Would you have a pee in front of your husband? Or your lover? Or your friend?
This was a question that came to the fore as The Lover and I set off to stay in a castle for the weekend last week. Looking at the reviews on Trip Adviser I realised that in some of the rooms, the en-suite bathroom is only separated from the bedroom by a curtain! Now I know it’s a castle and all that and at least I’m not having to pee into a hole in the floor, but really! It’s not what you expect from Relais and Chateaux!
It made me think about mystique. I, for example, still get incredibly embarrassed if I accidentally break wind in front of HWMBO, even after a ten-year relationship. Likewise, I can now have a pee whilst he is in the bathroom with me, but only if I am running the tap into the bidet and thus he can’t hear it. A few times, we have tried to do the kind of BDSM play where the dom supervises you on the loo and I can never go, my bladder is always frozen with embarrassment even if he has made me drink ten pints of water and I feel ready to explode.
The thing is, do guys fancy you less when they realise you have bodily functions like them? I’m not sure, but for all those reasons, I don’t do any of the following in front of the men in my life, even the one I’ve known for ten years!
• Break wind (unless by accident)
• Pee in their hearing
• Do a number two.
• Have unshaved legs (unless waiting for a wax and one must be booked)
• Ditto unshaved armpits and pussy
• Have sex if I have my period
• Allow them to see my tampon
• Make them buy some tampons
• Cut my toenails
• Belch
• Be sick (actually, this one has gone wrong a few times. Gotta love HWMBO for holding my hair back)
I’m reminded of the story of Marilyn Monroe, shortly before she married Arthur Miller. He took her to meet his parents and over dinner, she needed to have a pee. So when she went to the loo, she turned the bathroom tap on full blast so they couldn’t hear her doing it. Which led, when she’d gone home and he was talking to his parents about her to his mother saying:
“Gee Arthur, I sure do like that gal, but she pisses like a horse!”
You can’t win, can you!!
This makes me think of the marital scenes in Eyes Wide Shut which include Nicole Kidman’s character using the toilet and getting ready to go out in a way that lets you know she eats, sleeps, and goes to the bathroom. Even though it was filmed in passing, while they were having a conversation, it was a little shocking because you don’t see that in films. But, I liked it a lot and found it comforting and more intimate than watching sex on screen. It takes a lot of trust to reveal your fully human and unromantic physical self with your partner.
I read that Kubrick closed the set while filming those scenes with Cruise and Kidman, and sometimes he ran the camera himself, so it was only the three of them.
Some of the items on your list are understandable, but perhaps for the wrong reasons. Bodily functions are not something to be ashamed or embarrassed about.
The only reason I can think of to not do some of those items infront of someone would be to spare them any discomfort, (IE. smell, etc)
Clipping your nails, burping, purchasing tampons, and peeing are fairly innocent in my books.
That Marilyn story is hilarious. . .
And I’ll never forget having to pee into your chamber pot in front of him. Single most intense/humiliating scenes, ever!