This is a story that related specifically to my Crohn's Disease.
If you haven't figured it out already, I'm pretty much a goodie-two-shoes. Adding to that, I couldn't have any amount of alcohol for just under four years - most of which was after turning 18. Both of those factors together means that I rarely got 'out of hand' if I went out with the girls to have some fun, play pool, do some two-stepping, and just having fun at my first go-to spot for country dancing.
Now, we all know the state of most bar bathrooms.
Dingy, never quite enough toilet paper in ALL of the stalls to make it through an entire Friday night, doors with no locks, doors with no handle at all, uneven doors that had to be lifted to get it to lock, overflowing garbage full of paper towels, and a mixture of booze and toilet water all over the floor. An added bonus: all of the toilets each need a special way or trick to get them to flush properly.
First, I need to find a stall that's relatively safe and private. Then, I have to decide whether I'd prefer the hook on the back of the door for my purse so that I didn't have to place it on the sticky and disgusting floor, or one that didn't need me trying to squat while holding the stall door closed with my foot and hope no one would heave on the door.
So, to add to all of the small trials that all women go through in the public cesspool that is the bar bathroom, I have Crohn's Disease! - I spend way too much time in a stall (which pisses off the ladies waiting in line), I have to spray air freshener that I kept in my purse, and I have to hope that there is toilet paper - because, let's face it, with urgency, sometimes it's more important to get hovered over than to take that extra thirty seconds to check the dispenser. Plus - having Crohn's means that I am one of the rare women at the bar who WANTS to hit the washroom unaccompanied.
Where is this going?
Well, there I am, in the stall, doing what no one likes to do in public and feeling awful. I have not had one drop of alcohol, my friends are all still on the dance floor, and I am just hoping that the music is loud enough to cover up any embarrassing noise.
And then - the worst happens. (Okay maybe not the worst per se)...
I try to flush the toilet... It's clogged.
(One of the only worse places this has happened to me is on a date at the guy's home. That one sucked. And I didn't hear from him again... Go figure).
Brutal.
Now I have a lineup of girls WAITING for the stall... They all heard me flush so the next girl is waiting anxiously and impatiently for that stall door to swing open and for her to be able to rush in...
I open the door... All ashamed and red in the face... And have to tell the entire lineup that that particular toilet is now broken.
The next girl in line was pretty furious. She was also pretty incoherently inebriated. Great. Drunk and angry... So, at first she's like - 'don't care, I just have to pee'.
So how do I deter this girl from seeing the embarrassing and just about overflowing clogged up toilet ... From a girl who spent WAY too much time in there... And still save face??
One of my go-to explanations is that I was vomiting. Or saying "I got sick" without specifying. I usually only use this excuse while in public washrooms or when I am with people who don't know about any of my illness.
So I tell her - "trust me. You don't want to go in there. The toilet is clogged and overflowing.. I was puking in there for a while."
The whole lineup of girls make a little disgusted face with a giggle or a sympathetic 'oh no' or 'sucks to be you' remark.
I think it's over and done with - evaded an even more embarrassing moment - and then I hear the super drunk girl ACTUALLY vomiting. I offer her my glass of water and then leave.
Crohn's strikes again only a couple of minutes after leaving the washroom. So I run back in just as the piss-drunk gal is leaving. Luckily, a really popular song comes on and I've pretty much got the whole bathroom to myself - awesome.
And then, as I'm washing my hands, the female bouncer walks in.
Turns out, the drunk girl who was vomiting told the bouncers that I was vomiting... And this bar has a very strict policy. The female bouncer is there in the washroom, and a male bouncer is outside the door - waiting to escort me out of the bar.
So .. There I am.. Miss goodie-two-shoes, not even physically capable of drinking any alcohol, being escorted out of a bar for being too inebriated resulting in 'vomiting'... Just to save face from a clogged toilet for a different reason.
No, I did not mention to the bouncers that the adult tattle-tale was also vomiting. She ended up getting kicked out shortly after anyways.
I waited outside of the bar for my friends (since I prefer washroom breaks alone), and drive us all home.
I was:
The Designated Driver.
The one and only time I was ever kicked out of a bar - when I was stone cold sober and the Designated Driver.
Oh, Crohn's Disease, you make my life interesting to say the least.
:/