robbin - i have a very similiar story to yours and most of my life i paid no attention to my bowel habits: now they more or less run my life, in the mornings, anyway. i have "retrained" my body to "go" in the mornings, after hot liquids and a thousand cigarettes (not that i am advocating smoking, mind you) and apart from trying to eat a high in soluble fiber diet (cooked greens, prunes etc) the only fiber i take is Fiber Delights (inulan fiber, see other post on this forum) and/or FiberChoice (fructan) found at any drugstore. various specialists have told me, and i believe it to be true, that the body can be "overdosed" with insoluble fiber and most definitly with laxatives. hence, i try to make food my medecine but sometimes the body takes time to adjust and then it gets used to things and needs change. i personally have a hard time with insoluble fibers (bran, pysllium, etc) so i tend to avoid them. now, i am going to get a little bit gross and detailed here, hope that's ok: i also feel that stuffy feeling in rectum, very often in late afternoon, early evening, and if i am home i take a fingercot (latex finger cover) and get into the shower and go up there myself and pull it out. these are tiny little pellets and snakes and balls of stool that cannot get evacuated for some reason. since i always have a handheld shower wherever i live, i rinse myself out and that's the end of that, feel much better afterwards. if i am not at home, i wait until i get home and then do it before bedtime or something. most of the time, if i make something hot to drink and sit around and relax, the urge to go and actual evacuation will occur. my boyfriend, who is one of those folk who just go when they go and that's all, laughs at me but is very understanding. hope any of this helps!