Clogged Toilets Are No Fun

Let me say, once again, I'm sorry for not posting on the regular this week. A clogged toilet has really messed up my life the past few days! I spent several hours on Saturday, and all evening Monday and Tuesday working on this stupid toilet. Why do plumbers have to be so expensive?!?


If you have been reading awhile, you will know that I live alone. Well, not with any other human beings. I have 2 cats, 2 turtles, and a dog. So you would think that it might be hard to get a pill bottle accidentally flushed down the toilet. Well not in my world! 

It all started Friday night. Of course I stopped by the local bar and had a few drinks - it was Friday. I was by NO means drunk. I came home, and in typical Friday night fashion, I went upstairs and changed into my sweats. I also went pee. After I peed I stood up and hit my head on the cabinet above my toilet. This cabinet is strange. It has a pull down door - something similar to this:

Source

But the door is the bottom shelf. I have no idea why I didn't take a picture of mine, but I didn't, so this is what you get.

Well, I open this door each morning, and put all of the stuff I will use throughout the day on this door. Then when I'm done, I put everything away (this way I KNOW I put on deodorant). I have 2 prescriptions I take at bedtime, so they sit on this ledge until I take them and go to bed. Long story short, this door was open and for some reason I hit my head on it (because I swear, I use the toilet all the time with the cabinet door open and don't hit my head). 

No big deal right? You would tell me to just pick my stuff out of the toilet and move on (although it would have to be thoroughly disinfected). Well, I'm what you would call a "lazy flusher" when I'm in my own house. As I stand, I put my arm around my back and flush the toilet (bet you didn't know you were going to learn all about how I operate a toilet today huh?). So the toilet was already flushing when my head hit the cabinet and everything started to fall. And yes, everything fell from all of the shelves, not just the two prescriptions that were on the door. 

After catching everything and stuffing it back on the shelf I did a quick inventory and immediately got that sinking feeling in my stomach. One of the prescriptions was missing. I looked down at the toilet and there was nothing in there - and the toilet had flushed just fine. First thing I think is the warning "don't flush extra pills down the toilet" and think somewhere someone is going to read my name and address on this bottle and come lock me up for flushing pills. And then I thought, "Well there is really nothing I can do about it now!" I continued my night, and went pee before I went to bed, only to discover the toilet wouldn't flush. I frantically plunged over and over and prevented the toilet from overflowing, and went to bed thinking I was in trouble.

On Saturday morning, I called my coworker who once owned a construction company, and knows how to fix almost everything in a house. He came over and we did some investigations. Yes, there was something stuck in the toilet, and no we couldn't get to it. Upon further investigation, he informed me the "guts" of my toilet were crap and needed replaced (which didn't surprise me, since I have had issues with this toilet since I moved in 5 years ago.) He said we couldn't do anything until we went to the Home Improvement store and bought all of the stuff we needed. After about 2 hours of messing with the toilet I told him I would take him to the bar and buy him a few drinks, so that's what we did. 

Since I had water everywhere in my bathroom after that 2 hours, I had every "garage/dog" towel I owned upstairs, and stacked them on top of the toilet so I would remember not to use it. Monday after work the coworker and I headed to Lowe's and spent about $30 bucks on replacement parts. And then we started working on it and realized we forgot something. So it was back to Lowe's, another $4 and out of time for the night (I guess he likes to go home and see his family, and not work on my toilet until 10PM at night). 

Tuesday it was on. As soon as we got home, we went to work - with all of the parts we needed. My master bath is very small, so pretty much he did everything, while I ran around the house getting anything he requested (rubber gloves, more towels, a plastic cup, a beer, you get the idea). I did take some good pictures though. 

I had no idea the tank could come off the back of the toilet. 

I could not believe how nasty it was under the toilet. I mean I knew it would be gross, but the grime that had built up was ridiculous. I went in and scrubbed before I would let him put anything back together. And the point of removing the toilet, was to put a snake up it and try to get the pill bottle out.

It took some serious effort, and eventually some pliers, but we got it out. 

That thing was WEDGED in there. 

After the fact, he said we did the right thing. Apparently that bottle being so awkwardly shaped (have you ever gotten a prescription from Target?) would have NEVER gone down if we had just tried to snake it from the bowl. And then we would have caused much bigger issues. It's been an interesting few days (I actually learned a lot about toilets), but I'm glad that is behind me! I have 3 other bathrooms in the house, but not having this toilet was a huge pain. I use that master bath more than I realized! Now I hope I never have to do something like this to the other 3 toilets.

In other news, I've tried 2 new healthy recipes that turned out great, and I can't wait to share them with you. I also have my spring goals, but I felt it more important to tell my extreme toilet story today. I plan to have posts up the rest of the week so stop back soon. Have you ever accidentally flushed something you shouldn't have??