Urine therapy

I thought I was going to keep my cool with this topic but I can't. URINE THERAPY. Does anyone know anything about this?

The extent of my knowledge until yesterday's internet research was this: I hung out with a guy in New York who once told me that peeing on wounds helps them heal faster. I immediately chalked this up to his being from Oregon and decided that this was just a typical thing that he'd say since he also ran a car on veggie oil and loved the smell of his own armpits. I, by the way, think my pits are rank but would love a veggie car. Or electric, thank you.

I forgot all about the said healing properties of urine until yesterday when I read online about urinary tract infections in dogs. Patsy has either randomly decided to get super interested in tree trunks and marking her territory or something is going on with her peehole because she's been crouching in the grass about ten times longer than usual and nothing is coming out. She's also been waking me up in the morning by touching her nose to mine and whining, totally uncool and not normally tolerated behavior except now I think she might have a UTI so I get up to take her out. As one who has suffered a hundred UTIs, I sympathize.

Normally, we take Patsy to the vet right away but I'm being cautious because she just finished a bottle of antibiotics that she was on for three weeks. She had a yeast infection IN HER ROLLS OF BELLY FAT. YES. She also had "yeasties", as the vets like to call them, in her ears and paws. She was basically an adorable walking yeast infection. Merrick told me that yogurt helps prevent infections in dogs and I searched more online and learned the benefits of apple cider vinegar AFTER I got caught in the urine therapy wormhole.

It was not good.

I found myself making my way down a thread of messages by people discussing the ways that they use their urine: they drink it, they use it as mouthwash, they rub it all over their face with a cotton ball every morning. I was horrified but also drawn in and conflicted. So many of the people taking part in the conversation were afraid to tell anyone in their lives that they were using their urine therapeutically. They were thrilled with the results but ashamed by the method so were living - and thriving! - silently with the secret. The problem for me was also that most of them were using the urine to clear up their complexions, something that is very much pissing me off right now.

My skin has been going from okay to bad to worse and since we moved has taken on new characteristics. Besides my regular monthly breakout around my chin and jawline, I have a rash of zits on my neck and around my ears that doesn't go away. My forehead is bumpy, worse in some places than others. The skin around my mouth is constantly erupting. I've tried lots and lots of products and usually I deal okay with this vexing adult acne because I have perspective on what is truly important in my life and the means to buy fancy foundation. The day however, that I wore a surgical cap and slopped LUSH henna on my hair for seven hours, I had a good think. I am now of the age where I have a lot of gray hair AND teenager skin. It may be unjust but I'm sure it's not unheard of. It's just really annoying. At some point I will let all my gray hairs grow long and I will discover the reason my skin is so angry and then what? I'll find something else to be perturbed with.

In the meantime, all these people are having amazing success with their urine face rubs. They say morning pee is the best. The skin problems that have plagued them for years have all but disappeared. "It's sterile!" they say, "It's clean!!" One woman said that when she's home she always has pee on her face; she only washes it off when she leaves the house. "And does she wonder why she's not in a relationship?" I ask Matthew, not kindly.

I'm being cagey and unkind because a part of me would pee on a cotton ball in a heartbeat if I thought it would really help but I'm not comfortable with that. The other part of me would die of embarrassment at the thought of urine therapy and would never consider about it much less write about it.