To take, to have or to give…Which one is the appropriate one? Are any of them?

I hope that I am not lowering the tone here…but I most probably am. So please excuse me.

When one uses the colloquial expression ‘I am going to take a leak’ why is it that one says ‘take’? After all, one is in fact not taking it anywhere…if anything one is getting rid of it. Letting it go, releasing it…

The same thing can be said for several other bodily functions, which I do not intend to list here, as that really would be lowering the tone. But I am sure that you can imagine what expressions that I have in mind. Other bodily functions which one says that one ‘takes’.

Mused by Probable not-24-any-more Sushi