This Is Why You Feel Cold After Pooping

While pooping isn’t the most popular cocktail-party conversation topic, it’s normal to have questions about your bathroom habits. Case in point: poop shivers.

Feeling cold during or after pooping is a strange sensation, but it’s not usually a cause for concern.

We spoke to Niket Sonpal, MD, a New York–based internist and gastroenterologist, to get the inside scoop on poop shivers — from what causes them to how to make them less likely.

Why Do You Feel Cold During or After a Poop?

“When you have a bowel movement, you are stimulating the vagus nerve,” Dr. Sonpal says. The longest cranial nerve in the body, the vagus nerve extends from the brainstem to the rectum. And if you tense your abdominal muscles or strain a little to push out poop, this can stimulate the vagus nerve, according to Harvard Health Publishing.

The vagus nerve plays a pivotal role in your parasympathetic nervous system and helps regulate bodily functions like breathing, digestion, blood pressure, and heart rate, according to the Cleveland Clinic. When it’s stimulated, your blood pressure and your heart rate can drop, Sonpal says. This combination can cause you to feel cold and experience poop shivers. It can also make you feel momentarily lightheaded and weak.

Are Poop Shivers Harmful?

If you’re feeling chilly after a bowel movement, you might be concerned that something’s wrong, but poop shivers are not uncommon and are harmless.

“It may not happen with every bowel movement, but it is normal,” Sonpal says. Bigger poops — which are more likely to involve stimulating the vagus nerve — will make you more prone to poop shivers.

However, if you feel faint after a bowel movement and it doesn’t resolve within a few minutes, you should speak with your doctor, Sonpal says. Dizzy spells can be a sign of an underlying health issue.

Can You Prevent Poop Shivers?

Maybe. “Usually when you have a very large bowel movement, or if you’re straining a lot, the stimulation [of the vagus nerve] is the greatest,” Sonpal says.

Because your diet has a lot to do with the size and frequency of your stool, hypothetically, what you put on your plate can potentially prevent poop shivers.

For example, if you eat enough fiber-containing foods (like fruits, veggies, and whole grains) and gut-friendly probiotics (like yogurt, kombucha, and sauerkraut), you’ll likely poop more easily and more frequently, Sonpal says. You’re also less likely to bear down during bowel movements, which, in turn, results in less stimulation of the vagus nerve.