When you've gotta go, you've gotta go!

Men have it so easy! You often see men stopping along the road during a race to relieve themselves.  They run off to the side, turn their backs to the runners and do what they need to do in a few seconds, no mess, no fuss, and quickly return to the road to carry on running.  Women on the other hand...well we have a real problem! Firstly, I'm convinced women have smaller bladders...??? The queue for the bathrooms (or rather, portable loos) are always filled with women before a race.  Running is not a particularly glamorous sport to begin with, what with all the panting and the sweating, but this makes it really unflattering! Portable loos are pretty disgusting, but they beat going along the side of the road mid-race! So you try to get in the queue with enough time before the gun goes off to start the race.  Sadly, this doesn't always happen the way you plan.  On Saturday morning the alarm was set for 03:50 to get to a race that started in Pretoria at 06:00.  Thinking that was plenty of time to get ready, get to the venue, enter and use the facilities before the start, we were unpleasantly surprised when we were met with ridiculous traffic and crowds trying to do the same thing!  I was about 5th in the queue for a bathroom when the gun to signal the start of the 21.1km went off.  I had no choice but to leave the queue and run to the start to catch up with the other runners.  Unfortunately, by 6km I was desperate and running was becoming rather uncomfortable.  I had no choice...I had seen other women do it before and now it was my turn! At that particular part of the race, there happened to be a large field with many overgrown bushes and tall grass.  It was now or never! I sprinted as deep into these bushes as I could go, making sure runners could no longer see me.  I squatted down and cursed this disadvantage that women have! Not one of my finest moments!! I rushed back to the road as quickly as I could and tried to put the memory out of my mind.  Unfortunately the bits of dry grass and weeds that I pulled up along with my pants were there to remind me every step of the way! Not amazing!! Sometimes you have to forget that you're a girly girl and just be a runner, because when you've gotta go, you've gotta go!