Opening the Floodgaytes: #Pisstory: All About

From Wikipedia: "A chamber pot is a portable toilet, meant for nocturnal use in the bedroom. It was common in many cultures before the advent of indoor plumbing and flushing toilets."

While doing another article recently I (re)-discovered the topic of chamber pots: those lovely Victorian contraptions people kept near their beds overnight to avoid having to make a freezing expedition to the outhouse half-asleep. I was always vaguely aware their existence but had never taken the time to really dive into the rabbit hole headfirst so to speak. This period in history bores me very much overall so I tend to give a shrug and a "meh" to all things pre-20th Century. (Okay, pre-2nd half of the 20th Century).

Chamber pots, Victorian bathroom etiquette - Fenton History Center

Still, the thought of people hiking up their bedclothes in the dark and hissing into bedside potties seems pretty risque in some ways by today's standards, doesn't it? Yet these were Victorian people living in the long-ago period from 1837-1901 when Queen Victoria of England reigned, a time that's considered highly conservative socially... the women were known for wearing girdles so tight there were rooms built called fainting rooms that were likely around to allow women to pass out safely because the corsets were too damn tight to breathe! (Or too hot! Just look at all those layers of suffocating crap they wore). 🥵 The fact that we modern polyamorous consumers of Pornhub and OnlyFans would consider their daily habits "icky" would probably make them laugh with confusion.

At the same time, some things never change. I see obvious parallels with the "guys leaving piss jugs/bottles laying around the house" trend so many wives and mothers complain of today. However these folks had a legit excuse: indoor plumbing and flushable toilets had not yet been invented, so needing to drain the main vein at an inopportune time--such as in the middle of the night, while bedbound due to illness/injury or in the dead of winter--would've required a helluva lot more effort than it does today. Yet there are many people who wake up in the night in the modern era, sometimes more than once, needing to go #1. This not only interrupts sleep but puts them at risk for falls and other injuries. They could definitely benefit from something like a chamber pot.

YT creator feigning(?) disgust at the concept of chamber pots. Typical.

Outhouses were the only halfway civilized (and halfway is a STRETCH) alternative to today's cushy urinals & private toilet stalls, and they left a lot to be desired. I've personally heard tales of folks wiping with magazine pages and, before that, dried CORN COBS due to a lack of other alternatives. Apparently AI's heard that too. See for yourself:

AI knows our secret. 😭

Yes, times were hard for a lot of our ancestors on the Great American Frontier. And for many extremely poor, rural or disenfranchised Americans outside major metro areas, those hard times kept chugging right along well into the Atomic Age, the Space Age, the Age of Aquarius, the Cold War Era of the '80s, the Jerry Springer Epoch... hell, they apparently never stopped for a good chunk of the country. (Outhouse article coming soon). A final note on that: I personally had grandparents who grew up using outhouses, and aunts/uncles who talk somewhat fondly of using them too. Sorry dawg, can't relate.

Wyoming journalist(?) shares rules for using the old-fashioned loos.

But I can empathize with those who find chamber pots intriguing-bordering-on-taboo or even sexy. I mean c'mon: who WOULDN'T like to have their very own makeshift toilet IN their room at night that they were expected to use because everybody did the same thing?! The hotness lies in the casual convenience aspect of it for me. The fact that these dainty little "pisspots" Aka "pots to piss in" which, if you couldn't afford one, made you "piss-poor" (see full article about the normalization of this pee-soaked terminology here) were totally normal in houses across America and even the world just blows my mind.

I've included some pics of real chamber pots below to give you an idea of what they looked like. For anyone who feels guilty or gross about keeping a bedside wee container, just remember our ancestors thought nothing of it. (Just be sure to empty it and keep it nice and clean).