How To Clean Yourself As A Bottom

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How To Prepare for Anal As a Bottom

When it comes to bottoming, most of us never had access to proper education, especially when it comes to the butt. This means both beginners and experienced players have had to turn to adult movies, friends, or Reddit to figure out how to properly prepare, play, and care for our butts. This doesn't sound safe now, does it?

In my surgical practice, I quickly learned that nearly everyone who engaged in backdoor intercourse had cleaning regimens that involved either water or store-bought enemas. For those who may be unfamiliar, preparation is the act of cleansing the butt canal, most traditionally done with liquid expelled from a bulb or shower hose. Everyone wants to be confident that they won't have any unnecessary surprises when it's time to play. Sometimes their diet (like fiber intake) or stress levels means that preparation right before play is the final step to getting their butt squeaky clean and ready for the big D.

After realizing the void in education, I also realized that there had never been safe and appropriate butt-preparation products. That's when I sought out to create Future Method Cleansing Solution --the first ever preparation product developed specifically for butt play and hygiene.

Get Your Pre-play Basics Down

As we discussed in our bottoming for beginners guide, there are some great simple steps to acquaint yourself with butt play. This includes familiarizing yourself with lube, solo play (preferably with a toy, not your fingers) and learning the unique sensations that those nerve endings excite as well as muscle control. This may take a while, but it's worth it! There's no better preparation than learning your own personal comfort and slowly increasing your capacity with butt plugs of incrementally larger size prior to engaging with a partner.

Types of Anal Preparation Products

There are a couple of methods to prepare to bottom:

Water and store-bought enemas: Water, followed by store-bought enemas, is the most common formula/liquid gay men (and those who enjoy butt play) use to prepare. Unfortunately, they're not as innocuous as you'd think.
There are essentially two types of cells in our anus. When we prepare, the lining (also known as the mucous membrane ) can be affected. These cells are hypersensitive, so when somebody prepares with water or store-bought enemas, for example, the ability for these protective cells to function is depleted. Water pulls out all of the cells' nutrients and store-bought enemas pull out all the water. Regardless of what is used, the end result is cell destruction.
This human-caused alteration also disrupts what is known as the microbiome in your butt, which affects the normal balance of the good bacteria and bad bacteria that resides there. As a result, there's a chance that micro-cuts and tears can happen, and with the absence of the protective layer, it can lead to a higher chance of contracting HIV and other STDs, and other significant complications.
Isotonic formula: The Future Method Cleansing Solution is truly the first of its kind on the market. It's the first scientifically-formulated, isotonic solution that gently – yet effectively – cleanses the butt to prepare for the heightened experience we all deserve. Isotonicity means that the formula allows for the free movement of solution across your cell membranes, without disrupting the cells in your butt and, therefore, only cleansing. We want you to be well prepared to bottom for any intimate moment.
Put another way: if we were to create a spectrum, water is on one end and a store-bought enema is on the other. We want to be right in the middle –exactly the same concentration as a cell, aka "isotonic". This is important, because we want our solution to do one thing: clean. We don't want to irritate a cell, disrupt a cell, and certainly not cause trauma. So if an isotonic solution comes into contact with a cell, it leaves the cell alone because there's no difference between the concentration of our solution and the concentration of the cell.

Not only is our solution isotonic, but we added a mild cleansing agent called Tego Solve, as well as licorice-root extract, called glycyrrhizic acid, which is known to be soothing.

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The 5 Steps of Preparing to Bottom

Knowing how to properly clean your anus will help maintain your bottom's microbiome. While you should never use harsh soap inside your anus, an isotonic solution and a gentle touch are best for rectum cleaning. The skin around your anus is extremely thin, making it important to keep best practices in order to prevent injury and infection. It's important to know how to properly clean using the following steps:

Use the bathroom to get rid of any possible poop present in your bowels.
Clean your Future Method bulb and tip with warm water and soap.
Assemble the bulb and tip, then draw the Future Method solution into the bulb (roughly half the pouch).
After applying lube to the bulb tip, slowly insert it into your rectum to complete rectum cleaning. The best position is to be on all fours. Gently squeeze the bulb, allowing all of the liquid to flow into your rectum.
Before releasing pressure from the bulb, remove both the bulb and tip, and then expel the solution from your rectum into the toilet. If desired, a second pouch may be used.

Is Preparing Before Bottoming Safe?

Yes, preparing is safe, assuming you avoid some common pitfalls and myths . When we think of preparation solutions, it's not only the liquid or formula that can cause problems, but also the mechanics of how it's delivered into the butt.

Over preparation is a big problem in the butt community because we have all been trained to think that more is better.

Bottoming preparation risks to avoid

Over-preparation: Cleaning too deep, with too much force, or with too much water (either all at once or through too many applications) can cause long-lasting problems, including irritation of the region. When you prepare with other, larger bulbs in the market and insert 7+ fluid ounces in one squeeze, the liquid ends up going too far beyond the rectum, into the sigmoid colon above, where poop is stored. This can actually make the situation even messier than if you hadn't prepared at all.

Over preparation is a big problem in the butt community because we have all been trained to think that more is better. But when it comes to preparation, less is actually more. The more liquid you insert into your butt (and the more times you do it), the more trauma that occurs. Regardless of the trauma, most people are uneducated on the actual anatomy of butt intimacy. For routine intimacy of this kind, your finger / toy / partner(s) aren't going as deep as you think. In order to better understand why less is more, we must first understand the location of our poop and bowels in relation to where in the butt engagement actually takes place. Most shower hoses are actually too long and end up way higher inside your colon. This is no-no #1.

Then, once inserted, you turn on the faucet. Unfortunately, most shower hoses do not have any way to regulate water pressure. Now, all that high-pressure water creates a balloon effect, distending the rectum, washing away all the good things, and then shooting that water way up into the colon–much further than anyone will ever go during routine butt intimacy. You may ask yourself: what's so bad about this? Well, the colon is where poop is stored. So the more you flush, the more poop you'll dislodge, the longer it'll take for things to "run clear". This is no-no #2.
Enema Dependency: Enema dependency is a potentially serious consequence of over-use. I see it time and time again from the aforementioned over-preparation. I even know some people who use the shower hose to poop normally–not just when they're preparing to bottom. By doing this, the inner muscles of the rectum not only get distended beyond their capacity, but also, over time, they lose their ability to recoil. We need those muscles to effectively go to the bathroom and keep everything in its rightful place. Without these muscles to help, people can lose that imperative reflex, causing significant constipation and/or–the most catastrophic–what's called rectal prolapse. In order to go to the bathroom, in this over-use scenario, you have to create so much force that your insides are literally pushed out. It isn't pretty and can lead to a surgical emergency. The good news is that these variables are compounding and with proper education surrounding preparation, we can hopefully avoid these detrimental effects.
Shower Hoses and Water Pressure: When using a shower hose, you're forced to constantly insert and remove the nozzle in order to expel the water and release the balloon-like pressure. During this repetitive action of fill up, rinse, and release, the trauma is compounded. Over and over again, I see people who practice this type of preparation, some of whom are doing it for over 45 minutes, several times a week. Do we now see how bad this is? And, quite frankly, how unnecessary it is?

Unfortunately, no one taught us any better, until now. The goal for Future Method is to educate people on the science of intimacy. We are here to analyze everyone's intimacy practices and come up with solutions rooted in science. We want you feeling as awesome and as clean as you want, but to achieve these end results in a safe and simple way.

How to Clean Your Bulb

Cleaning your preparation bulb is actually a fairly simple process:

Separate the tip from the bulb itself.
Wash both the tip and the bulb with warm water and soap.
Dry them both before putting them away.
Please remember to store them in a clean, cool, and dry place in between uses.

Bottom-Friendly Diet Tips

What most people don't realize is that being ready to bottom at the drop of your pants actually starts with your diet. If you maintain a healthy diet full of fiber (either natural or through fiber supplementation), preparation should only take a few minutes (and for a lucky few, not necessary at all).

Why fiber? Think back to the last time you saw a dog poop. Have you ever seen them use toilet paper? No! This is because their food is naturally super high in fiber, which causes their stool to bulk together in one smooth, bulky mass.

While it's hard for most of us to naturally incorporate enough fiber into our diet (through fresh fruits, vegetables, leafy greens, whole grains, and unprocessed bran), adding supplements is a great alternative. Most of us are probably familiar with drugstore brands like Metamucil, Citrucel, and Colon Cleanse Daily Fiber, which all come in pill and/or powder form. Another option is designer fiber, like Pure for Men , which was specifically designed for those who enjoy bottoming.

If going the supplement route, you'll need a lot of patience while you find the right timing and dosage of fiber to ensure maximum cleanliness for your body. I always recommend taking your fiber before bed since this allows absorption and optimization to occur while you're sleeping and then going to the toilet when you wake up in the morning.

About the author

Dr. Evan Goldstein is the Co-Founder of Future Method and the Founder and CEO of Bespoke Surgical, the leading private practice in health and wellness for gay men. He received his MD from the University of Medicine and Dentistry School of Osteopathic Medicine. Dr. Goldstein is the go-to butt and bottoming expert, having been published in Huffington Post, Men's Health, Healthline, and more. Learn about Dr. Goldstein by visiting his practice, bespokesurgical.com.

The views expressed in this article intend to highlight alternative studies and induce conversation. They are the views of the author and do not necessarily represent the views of Future Method, and are for informational purposes only, even if and to the extent that this article features the advice of physicians and medical practitioners. This article is not, nor is it intended to be, a substitute for professional medical advice, diagnosis, or treatment, and should never be relied upon for specific medical advice.

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