Diet and health are usually put on the back burner for college students lacking grocery money or subject to the whims of Campus Dining. But if we aren’t careful there can be significant side effects to our health if our bodies’ dietary needs aren’t being met. While it isn’t exactly dinner conversation, your poop is an easy way to determine how your body is reacting to your diet.
Human stool consists of about 75 percent water and the rest is bacteria, cellulose, fat and mucus. Normally (as you have probably learned) your poop is brown, but color can be a great indicator of what is going on inside the body.
If your poop is green it means you have been eating a lot of veggies. Because our bodies cannot digest certain types of fiber it passes through with the same color. This is also the reason corn passes through seemingly unchanged.
If your poop is blue then you should probably lay off the Kool-Aid for a while because it is most likely just the result of blue food dyes.
There are more serious issues your poop can address. If your stool is red you are either eating incredible amounts of beets or bleeding in your lower digestive system. If your stool is black you might be bleeding in your upper digestive tract. Both red and black stool can be signs of serious health problems and you should visit a doctor. Yellow poop could signal giardia.
The shape of your poop matters too. Healthy stool is continuous and will curve in the toilet. This is an indicator that you are receiving enough fiber, which acts as glue to hold your stool together. If your stool is in many small pieces you may be missing fiber in your diet. Pencil thin turds can be a sign of narrowing passageways your stool passes through, which is an indicator of rectal cancer.
While nobody’s poop smells like roses, poop that consistently smells unusually foul can be a sign of a more serious infection.
You should also pay attention to floaters and sinkers. Your poop should sink. If it floats your stool has a high fat content, which can reflect high-fat diets or more serious issues like celiac disease or chronic pancreatitis.
It is also important to focus on the task at hand. Studies have shown that pushing too hard or spending too long in the bathroom leads to a higher risk for hemorrhoids.
So next time you find yourself sitting down on the toilet, relax and rest easy knowing that you are now a poop expert. It might be uncomfortable to think or talk about, but remember — it unites us all.