What does defecating mean?
"Defecating" is the present participle and gerund of the verb "defecate", meaning to discharge faeces from the bowels — the normal, physiological act of passing solid bodily waste. The word belongs to formal register: it is the standard term in medicine, veterinary science, and public health, appearing in phrases such as "the patient reports difficulty defecating" or the hygiene term "open defecation". Because the subject is delicate, everyday speech tends to favour euphemism — people say they are going to the toilet rather than that they are defecating — so using the word directly can strike listeners as blunt or overly clinical. Etymologically it descends from Latin defaecare, 'to purify by removing dregs', which is why older scientific texts use "defecate" for refining substances like sugar. Its noun form is "defecation", and its adjective relative is "fecal", both from the same Latin root faex, 'dregs'.
verb (present participle and gerund of "defecate")Present participle and gerund of "defecate": to discharge waste matter (faeces) from the bowels.
- (of a person or animal) to discharge faeces from the bowels; to pass solid bodily waste.
"The doctor asked how frequently the patient had been defecating over the past week."
"Health workers taught villagers to build latrines to stop people from defecating in the open fields."
"A change in diet can alter how often a cat defecates."
Before it meant anything scatological, "defecate" meant to purify — it comes from Latin defaecare, literally 'to clear away dregs', so chemists once spoke of 'defecating' sugar and wine.
Reviewed by Deb Chak, Editor. AI-assisted content curated by RJS Tech Solutions LLP.
Etymology of defecating
English "defecate" derives from Latin defaecare, formed from de- ('away, off') plus faex, faecis ('dregs, sediment'), so its original sense was 'to purge or purify by removing impurities'. From the early modern period onward it was used of clarifying liquids such as wine, and of refining sugar. By the seventeenth century the word had also come to mean evacuating the bowels, an extension based on ridding the body of waste matter, and this physiological sense has become the dominant one today. It shares its Latin root with "faeces" (and "fecal") and "feculent".
Related word forms
How defecating is actually used
"Defecate" is a formal, clinical term used in medical, scientific, and public-health contexts. In everyday conversation English speakers overwhelmingly prefer euphemisms such as "go to the toilet", "have a bowel movement", or cruder informal equivalents. The gerund form "defecating" appears most often in medical notes, veterinary writing, and hygiene campaigns (e.g. "open defecation").
Easily confused with defecating
"Dedicating" means devoting something to a purpose or person, while "defecating" means discharging waste from the bowels — they differ by a single consonant but are entirely unrelated.