioning my own memory of. Sometimes I still do . . .

Anyways guys come visit it’s super fun here all the time. 

Please bring cupcakes and wine.