Wetsuit Urination - Should I Pee Or Not?

It's happened to all of us, you descend to 18 metres and suddenly you feel the urge. You can either try and hold it, ruin the dive for everyone else, who won't be too pleased to learn the dive they have been preparing for all morning ended for a toilet stop, or pee in your wetsuit!

In reality, there is no real health risk, because urine is actually sterile, the only symptom of wetsuit urination is the temporary warm feeling.

However if you are dehydrated your urine can be dark and smelly, so you dive buddies may not take too kindly to this, should they find themselves swimming through it. To avoid this problem drink more water, then your urine will not be dark or smelly, If you are hydrated, your urine should be clear and odourless.

Even if you relieved yourself before the dive, you may need to go again when you get down to 18 metres or so due to the increase in pressure, your body feels compressed and your kidneys start to produce urine.

You should always rinse your wetsuit and other dive gear thoroughly after your dive anyway, so there should be no trace of urine smell anyway. The reality is that if you do not rinse your wetsuit it will end up developing some rather unpleasant smells from the algae and other dirt in the water, and not from your urine!

As they say 80% of people pee in their wetsuits, 20% lie!

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