Drop Dead Healthy by A. Jacobs (books to read to increase intelligence .TXT) 📕

calls me into the exam room. He’s soft-spoken, so much so that I find myself leaning forward to hear him. He’s got orangish hair, which is tousled in a just-woke-up way.

“Kneel there, pull down your pants, and lie on your stomach,” he says.

I follow orders.

“Can you give me an estimate on the pain?” I ask over my shoulder.

“It shouldn’t hurt too much. Unless you want it to.”

I phone in a half snort, half laugh. I’m guessing proctologists have to memorize ten such responses for their board certification. Just as the Talmud must require mohels to make circumcision jokes.

After the exam—which hurt much more than I “wanted”—we went to his office for a debriefing.

I sat down across from his desk. He had on a concerned face.

“Do you read while going to the bathroom?”

“Sure,” I say. “Who doesn’t?”

“I could tell you did. You have significant hemorrhoids. They’re not huge, but they’re not small.”

This diagnosis seems spectacularly unfair. One of the least welcome pieces of news in my project so far. They can take away my Doritos. They can forbid me Diet Cokes. But reading on the toilet? That’s practically in the Bill of Rights.

Dr. Gottesman is stern.

“Don’t read novels on the toilet,” he says. “Don’t write novels on the toilet. If you keep doing it, then you’ll have to get surgery. And hemorrhoid surgery is not fun.”

Reading distracts you, causing you to sit on the toilet longer. Sitting on the toilet causes swelling of the veins in the anal canal. And that swelling results in enlarged hemorrhoids—a condition that affects more than 70 percent of Americans at one time or another.

I promise to keep magazines out of the bathroom. I then ask Dr. Gottesman some other common colorectal questions.

How often should I be moving my bowels?

Some zealous health experts say we should go frequently and in great quantity. On Dr. Oz, I watched a gastroenterologist rave about sub-Saharan people whose three-times-a-day movements are “the size of my head.” Also, some doctors recommend that the poop be in the shape of an S-curve.

Dr. Gottesman—echoing the recommendations from the American Society of Colon and Rectal Surgeons—is less specific. Anything from once every three days to three times a day is acceptable, he says. And the S-curve is fine, but not necessary.

How much fiber should I be getting?

A huge amount. The Institute of Medicine says thirty grams a day. Which is a challenge. An apple—one of the most high-fiber foods—has only three grams of fiber.

When should I get a colonoscopy to screen for colon cancer?

Unless I have a family history or symptoms (thank God, I don’t), most experts recommend fifty.

Should I wipe while standing or sitting?

Sitting. It’s easier to get fully clean, he says.

Should I get a colonic?

“They don’t help, but they probably won’t hurt.” Colonics are supposed to wash away toxins that build up in your bowels. There’s scant scientific evidence to support any health benefits. (Incidentally, as part of my project, I did get a colonic, but I’ve decided not to write about it at length. I didn’t find it helpful or enlightening. I can tell you what it felt like, though: It felt like someone shooting water up your butt.)

Operation Squat

Dr. Gottesman’s no-reading-on-the-toilet commandment is a good, if unwelcome, piece of advice. But the more I learn, the more I realize it’s only a half measure.

To have the ultimate healthy bathroom experience, I shouldn’t be sitting at all. I should be squatting.

I first heard about the joys of squatting from Vlad, the raw-meat-loving caveman who told me I had a flat chest. He informed me that he goes to the bathroom by perching on the seat of the toilet. But since I’m a novice, I should buy an apparatus on the Internet to help position myself.

I dismissed his squatting lecture as caveman crazy talk. But oddly enough, there’s bonafide evidence that squatting is better for you. I e-mailed Gottesman, and he backed it up.

As Daniel Lametti points out in a definitive Slate magazine article on the topic, the sit-down toilet is a recent invention, dating back to the sixteenth century. Lametti quotes a proctologist in Time magazine who said, “We were not meant to sit on toilets, we were meant to squat in the field.”

Sitting puts more strain on the bowels than squatting, leading to an increase in hemorrhoids. Several studies address the issue. One Israeli scientist compared subjects who squatted over a plastic container and those who defecated on a high toilet. The squatters averaged 51 seconds per movement. The sitters, 130 seconds. And the squatters also rated the experience easier.

The most fervent pro-squatters say the posture also prevents cancer and Crohn’s disease, though these claims remain unproven.

Following Vlad’s orders, I found a squat-aiding apparatus on the Internet. It’s called “Nature’s Platform.” Apparently, demand is high. The website was out of stock.

Regardless of the warning, I ordered it, and Nature’s Platform arrived a few days later. The platform consists of a folding metal frame topped by a white plastic board with a volleyball-size hole in it. You assemble Nature’s Platform yourself, put it over the toilet, climb on top, and squat, essentially turning your flush American Standard into a third-world hole in the ground.

I install my Platform before Julie comes home from a meeting. She heads to the bathroom. I wait.

“Not funny!” she shouts from inside. “Not funny at all.”

She says that, but in truth, she’s laughing. It’s hard to resist the charms of Nature’s Platform.

Julie gives Nature’s Platform a test-drive while peeing, and pronounces it “interesting.”

“Flowers are a more traditional gift,” she tells me when she gets out.

I’ve been using Nature’s Platform for a couple of weeks. It definitely speeds things up. Though it does turn reading on the toilet into a dangerous acrobatic balancing act. Books are out of the question. Which would make Dr. Gottesman even happier.

By the way, after going, one other health tip: I make sure to shut the lid before flushing. Otherwise, an explosion of tiny droplets of bacteria-ridden toilet water will coat your