Hosting a dinner party can be stressful. You want to be charming and laid back, but if your partner disappears the pressure is on you.
Even if their disappearance is excused by a biological function.
Redditor dinnerpartypooper encountered this very issue with his wife. So they turned to the “Am I The A**hole” (AITA) subReddit for moral judgment.
He asked:
“AITA for pooping during a dinner party?”
The Original Poster (OP) explained.
“My wife and I were hosting a dinner party (pre-COVID). At some point during the meal, I felt like I needed to poop, so I got up from the table and excused myself to the downstairs bathroom.”
“After a while (20 minutes or so?) I was done with my business, so I washed my hands and returned to the table. I didn’t notice anything odd, but later that night after our guests had left, my wife told me I had been rude to our guests.”
“She said I had violated the unspoken (but, according to her, universally known and practiced) ‘Dinner Party Pooping Rules.'”
OP explained the rules.
“In my wife’s words, the DPPRs are:”
- “If you are hosting a dinner party and you need to drop a deuce, you must absent yourself to the upstairs/private toilet with a believable non-poop excuse, and you may be gone for 3-5 minutes.”
- “If your bowel evacuation takes longer than 3-5 minutes to arrive and reach completion, it is not a Dinner Party Poop and must wait until either a) after the guests have left or b) your state of bowel readiness has progressed to the point that the poop will take no more than 3-5 minutes.”
- “You are not permitted to befoul the public/downstairs bathroom with poop stench.”
- “Nor are you permitted to use either bathroom (but especially not the downstairs/public bathroom, which is adjacent to the dining room) for upwards of 15 minutes, especially not when you have a table full of guests in the dining room trying to make polite conversation despite your conspicuous absence.”
“I agreed to use the upstairs bathroom if I needed to poop the next time we had a dinner party, but only because it wasn’t worth getting into an argument with my wife about pooping.:
“She says it’s not about pooping, it’s about making our guests feel uncomfortable by being gone from the table for a long time, and for making the guest bathroom smell like poop. IDK, I guess I think that bathrooms are for pooping in and it’s not a big deal, and no one else follows these rules?”
“So, Reddit: AITA for pooping during a dinner party?”
Redditors gave their opinions on the situation by declaring:
- NTA – Not The A**hole
- YTA – You’re The A**hole
- NAH – No A**holes Here
- ESH – Everyone Sucks Here
Most Redditors agreed OP was the a**hole.
“YTA. It’s super rude to disappear during a dinner party and leave your wife to entertain the guests alone. This kind of happened to me with my first serious boyfriend. He wanted me to get to know both his mom and best friend, I’m super shy and I prefer one-on-one interactions, but he was super social and he promised to make it easy for all of us to get along so we decided to host a dinner together and invite them.”
“Everything was going fine, until he decided to go to the bathroom, next to the dinning room, and yeah, poop for like 15 minutes. Right in the middle of dinner. We could definitely hear him, and not only that, it was the first time we all spent time together, so we ended up spending those 15 minutes struggling really hard to make conversation, and ignoring the awkwardness of him in the bathroom next to us in the middle of dinner. Worst dinner experience.” ~ theponicorn
“YTA never poop in the guest toilet when you have guests ewwwww.”
“I agree with your wife. Pooping during a dinner party, let alone for 20 minutes is filthy rude. Everyone sitting down knows your sitting there letting out a long stinking sh*t! Gross.” ~ B_blue_
“YTA…but I loved the specific rules so much! It would be kind of weird for a guest to leave and use your bathroom for 20 minutes during dinner, right? Also kind of weird for you to do it. Plus, you could have used the upstairs bathroom to make it less awkward for guests who don’t have the option to use the non-public toilet.”
“You and your wife seem like you have a fun balance of humor for those to have been the rules presented…lol.” ~ Galwaydreams
“YTA. 20 minutes? Next to the dining room? Yeesh, I hope nothing was audible.”
“Fun fact, mammals all normally poop at roughly the same speed, bigger mammals produce more mucus so it comes out faster. If you have no medical reasons, more water & fibre & less mobile phones would sort that out.” ~ Whitwoc
“YTA. There’s a reason the saying “party pooper” exists (yes I know its not its original meaning, but taking a 20 min shit in the middle of dinner fits way too well).”
“Unless you have a medical condition you haven’t mentioned here there is no way you were all business while you were in there.” ~ philmcruch
“YTA”
“I as going to say NTA but 20min? You had guests and if it takes you 20min to poop, then go when you know it will exploded from you and be done with it 3-5min. If you just sit there waiting for the doogie to drop, then you are AH. Glad I made a deal with my poop when it’s okay to enjoy the scenery and when it’s time to slide like the flash.” ~ Black_kalla
Others argued OP was right.
“NTA, I’m with you man, if you gotta poo you gotta poo. Don’t try and put a time limit on it either, it takes as long as it takes.”
“Probably should avoid the guest bathroom though, she has a point there.” ~ Tidus790
“Universally known and practiced ‘Dinner Party Pooping Rules.’ Your wife is full of shit, there is no such thing. NTA When you have to go, you have to go.” ~ Oh_No_Its_Dudder
“NTA simply in recognition of your hilarious anecdotal writing style.” ~ bootlegenergy
They give a new definition to the phrase “party pooper.”