When you purchase through links on our web site , we may earn an affiliate commission . Here ’s how it works .

If you get the impulse to pee when you ’re nervous , you ’re not alone .

It ’s vulgar to sense the need to nullify your bladder when you ’re feeling tense , said Dr. Tom Chi , an associate prof of urogenital medicine at the University of California , San Francisco .

Life’s Little Mysteries

This woman is probably wondering where she can find a bathroom.

" When in doubt , just do what your body says , and go to the can — you ’ll in all probability be hunky-dory , " Chi tell Live Science . [ Why Does Asparagus Make Your Pee Smell Funny ? ]

In a distinctive situation , when you ’re not feeling skittish or anxious , the bladder is unwind as it fills withurine from the kidney . In contrast , the vesica ’s external sphincter muscle is tightly unsympathetic to make certain that urine does n’t leak out , Chi said .

A healthy vesica can holdup to 2 cups(16 fluid ounces ) of weewee . Once the mesomorphic sack is full , " the vesica transport a signal through the prickle up to the head that says , ' OK , I ’m full ; I get to go , ' " Chi said . Once this signal is received and the individual is ready , the vesica contracts , and the external sphincter muscle relaxes , letting a flow of pee flow .

Nervous woman

This woman is probably wondering where she can find a bathroom.

Doctors are n’t entirely certain why people be given feel the call of nature during time of anxiety , mostly because the need to piss is ensure by many factors , including the nerves along the spinal corduroy , the brain and your emotion . But research worker have two practiced guesses for why this phenomenon happens , Chi said .

One idea is that when you ’re anxious or uneasy , your consistence goes intofight - or - flight mode . This tense , adrenaline - occupy response may shake up the need to relieve yourself . The fight - or - flight of stairs reaction may also increase the kidney ' output of water , Chi said .

The reasons linking this reception to the need to void are n’t fully understood . But it ’s thought that " under stress , the [ central nervous ] system is activate to manoeuver at a high storey of sensitiveness , imply that it takes less to activate the unconditioned reflex , " Dr. Alan Wein , a prof of urogenital medicine at Penn Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania , tell Live Science .

Woman clutching her head in anguish.

The other idea is that when you ’re nervous , your muscles tense up , " and one of those heftiness may be the vesica , " Chi said . " When that happens , it makesyou want to pee . "

If you ’re nervous and feel the need to relieve oneself but you do n’t have easy access to a bathroom , Chi recommended distracting yourself or doing speculation exercises to relax your mind and brawn .

Original clause onLive scientific discipline .

Shot of a cheerful young man holding his son and ticking him while being seated on a couch at home.

Three-dimensional renderings of urinals. From left to right: Duchamp’s “La Fontaine,” a contemporary commercial model, Cornucopia, and Nautilus.

a woman with insomnia sits in bed

a photograph of an astronaut during a spacewalk

a woman yawns at her desk

a person holds a GLP-1 injector

an illustration of a group of sperm

an MRI scan of a brain

Pile of whole cucumbers

An illustration of a hand that transforms into a strand of DNA

X-ray image of the man�s neck and skull with a white and a black arrow pointing to areas of trapped air underneath the skin of his neck

An image comparing the relative sizes of our solar system�s known dwarf planets, including the newly discovered 2017 OF201

an illustration showing a large disk of material around a star

A man with light skin and dark hair and beard leans back in a wooden boat, rowing with oars into the sea

A photograph of two of Colossal�s genetically engineered wolves as pups.

A still from the movie “The Martian”, showing an astronaut on the surface of Mars