No Sh*t! Why Pooping In Front Of Your Spouse Is The New 'I Love You'

It'd like to preface this whatever this is by saying the following: I do not particularly care for toilet humor. I was scandalized when I heard my 5-year old nephew say 'fart' recently; I wish my sister's home had a fainting couch.

I know I should love the Jackass franchise, but I live in a constant state of terror that an overturned porta-potty (or one flung by a giant rubber band) is the gag coming up after the next act break. My coprophobia is extensive enough that I've sworn off "butt stuff," despite its legacy of being more intimate.

But here's the thing. Unfortunately, our crap factories do invite intimacy into our relationships.

Are you grossed out yet?

People automatically think that saying the words 'I love you' will take your relationship to the next level. But they couldn't be more wrong.

Those words don't always hold much meaning. If you really think about it, sex isn't intimate either. Nope, it's carnal and doesn't necessarily mean anything. I'd wager that most of the people reading this have gotten sticky with someone whom they wouldn't remember if they sat on their face, again.

Is it a mutual appreciation for Jon Hamm and his prodigious hog? Nope, that's just good taste. The brutal truth is that intimacy is recognition and ready admission of our flaws, of our ugly humanity.

And our stink is one of the surest reminders that we're mostly hairless mammals who happened to invent R&B music because we didn't think we were f*cking quite enough.

Sometime just before you learn that you are not in fact omnipotent, you learn that everybody poops (to help parents with this conversation some self-marketing genius penned a book called Everyone Poops), but we spend the better part of our lives under the auspices that we're protecting other people's sensitive sniffers.

In the context of dating, presenting the best versions of ourselves — a ritual that dorks from the 1970s called courtship — thus covering our bad smells as much as possible: Maybe I am perfect, maybe my sh*t doesn't stink.

While I have no problem letting loose the bowels of hell in a public bathroom (my quads could kick the wings off of Drogon), I hide my shameful digestion like a King Charles Spaniel with generalized anxiety disorder for as long as possible in a new relationship. Here's how:

1. Pepto is your friend. 

I'm sure that whatever chemicals are in that delicious chalk shake are tearing me apart and the next day does make the post-game of a Mexican food-Pabst Blue Ribbon night seem like a silk hanky by comparison, but the pink stuff does keep gas on deck and mud butt firmly in check.

A mouthful of it should suffice unless your night is going to involve some combination of nuclear chicken wings, high-octane coffee and running from a Ouija board-wielding, reanimated corpse.

2. Test out the good ol' shower trick.

Yes! A spend-the-night. Congratulations on getting the time to shoop with someone you at least kinda like; I knew you had it in you. However, I know what else you have in you: solid waste. Wait until your sleepover pal falls asleep, then get up and head to the bathroom. Most people who aren't animals will have matches in the bathroom (minor red flag if not) but you have to cover the time too.

That's when you take a quick shower. If questioned make it a comfort thing about helping you falling asleep rather than you feel dirty after hooking up; saves questions and hurt feelings.

3. Be a stealthy ninja.

Your first hotel stay with each other! Wowzers. This thing really blossomed. Good for you. But these quarters are TIGHT! Taking something to be bound-up all weekend is a no-go and the shower trick won't work twice in the same day.

So you have two options. You can A) be an adult and admit you sometimes make bad smells from your behind or B) realize that every hotel has public bathrooms in the lobby. The pretext of an errand or quick phone call is all you'll need to cover your clandestine, lobby bombing run.

I have a friend who kept up this charade for three months while living with his now-wife.

We all know there's no dook fairy who teleports the contents of our guts to a faraway land where ogres turn partially digested animal and vegetable matter into low-cost fuel for orphanages. Outkast's Andre 3000 summed the whole thing up with this gem, "But lean a little bit closer, see, roses really smell like poo-poo-oo."

The relationship doesn't start until you're comfortable with the poo-poo-oo  And, frankly, your main squeeze could be a toot-huffing, super-freak like James Joyce and actually enjoy it.

Side note: Unless there is a documented medical emergency, no couple ever needs to be so close that they are both in the bathroom while a bowel movement is taking place.

Draw the line at peeing, friends.