Sanitation: Toilet Paper and Waste Disposal

By Paula Kravfordt

If you have food to eat, you have a sanitation issue, from personal cleanliness to food preparation. This is the most critical area of concern especially if we were in a disaster type situation. If your family gets sick from poor cleanliness habits, it won’t matter how much food you have stored.

"After awhile, even gold can lose its luster. But there is no luxury in war quite like toilet paper. Its surplus value is greater than gold's." (Sorry I can’t find the author of this truism!" After the info I present to you, I think you will agree with this assessment!)

Toilet paper is a recent luxury, so what did all our ancestors use???

- corn cobs soaked in a rain barrel

- mussel shells

- a "gompf stick" that was kept in a container by the privy, but this was late period

- Irish and Scandinavian ancients used moss

- Romans washed up with water

- both linen and wool cloth scraps have been found in ancient privies, scraps from old clothing

- discarded locks of sheep's wool, which would make sense from skirting fleeces

- hay-balls

- straw

- smooth rocks

- sailors used the ends of frayed anchor ropes On Frontier House, they said settlers in the 1800's each used their own rag and washed it after.

A little about the corn cobs - Old privies had a hole in the side wall to dispose of the corn cob and this was called a "corn hole." Now you know where the expression ("corn holed") comes from. To prepare the cob, you take two dried corn cobs, and rub them together so as to make a nice soft frayed surface. Then you use it and dispose of the cob through the corn hole after wards. Those were plowed under since there was such a small percentage of offensive material in them.

When I was a little girl my grandmother lived in Mud Lake, Idaho. They didn’t get plumbing until the late 70's. They had an outhouse with the prior year volume of Sears Catalog. It was made at the time of the same paper that phone books are made of. The idea was to take a page and smash and rub it in your hands to soften it up. It was your choice how long you were in the potty to soften it up to your personal liking.

What do people use now who do not use TP?

The Europeans have had this down for a while, they are called Bidet's.

Others use a damp cloth, then wash the cloth. Use a diaper pail or something until a washing load is ready. By the way, half diapers are great - damper on end, wipe, and use the dry half to dry. (Make sure not to use those cloths to wash your face) Some cultures use their left hand, their right hand is for eating. Other’s use leaves, (be watchful for poison ivy!)

Reading about all of this has given me a greater appreciation of toilet paper! I don’t know how many people are going to be willing to share their TP!

How much Toilet Paper do I need to store?

It has been suggested that each person needs a roll per week. The best brand of TP I have found so far to be the best value is Scott. I try every week that I go shopping to buy a big package of it. It is bulky and cumbersome to store, but after the research I have done, that is ok!

Babies and Diapers

Since most people use disposable diapers, many do not have cloth diapers in storage. If disposables were not available, you would need cloth diapers, pins and plastic pants. You need to make note of how many diapers your baby goes through each day. You need at least 3 days worth of diapers. You also need to have 2-3 pairs of plastic pants per day and at least 4 sets of pins. I don’t like to mention store names, but Wal Mart is the only store that carries these things regularly.) You also need to make sure you have a rash cream for your baby, you need 20 oz for every year of age your child is that is in diapers.

Baby Wipe Recipe

1 cup warm water, 1 tablespoon lotion, 1 tablespoon baby wash. Mix well. Put soft paper towels that have been cut in half in air tight container and cover with liquid.

Waste Disposal (It shows how blessed we are that we really don’t know how to deal with this subject and turn our noses up at it.)

What would happen to our world if the toilets no longer flushed? Few things can spread disease faster, attract more flies, vermin and rodents than the improper storage of human waste. It has been speculated that some of the deadly diseases of the Middle Ages in Europe were spread mainly by the inadequate sewage systems of the time. Failure to properly dispose of human waste can lead to epidemics such as typhoid, cholera, dysentery, nausea and diarrhea.

This is a very brief outline of these things.

So how do we deal with this waste?

Toilet - No running water: We could still use our potties if there weren’t any broken sewer lines. The water uses the gravity system. You would need to use grey water to flush the toilets. They would have to be flushed less often to save on water use.

Toilet - Can not flush: Place a one gallon bucket inside the empty toilet and a plastic bag inside the bucket. When the toilet is used, tie up the bag and dispose of. You will need to bury it, if garbage services are not available. Buckets - This is the easiest thing for an indoor waste disposal system if the toilets couldn’t be used. Put a heavy duty trash bag inside a 5 gallon bucket as a liner. You will need a bucket for urine and a bucket for excrement. After each use add a little dirt, kitty liter, or sawdust. When they are full pour out the urine in a location far from your water source. Use a shovel to dig a hole and bury the excrement. You can even add a comfortable toilet seat to the bucket. A family of four will fill this in about 4 days.

Portable Toilet - Portable toilets are available in the camping section of your local retail store and are miniature versions of a porta potty. They hold a reservoir of water that flushes the waste into a storage container. (Keep in mind you would have to empty this often. When we were at girls camp we had 40 people and we filled 2 full size porta potties in 4 days.)

The Outhouse - This is very efficient and low cost. Find a place away from your water source, dig a hole, place a protective covering around it, fit with a seat with a hole in it. and it is ready to go. This is one that you don’t have to worry about sanitation and moving waste from in the house. Make sure that everyone washes their hands after. (Also make sure the door has something on it: a leather strap split to go over a nail or whatever to keep little children from wandering in and falling in the hole.) (Lime can be used but must be used with caution to keep the smell down.)

What if I Run Out of TP - You can use a cake pan that has a sealed cover on it. Put several layers from magazines, newsppers, telephone books etc. Add a little water to the paper and seal it up. It softens the paper and moistens it just a bit so there isn't the irritation that too rough of paper can create.

Other ideas - duplicate what has been done in the past.

PREVENTING THE SPREAD OF DISEASE

It is vitally important to wash your hands after using the bathroom, particularly if there are water shortages. If you have to use outside facilities like an outhouse you might want to hang a water bag filled with water with bleach in it to rinse your hands after going potty.

Other suggested items to be stored in this are would be:

Antibacterial soaps

Baby wipes

Bar soap (Be sure to store the antibacterial bar soap)

Liquid soap with pump

The families who did our little experiment of going 72 hours without electricity and running water, learned a lot about this area. We all used our potties to flush but we used stored water to wash with.

The comments included:

We did not have enough water to properly wash our hands

We did not have the right kind of supplies to properly wash our hands

We did not have enough hand towels. We went through a lot more of the smaller towels than we do normally. I need to add more hand towels or plan to rip up my big ones which would lead to a shortage there.

We found we needed more rags.