Time for another installment of this Wednesday/Sunday night series!
Picking up from last time –
So, that Friday, October 10th, I did my 24-hour urine collection.
I volunteered at the Long Beach Half Marathon expo that day. I figured that with a shift that was only a few hours long, I’d be able to get there and get back without having to pee.
(During my first 24-hour urine collection, I volunteered at a pirate night without any issues. I guess I must’ve drank more water this time around or something.)
In the middle of my time at the expo, I felt I kind of needed to pee, but figured I could still hold it ’til I got home.
I hadn’t peed much at all during my first urine collection. So, on the one hand, I was trying to remedy that, and make sure I stayed hydrated. On the other, I couldn’t pee until I got home. I didn’t find the right balance.
Once I felt I had to pee, I really slowed down on water, but it was a bit too late. Toward the end of my time at the expo, I was feeling it.
As I left, I thought about what to do. I almost just called a car to go home. But I kind of thought even though that would be faster, that sitting would be worse than standing on the train – I really had to pee at this point.
So, I went toward the train. But there was construction happening, so there was a bus transfer… I saw getting home was going to take way longer than it normally would have (which already would’ve usually been an hour).
I didn’t think I could wait until I got home.
As I mentioned, UCLA’s paperwork said you could use a different container. So, I figured using a different one for an hour or so couldn’t be awful. I ran into the nearest coffee shop I could find, bought two of the biggest empty cups they had, ran into the bathroom and filled them both up with pee.
I thought I was being generous with space, buying two cups – yet I still had to pee once they were full! But I could at least wait on the rest of it ’til I got home.
Then I had to very carefully get on the subway. This was so embarrassing carrying around two pee cups! Granted, I’m pretty sure most of LA smells of urine, and I’m sure crazier things have been carried on the subway. So, it was fine.
I just certainly didn’t want to spill any. (How embarrassing would that have been?) So, I handled them with extreme care.
I did indeed make it home without any crazy incident with my pee cups. The first thing I did was pee out the rest (since, in the hour or so it took to get home, my desire to pee grew and grew).
Then I transferred all the pee into my container.
And this is where I’ll pick up next time.