We had a water main break last week, meaning no water at the house for about 8 hours while they fixed it. That meant no flushing Fortunately, it was around dinner time and we went out to eat and used the restroom there.

But what to do in the event of a prolonged outage? That's a lot of poo and TP to leave sitting in the toilets. Yuk.

One thought was using bottled water to fill the tank for flushes. If you have a low-flo toilet I guess that's not a bad idea. What would you do (and going outside is not an option )

I keep a 5 gallon jug of water in the garage due to several power outages in the midwest the last couple of years.Just pour water into a large pitcher and pour it direct into the toilet basin and bingo the toilet flushes.

OK, this may sound gross, but it worked. Last year, when my pouch was connected (currently have loop ileo again) I had my windows replaced and there were some guys in one bathroom replacing the window and in my bedroom right next to the other bathroom. As we all know, the pouch is not exactly quiet so I was afraid to go in my bathroom. I took a trashbag and some paper towels into the basement, put the trash bag into a bucket, with the paper towels in the bottom (of course had some t.p. too) and sat and did my business. I then tied up the bag, threw it out, washed hands as usual and it was all good.

In a pinch, anything works!

Erin

EF,

Ran into this situation a couple of years ago when I lived in Cleveland and the electricity was out for a good 12 or 16 hours (at least as long as I stuck around in town). The kicker was that some genius(es) somewhere along the line specified the use of pumps (for supply of water for drinking and sewage) that were powered by electricity. Utterly ridiculous! Since that outage was not so terribly long in duration, I dumped bottled water into the toilet (although I was rather irate at needing to do that).

Honestly, I'd craft my own toilet. I saw some good ideas on this board recently from some individuals that hunt or spent significant time in the wilderness away from plumbing. I think one individual cut a hole in a folding chair and affixed a bucket or a bag to capture the waste. I imagine that waste in a garbage bag would be easiest to manage and dispose of. Maybe not ideal, but it'd work.

I, too, rigged a bucket with a trash bag as a temporary toilet when I had a main line back up and had to wait a day to get the plumber out. It worked just fine. I only wish I had a toilet seat which fit on top of the bucket. And, I need to place the bucket up on something as it sits rather low when placed on the ground. I'm not as spry as I used to be!

Use biodegradable bags containing a powder that gels up
your waste and deodorizes it. That way, you can use
the same bag multiple times and then just throw it in
the trash.

There are lots of options for emergency toilets to
use with these bags, such as seats that fit over 5 gallon
buckets.

Here's a link to my previous post with more info:

http://j-pouch.org/eve/forums/a/tpc/f/9151071921/m/6661...331009172#5331009172

When my husband ( no gi issues) is on a construction site with no available bathroom he takes along a 5 gallon bucket (with lid)puts some cat litter in the bottom and there you go,portapotty. You do what ya gotta do, I guess.
LoriP