Frank Talk About Toilet Paper
Posted by Rachel on October 21, 2008
This silly little post addresses toilet paper and vulvar unpleasantness. If you can’t stomach it, move along.
OMFG. I will never buy Kleenex Cottonelle toilet paper. That’s what my hotel had this weekend. Let me just say that when it gets wet, it leaves behind pieces when you wipe.* Apparently it just disintegrated in contact with fluid, which sort of the exact opposite of what toilet paper should do. And those pieces get all stuck in the folds of your natural vulva anatomy. And then create an itchiness so intense you might just lose your mind.
I seriously thought I was going to have to take a second shower to deal with the adverse effects of my toilet paper. That’s just not right.
I’ll stick with my cheapo store brand or something like Angel Soft, thanks.
Coincidentally, I just saw a tv ad for another toilet paper (Charmin) last night where the main focus was that it won’t leave pieces behind. I’ve been buying the same couple of brands for so long, I’d forgotten how much I care about this particular feature. AdWeek has a piece on the new frankness in advertising that talks about this campaign and also commercials that actually say the words “period” or “pregnant,” which you never would have heard years ago.
*Since I’m naming a brand, I’ll leave room for the possibility that the hotel buys Cottonelle packs that failed inspection or some industrial formulation that’s different from what’s in the grocery store. But I’m still not ever, ever buying it.
Photo by by MotherPie and used under a Creative Commons license.
newscoma said
Toilet paper can piss me off in about 2.2 seconds. Angel Soft or Charmin on sale.
That’s how I swing. (Fun post.)
nm said
Heh. I hate the soft toilet papers, all of them. They all fall apart somewhere or other, and I never feel clean after using them. Thank goodness my husband is of the same mind or we’d have to have that double roll setup like in the picture. Scott Tissue for me, thankyouverymuch. Which just goes to show that anatomy is not destiny, or all humans would have pretty much the same ideas about this.
Ethel said
I got teased at 5:30 in the morning when I was buying Charmin by some asshat who thought I was high f-looting for that purchase. He was purchasing John Wayne toilet paper himself. All I know is that with my genitalia, menstruation and general anal issues due to celiac disease there’s no freaking way I am skimping on that front, it sets the whole day wrong to deal with cheap stuff and effects everyone else too. Men might have highly exposed gonads, and are fragile in that manner but they don’t have much more to deal with then their anus, and they’re probably the ones who made the decision for the hotel. Of course, I have read the same complaints about hospital supplies.
lyrl said
In college, I just used whatever was stocked in the dorm bathrooms. The stuff didn’t cause me any unpleasantness of the sort Rachel describes here.
So one day, I had my annual gyne exam. She tells me, “It looks like you have a yeast infection.” I think, that’s odd, I don’t have any symptoms. A pause. “Oh, wait, that’s just toilet paper.”
I’m with nm 100% of the way on this one. I will never buy anything except Scott.
mei said
i only use water!!!
Dingleberry Checks | The 'Real' Princess Diaries said
[...] know this is completely out of the clear blue, but Rachel has a similarly random post up on her site about toilet paper. Or, rather, the little toilet paper “residue” left [...]
katbur said
The power of the internet cannot be overstated. I thought it was just me and it was because of menopause and the “drying” effect. Thanks for the recommendations!
autoegocrat said
My grandparents told me that they used the Sears Roebuck catalog during the Depression. It was the style at the time.