"relieve oneself" is a correct and usable phrase in written English.
It is a polite way of saying "urinate" or "defecate". Generally, it is used more in formal contexts, such as in medical articles or reports. For example, "The patient was instructed how to properly relieve themselves in the bathroom."
"To begin with, one needs to understand," he says, "but I think the final project is to relieve oneself of the need for self-knowledge.
Brickner said that as the body pumped more and more blood to its vital organs to protect them, the kidneys could feel as if they were over-hydrated — thus sending out the urge to constantly, if not immediately, relieve oneself.
Jessica Lynch or its vilification of enlisted grunts in the Abu Ghraib torture debacle, Mr. Wright's portrait is nuanced and grounded in details often overlooked in daily journalistic accounts, like the desperate search for places to relieve oneself during battle.
How can anything really significant and meaningful be conveyed in less time than it takes to relieve oneself?
However, what's more distracting than sitting at a desk, squirming left and right, desperate to relieve oneself.
A few may put on makeup or frantically try to get a stain out of their shirt, but really, the most common goal is to relieve oneself.
"I'm walking past people who are sick in the streets," said Tony Hall, a city supervisor who suggested the ban on sleeping and relieving oneself in public (which require that the city double its shelter beds, to 3,500, and open about 100 public toilets).
Not long ago many Italian cities had public urinals/washrooms; these facilities have gradually disappeared while penalties for relieving oneself in public have become harsher (as regards the US, compare with Waldron, 2000, pp. 383-384).
I have received loads of interesting questions about this performance, the most practical being, "Won't you get hungry?" and "Won't you have to go to the bathroom?" It would seem that sitting for 8 hours without eating or relieving oneself would be a recipe for torture, but thankfully, it's not.
Using a latrine for women was much more than relieving oneself: it involved security, intimacy and health concerns.
For some, relieving oneself means going behind a bush, or up the hill or jumping into a gully.
