Health & Wellness: Poo — What It Says About Our Health and How to Poo Properly” by PROPPR Co-Founder, Zhenya Gerson

Credit: PROPPR Co-Founder, Zhenya Gerson

As the makers of poo stools, you must guess that the health of our stools is of utmost importance to us. In fact, it’s so important there’s even a chart. You must have heard of it; the Bristol Stool Chart?

For all of you poo nerds out there, here’s some interesting info about the Bristol Stool Chart. The chart was developed by Dr. Ken Heaton and Dr. Chris Steele in the late 1980s as a way of standardizing the way colonoscopies were performed — it helps doctors know what they should be looking for when they examine patients’ colons, and how to interpret the results. The chart is so good, it’s now pretty standard to see it almost everywhere.

​Like all things from the 80’s, it needed a bit of a revamp and thankfully a couple of artsy girls in the UK have just done that, check out their updated easy on the eyes chart here.
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There are 7 types of stool:

• Type 1: Separate hard lumps (hard to pass)
• Type 2: Lumpy, hard, sausage-shaped
• Type 3: Sausage-shaped with cracks on the surface
• Type 4: Sausage-shaped or snake-like; smooth and soft
• Type 5: Soft blobs with clear-cut edges (easy to pass)
• Type 6: Fluffy pieces with ragged edges; mushy
• Type 7: Entirely liquid, watery, no solid pieces

Now that you’ve undoubtedly checked out the chart and now thought about what your last motion may have looked like and you realise that yours isn’t sausage or snake like, then here are our top five tips for healthy, good looking, easy to move poos:
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1. Eat plenty of fibre: Fibre is an essential part of a diet that keeps your bowels healthy and regular. Try eating more fruit, vegetables, whole grains and nuts.
2. Drink plenty of water: Water helps your digestive system function properly, so make sure you drink enough of it each day. Aim for at least 1 litre or 10 glasses per day (or more if you’re thirsty).
3. Exercise regularly: Regular exercise (and this includes a light 30-minute walk). This helps ensure that your muscles are working properly and enables your body to better absorb nutrients from the food you eat. It also helps release endorphins — chemicals in the brain that boost mood and relieve pain — which boosts energy levels while reducing stress levels as well. So, get moving! You’ll feel better when you do!
4. Get enough sleep: A lack of sleep can lead to constipation — so make sure you get enough hours between your head hitting the pillow at night until you wake up in the morning! Aim to be in bed before 10pm and have seven or eight hours per night minimum; 9–10 hours is optimal.
5. Prop those feet: Get a PROPPR under your feet when you sit down on the toilet to release. By propping your feet on a PROPPR toilet foot stool you unkink the bottom section of your sigmoid colon. So instead of going into combat with the kink, your poos will slide on out.

​The right height to poop, aka the PROP Zone
We’ve had our stylish and award winning PROPPR toilet foot stools on the market for a few years now, initially developed at a height to work with Australian toilets. It turns out that the average Australian toilet height, including the seat, is about 42–45cm (around 16.5–18 inches) tall. We designed the PROPPR with this toilet height in mind, so the gap between the top of the lid and the top of the PROPPR poo stool is roughly 20cm (8 inches). We call this area the ‘PROP’ zone. The ‘right’ height for a toilet stool is therefore one that gets you into this PROP zone.

Why do I need to use a toilet foot stool?

As supported by the science, the key reason for using a toilet foot stool is to simulate a squat position on the western style pedestal toilet. Ideally you want your knees as close to your chest as possible, to mimic a full squat, however at the very least, you need your knees to be higher than your hips. This postural position unkinks your colon, creating more of a slide — rather than pushing that s#!t uphill — so to speak.

The right height for a toilet foot stool is therefore more of a minimum height rather than a maximum. While you could sub in something from home, many of the options end up being too short, that is, they don’t get your knees above your hip line to replicate the squat position to poop.
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We will admit that changing your position after years of sitting at 90 degrees on the toilet may come with a little discomfort to start with, as it changes the position of your bottom on the toilet seat. It can take anywhere from a few days to a couple of weeks for your tushy to adjust. Butt (sorry, couldn’t resist!) once it’s re-trained, you’ll never go back. Your body will be thanking you for pooping in the PROPPR position with less pushy poop time and a full ‘evacuation’.

If you do experience any discomfort, we do encourage you to persevere. In time you’ll find sitting on the toilet with your feet on a toilet foot stool the comfortable norm. And when you’re without it you’ll be looking for the next best thing to prop those feet up and get things moving!

To learn more about PROPPR, visit here.