Little Sherri

I have another diaper dream to enter into the annals: My wife and I were on vacation somewhere tropical, and a cruise ship was in port, and somehow, we got invited onto the cruise ship for a tour. We walked around the ship - it was quite lavish, almost baroque. I recall taking a moment to wet my diaper while we paused to view a Titanic-esque dining area replete with giant chandeliers. Then we got invited to use one of the pools, and we were given a quasi-public space to change in, it seemed like a coat check room, or something like that. Magically, I now had my bathing suit with me, and I stripped off my clothes and put on the swimsuit. I distinctly recall carefully un-taping one side of my diaper, sliding it down, and then folding the tabs in on their nonstick parking spots so that I could reuse the diaper later. I recall noting that it was now wet, and not looking forward to putting it back on, but, I didn't have any other options. I somewhat awkwardly tucked the diaper under my clothes and left them on the floor in a corner, and then we went down to the pool. The diaper was an unidentified white plastic one with tapes - if I had to say what it was, I would go with a MegaMax or a BeDry. We were sitting around the pool when we suddenly realized that the ship was moving, so I went over to a crew member and asked what was going on. He said that it was too windy to stay close to shore, so they were headed out to sea. I said, so, are you docking anywhere else around here? And he said, no, we'll be at sea at least for a day or two before our next port of call. I panicked - we were leaving our hotel room, bags, everything behind, we didn't have a room on the ship, and, I only had ONE already-wet diaper with me. The conclusion was that we were going to be allowed to sleep in that coat check room - kind of them - but that I was going to have to go down to the shopping area on the ship and see if anyone sold anything approaching diapers. I recall thinking, but deciding not to say out loud to my wife, that I might have to buy the largest baby diapers they sold, and then use them as stuffers, and wear the diaper I had on for the next 48 hours or so, and thinking that I should be careful with the tapes. And that buying diapers in a cruise ship gift shop was going to be expensive, if they even had them. (In real life I know that giant cruise ships have expansive [and expensive] shopping areas and would at least carry baby diapers, and probably also adult pull-ups, but in my dream I was thinking I'd be looking for a dusty old bag of Pampers parked next to the sunblock on a small shelf in a store that primarily sold t-shirts). I was very distressed about being on a cruise with one outfit and one diaper and only a coat closet for accommodations, and that's when I woke up to find myself very happy to be in my own bed - and, in a wet diaper (a BeDry Night - still in it). I had evidently peed during the dream.

The soft, loving relationships in your stories are relaxing. My characters are always so at odds with each other!

Welcome, @FulcrumDaddy29 - there are a lot of great people here. I'm also a bit of an aviation nerd! It must be interesting working all over Europe. I live in the middle of North America, more or less. It's not entirely monocultural over here - we have Quebec ~ 5 hours away, and parts of the US have some notable cultural differences from where I am in South central Canada, but, the language and cultural differences you can traipse through within a few hours in Europe are incredible, whereas I could drive for 48 hour straight, and still be speaking the same language and using the same currency.

Yeah, I didn't last more than 30 minutes, sitting on the bed watching a TV show. My younger daughter joined us as well, and I was just too uncomfortable. Slightly, in the physical sense, more so, psychologically. And then I needed to go #2 again, and that was it - I wasn't going to do it in my Pampers; the first time around had been a legitimate accident. Coming back for a kill shot would have been gratuitous. (Funny note, "kill shot" autocorrected to "kill shit" the first time.) Not to say that I "lost control", but more that I ignored a slightly dodgy signal, because I had plastic disposable underpants on, so I took a risk I otherwise would not have taken, and was punished accordingly. So I opened my drawer, grabbed another Lil' Splash, went into the bathroom, and took a shower. If my wife noticed that I'd changed myself twice in two hours, she didn't say anything. Now I'm clean and dry and comfy and can relax and watch a show.

Thanks everyone for your comments. I have hit a point a couple of times where I could try and wrap this up quickly, but I like the characters and the potential in Zack's predicament, so I am compelled to keep telling the story. So thank you for your patience!

Well, I have another "first" to relate today, and a near-first... I got home from staying over at a buddy's place and eating a lot of crazy food last night, for a birthday celebration, and then I stopped off on the way home to visit another buddy who is going through some stuff at work, and we ended up going to a pub and having a couple of pints. I had been in my diaper - a Rearz Essential - for about 15 hours at that point, although 8 to 9 of those where while I was asleep and I only barely wet before I got up. Still, it had been a long shift for the Essential, so I stopped peeing for the last half hour at the bar, rather than doing a daytime standing diaper change in a public washroom. I drove home... got out of the car.. and ran into my wife and daughter on the driveway, who wanted to show me what they were teaching the dog. I said "I just need to run inside, give me one second..." but then my wife handed me the dog's leash and went off to try and show me how he comes when called, and she kept asking me to make him sit, "no... closer to you... no, wait until he's paying attention..." and then I just lost it and peed in my diaper. And I peed through my diaper and it ran down the inside of the leg of my jeans. It didn't make it to my shoes, but the inside of my right leg was very clearly wet. My wife said "Oh." I said "Yeah.... take the dog." Then I walked inside and threw my jeans in the wash and walked upstairs in my soggy diaper and got changed. THEN I came back down in other jeans, and we went to take the dog for a walk around the block. Midway through the walk, I felt like I had to fart, so I did... and, I pooped my diaper. Very slightly. Not a catastrophic blow-out, but still... I don't usually do that. We finished the walk and I just came into the garage to package up the garbage and to type this. Now, I'm trying to figure out if I should just toss the new diaper (A Rearz Lil' Splash), even though it's mostly dry, or if, because "the incident" amounts to very little, as far as I can tell... I should just ride it out until I'm getting ready for bed. I can't detect any odor about me other than baby powder - it's a small nugget in a big plastic diaper... but I'm also physically slightly uncomfortable, and existentially, even more so. My wife wants to watch a show. Do I sit on my bed in an even-mildly shat-in diaper and try to get away with it for a couple of hours, or do I change yet again within two hours... those of you in diapers whose spouses know about it, do you ever just hang around in a pooped diaper, or does that call for an immediate change...? My first instinct is to go change it, although I suspect she'll wonder what is going on, because I just changed a short while ago after peeing my pants on the driveway. She'll think I'm falling apart.

Chapter 62 – Small World [8:35 PM] Zack looked around from inside the black vinyl and plexiglass cave that was the backseat of the police SUV. Driving through the city in the back of a police car had felt weird; he felt as if people were looking at him and wondering what he’d done to end up in the back of a police car, on a Friday night, even though the glass was tinted, and logically, he knew the people glancing at the cruiser as they rolled past, could not see him. It was interesting to note him to note that the roads seemed to open up in front of them, even though they didn’t have any lights or sirens on. No, by all means, after you, Mrs. Cop, thank you for not pulling me over… Zack’s eyes widened as the SUV made a right turn up a short driveway, and then through a gate that opened automatically as they approached it. They were going into the back parking lot of a large police station. There were US, state, and city flags arrayed on tall poles in front of the building, and the surroundings were brightly lit. There was a parking area behind the building, surrounded by heavy, black fencing, that they pulled into. There seemed to be dozens of police cars parked side by side, all backed into their spots, looking ready to go. Many of them were the same SUV that they rolled up in, while others were cars, and a few were large pickup trucks. Zack had never seen so many emergency vehicles in one place. Officer Riley backed into an empty spot close to the building, which was a vast expanse of grey concrete, interrupted by black glass windows that you couldn’t look in through. She got out and opened Zack’s door, then went around behind the SUV and opened the hatch, before returning with the damaged scooter, and then extending a hand to Zack so that he could slide down off of the tall bench seat and put his injured leg on the cushion. Officer Riley let him wheel himself out of the way of the door, then said “Wait for me Zack, sometimes people zip out of this lot pretty quickly, don’t go out into the driveway without me.” She took his left hand in hers, and did a careful sweep of the lot, before leading him at a relaxed pace towards a set of glass and metal double doors. Other officers were streaming both past them, into the building, and out of the building towards them. Some of the officers nodded or said hello to the lady he was with, while many of them swept him quickly with their eyes. Zack again felt self-conscious about wearing the lightweight, damaged romper over a bulky, crinkly diaper, in front of the phalanx of young, serious men and women who were crisscrossing the lot in all directions. He felt like a toddler being led through a college campus, and he pinned his eyes on the ground in front of him and shrank in closer to the officer he was following, as much as the contraption he was straddling would allow. Officer Riley gave Zack’s hand a reassuring squeeze. “It’s okay, buddy, you’re not in trouble. We just need to figure out what’s going on with you…” She was interrupted by her radio cracking to life. “Twenty eighty-two, do you still require EMS to attend?” The officer stopped walking, and turned to examine Zack, who kept his eyes focused downward, as though there was something terribly interesting about the handlebars of his scooter. “Adam, I’m just going to run my hands over your arms and legs and back – tell me if anything hurts. Are your only injuries your knee and your hands, outside of your cast?” Zack nodded as the officer did a gentle sweep of both his arms, and then each of his legs, bending over to allow her to manipulate his ankles. Finally, she swept a hand down his back, immediately noting the plasticky smoothness of his underclothes, which commenced halfway between his shoulders and his waist. She did not let on that she’d noticed anything. “Did that hurt at all?” “Nope,” Zack whispered, as more officers filed past them on their way in or out of the busy building. She felt my diaper. She knows. “Well, I think we can tidy that knee up with a first aid kit for now, so maybe we’ll save ourselves the wait for a paramedic.” She picked up the radio. “Twenty eighty-two, negative, no need for EMS to attend.” “Roger, twenty eighty-two, social services is waiting for you in the front reception area.” The officer’s eyebrows went up. “Well, Adam, tonight is your lucky night; I thought we were going to spend a couple of hours twiddling our thumbs and getting to know each other before social services got here. Do you know what social services does?” Zack shook his head. “Let’s get inside and I’ll tell you.” Zack allowed himself to be led by Officer Riley through the black-tinted doors, and into a small lobby with a desk built into one side, behind which stood another police officer. An officer who guards the officers, Zack thought. Officer Riley spoke to the officer behind the desk, then wrote in a binder for a moment, and then there was a buzzing behind them, and another glass door, this one clear, unlatched and swung robotically open. Zack followed officer Riley through a maze of brightly lit, busy hallways, until they entered a room through a tan-coloured doorway marked “Interview 4.” Inside the room, there was a round table with a half dozen chairs around it, and then a sideboard with pads of paper and pens on it. She led Zack over to a chair and then pulled it out so that it would be easier for him to sit down on it. She held his hand as he shifted his weight off the scooter and pivoted to sit on the chair, then she rolled the scooter to the side. “I’m going to go find the social worker, and a first aid kit. I’ll be right back. If anyone asks you who you’re with in the meantime, what you going to say?” Zack squinted for a moment, then whispered “Officer Riley.” “Correct! And hopefully by the end of this conversation, I’ll know who I’m with, too! Don’t try and go anywhere – you need a card to swipe out of this place. I’m not going to lock you in here, but, you won’t get past the end of the hall if you decide to go exploring. Zack looked across the room at his banged-up scooter, which he would first have to hobble over to, without crutches or a hand from someone. “I won’t go anywhere,” he said in a low voice, and then he yawned, partly out of fatigue, and partly out of stress. “Do you want a drink, Adam?” Zack nodded, and then the officer left the room. Zack rotated his chair slowly and carefully, so that he faced into the dark, woodgrain plastic table, and then he put his head down on his arms and closed his eyes. _________ The door opened with a loud mechanical sound, startling Zack, who jerked his head up off his arms and looked around. I fell asleep. Officer Riley walked back through the heavy door, one which, Zack noted, could be locked from the outside but not from the inside. Beside her was another woman, slightly older, probably about Kelly’s age, he judged. She was dressed in jeans and a sage green woolen sweater, and she had a light complexion, curly brown hair that fell to just above her shoulders, and she was wearing red framed glasses. Behind the lenses were brown eyes that appeared to be kind. The new lady stooped over slightly and put her hands on her thighs, before extending her right hand to Zack across the fake wood of the table. “Hi, Adam, I’m Mrs. Katrina. I work with Social Services.” Zack nodded. “Hi, Mrs. Katrina.” She has the mannerisms of a teacher. Officer Riley closed the door behind them, and gestured to a chair, which Mrs. Katrina sat down in. The police officer remained standing, as she put a bottle of orange juice down in front of Zack. She seemed to want to loom over the table a bit, and she had a serious look on her face, but then she cracked a joke. “Someone is going to be searching for the thief that stole that juice from their lunch…” she said, and then she smiled slightly. Zack looked at the two women, and swallowed. He wasn’t sure what to say. As though reading his mind, Mrs. Katrina started. “Adam, I want you to know that you’re not in trouble, at least as far as we know right now. This is a police station, and Officer Riley is a police officer, but, you haven’t done anything that we know about that would put you on the wrong side of the law. Although, you should know that, under certain circumstances, it can be a violation of the law to give false information to a police officer. Information such as who you are, or where you live, for example, or, what you’re doing out on the streets late at night.” Zack’s face blanched and his eyes widened. “So,” she continued, “are you ready to tell us who you are?” Zack slid his eyes between the two ladies’ faces, and then down to the mustard-brown graining of the table. Even despite being in the presence of an armed police officer, and now, a lady from… Social Services? Whatever that is… Zack still felt that revealing anything that would result in him being whisked back to the hospital, and back to Kelly, would be a mistake. He was willing to take his chances with the law. He had never been in any trouble, but he knew people, distantly, who had, such as a kid named Karl in the eighth grade who had let off fireworks in one of the washrooms, resulting in an evacuation of the school in the middle of the day. Even that guy had been back at home and back on social media within a few hours of leaving in the back of a police car, although he’d been off school for a couple of weeks, which always struck Zack as a strange punishment to administer. He’d set off fireworks in the bathroom to get out of school. Mission accomplished. Zack shook his head, but then realized it probably looked like he was declining to cooperate, so instead, he started nodding vigorously. “My, uh, name is Adam Cooper, and I’m from Olympia. Two-one-two-three Woodhaven Street. Well, I thought that was the number, but I might be wrong about that. We just moved.” The police officer leaned forward to address the social worker. “He said that he recently moved here. From Canada. Somewhere in Canada… he’s not sure exactly where.” Mrs. Katrina furrowed her brow. “Well, Adam, I’m a bit confounded, because you sound like a smart boy. Are you saying that you never knew where you lived, up in Canada? Canada is a big, big place, Adam. Nobody is just ‘from Canada’. They have, I think, ten provinces, big cities, and thousands of miles of wilderness. Is there a province or a city that can recall having lived in?” Zack looked at his hands, which where involuntarily wringing themselves. He decided to occupy them, and the moment, by opening his orange juice and taking a long swig of it. Tart… gees. Really tart. He smacked his lips and took his time putting the lid back on the bottle, while trying not to let his hands shake. Where did that Asian kid in gym class say that he was from? “Uh, we lived in Vancouver. I’m sorry, I’m really tired, I’m just having a hard time thinking.” Mrs. Katrina looked up at Officer Riley, and then she motioned towards the door with her head, and stood up. “Adam, Officer Riley and I are just going to chat in the hallway for a moment. We won’t be long.” Zack nodded, and then the two women opened the heavy door, stepped out, and closed it softly behind them. In the hallway, which was brightly lit, police officers and an older man in a suit made their way past, as the two women leaned into each other and made eye contact. “You said that you think he was wearing… a pull-up or a diaper, under his outfit?” Officer Riley nodded. “I gave him a light frisk when we first got here, mostly to check if he had any other injuries, but also, just to make sure that he didn’t have anything on him that might have been useful to us – a phone or a wallet. He doesn’t have anything with him, other than a five-dollar bill. But he’s definitely got something bulky on, underneath that… bodysuit, or whatever he’s got on. It felt like it was made of plastic.” Mrs. Katrina nodded thoughtfully. “We have to consider the possibility that he’s special needs in some way, perhaps on the ASD spectrum, or that he might be developmentally delayed in some manner. He seems very well spoken, but also extremely nervous, which is probably fitting, given his circumstances. Did he say how old he was?” “He said he was thirteen,” the officer responded. “But I don’t necessarily buy that – he’s small for thirteen. My best guess is that he’s nine, maybe ten. He’s smart for age, whatever else is going on with him.” “Well, we should proceed cautiously, in my opinion. I’m not sure that grilling him or threatening legal consequences is going to get us anywhere. He might just shut down. We have to assume, given the diaper, and his strange answers, that there is more here than meets the eye. We might want to have him seen by a psychologist, or a pediatrician. In the meantime, he’s clearly exhausted, he’s got some cuts and scrapes, and, anywhere we go from here, it’s going to take some time.” Officer Riley nodded once. “I have to imagine,” the social worker continued, “that somebody, somewhere, is going to be looking for him, if they’re not already, and that they will reach out to the authorities, as soon as they realize he’s gone. A kid his age, in his condition, is going to be missed almost right away. So… does it make sense to keep him here, asking him questions that he clearly can’t, or doesn’t want to answer… or, should we clean up his scrapes, get him something to eat, get him a change of clothes, find him somewhere to sleep tonight, and wait for someone to come looking for him?” The police officer looked at the social worker, nodding slightly. She was thinking about where she was in her shift schedule, what she would otherwise have been doing with her night, and, the fact that some of her fellow officers were out on the streets, and might need assistance at some point, while she was in the station, babysitting a kid who might have developmental problems. This didn’t seem like a law enforcement issue – not yet, anyway. She could go down some obvious avenues of inquiry, put calls into local hospitals and group homes, and inquire if anyone was unaccounted for, but getting anywhere with that would likely take hours, later in the evening. Handing this off to social services makes sense. “That makes sense to me, Mrs. Katrina…” Mrs. Katrina interrupted her. “Just Katrina is fine, officer.” “Okay, Katrina, I can assume that your department will be conducting its own internal inquiries, given that it’s possible that you’ve been in contact with him before? Unless he is, as he says, a new arrival from Vancouver. in which case, the school boards or, or the Department of Citizenship and Immigration, will have him in their system somewhere.” “I will start the process first thing in the morning. For now, I’m going to try and see if I can find him an emergency placement for the night with a foster parent… although the diaper situation might complicate that a bit. I have people who are geared for younger intakes, and people who deal more with youths, but the youth people aren’t generally equipped for… that.” “Do you want me to run out and get him some pull-ups while you’re still here? There’s a twenty-four hour pharmacy around the corner from the hospital – they have almost anything you can think of. I was in there last week, trying to find a cane for an elderly guy who had his stolen from him. He literally couldn’t leave our lobby unless we found something for him, or we’d have had to call him an ambulance, but he wasn’t injured. Who steals a cane from an elderly person, I’ll never understand. I think it had a street value of about zero dollars…” “I don’t know,” Katrina mused, “if pull-ups are going to do the trick. I have a daughter who used to wear them overnight. They really were for minor accidents, at best. Given the size of what that kid has on, I suspect we might need something a little more serious. And would you be able to slide something up over that big cast he has on? I think he needs something with tapes.” “I see what you’re saying. Hopefully they have something in stock that would work for him – his waist is not that large. Or maybe an adult pull-up would fit over the cast, although I suspect those would be too big on him.” “Sure, Officer, if you don’t mind doing that. I don’t want to take up too much of your time.” “You have no idea how much of my time would have been taken up by him, if you weren’t available tonight. It’s no problem – I’m going to be heading out and driving around anyway. I’ll run up there and see what they have.” “Bring me the receipt, and I’ll e-transfer you whatever it costs, and put it in my expense report.” “Okay, then, it’s settled. I’ll go dig up a first aid kit, and then I’ll do some shopping. I’ll also get you to poke around in our storage – we usually have random articles of clothing in there – you know, evidence, things like that.” Katrina guffawed. “No, I’m kidding,” the officer said quickly, “but we deal with car accidents, domestics, fires… Victim’s Services has a relationship with a couple of local charities, so we usually have kids’ pajamas, teddy bears, t-shirts, things like that.” “Perfect – if we can get him through tonight, then tomorrow, if he hasn’t already been claimed by someone, I can get him some basics.” Officer Riley walked down the hall towards what looked like a central work area within the station, a cluster of desks and cabinets in a larger, brightly lit room, while Mrs. Katrina pushed the door to the interview room open, and once again found ‘Adam’ resting his head on his outstretched arms.

Definitely true for me as well. Rearz reduced the sizing on their Large models a couple of years ago - I used to wear mediums in some and large in others, now I'm in XL. My size has changed, too, but not that much - I haven't changed the size of my clothing. Definitely, with Rearz, pay attention to the sizing guide, and shoot for the middle of the range, not the outside edge, otherwise your diaper tapes will be on the outside edge.

My wife puts up with me wearing diapers - I've been 24/7 for 5 years - but that's about the extent of it. She has never offered to change them, and even if she were up for it, I think it would only be an occasional indulgence - it's not something I'd want to make into a "requirement" of the relationship, because I think it would be a lot to ask, and also might damage the dynamics. She can be a pretty "take charge" individual, and while I dress like a toddler under my clothing, I'm also pretty independently-minded - giving over that much control would come at a cost, is what I'm saying. She has packed diapers for me for trips and she buys me diaper cream and things like that, so I'm not complaining. I have a diaper drawer in our bedroom, and corner in our basement is stacked with them, and I haven't owned underwear that doesn't tape or pin on in nearly half a decade, so I feel like I'm getting space in the relationship to be who I want to be. I have to understand and meet her somewhere in the middle. It was not her dream to have someone in the house still in diapers, after our kids outgrew them! But on the other hand, were I to be beset by a stroke or something, I'm sure she'd change them, just as I would do it for her. But it's not on her wish list for activities we can do together, at least not now.

Ill leave this to @~Brian~, but if I had to guess, I'd say it's because insurance pays for them, and they want a recurring doctors order confirming he still needs them. Well, I can tick another box on my list, after ticking the boxes on their list: I have now had a massage while wearing a diaper. I chickened out on going in there and stripping down to just my diaper - this was a new RMT that I had never interacted with before, a middle-aged lady who was very nice and also effective - the massage definitely helped in releasing knots in my back. I know she did a good job because I felt like I'd been in a minor car accident by the end. She reviewed my intake form and asked me some questions about my medical history, but did not ask about the bladder functionality part of it - I take it that has little bearing on an RMT's scope of practice. As to why it's on there, I'm not sure - maybe their chiropractic practice would pay more attention to that, if, say, you were receiving rehab for a car accident injury that had neurological implications. Then, it was time to enter the chamber of relaxation, although I wasn't feeling very relaxed - if I'm being honest, I wanted to flee. I'd committed to myself that I would wear a "real" diaper - not a pull-up or a something tiny and cloth-backed. However, I also wanted a plain diaper, and one that wasn't conspicuous. I went with an Incontrol Essential - a white plastic medium-wight diaper with two tapes on each side. I elected to bring oversized, lightweight gym shorts with me so that I would not have to hang out in just a diaper - I didn't know exactly what the circumstances of the visit would be, and I've really only ever worn that little in front of my wife, so I wasn't looking for an opportunity to traumatize a medical professional, even if they've probably seen worse, or at least "similar" in their careers. She brought me to the room with the table in it, then suggested I get "changed" (ha ha), and get onto the bed and pull the sheet up over myself, and then she left for a moment. I dispensed with my outerwear and put on the shorts, which were in my laptop bag, and then I laid down on the bed faceup and pulled the sheet up to my chest. She knocked, I said come in, and then we made pleasant conversation while she began by massaging my shoulders. She worked her way down to my legs, in the process folding the sheet up until it was just covering my midsection, basically, and then she asked me to roll over, saying "You're mostly here for your back, so I want to concentrate on that." She did the back of my legs quickly, getting up to the tops of my thighs, where she rolled up the legs of my shorts, but, she while she was in "the general area", I didn't feel like it was likely she'd make contact with any part of me that was wrapped in plastic. Then she moved up to my shoulders and massaged them from behind, and I was becoming fairly at-ease and relaxed. However, then, she started working her way down my back, and commenting on the knots she was finding, and working those out, and she asked me about my posture when I work, and then said, "Now, I want to concentrate on your lower back." That raised alarms in me slightly, but it was far too late to do anything about it. I supposed I could have jumped up and just fled... So, she rolled the sheet down until it was mid-butt, and then... yup. She pulled the elastic of my shorts down until it was at the top of my buttocks, essentially. Or maybe I should say Essentially, because at that point, I knew that the waistband of my diaper had to be well above that of the shorts, and sure enough, I felt her working my lower back and the top of my gluteal muscles, through my diaper - I cold actually hear the plastic crinkling under the pressure. My cheeks were glowing red against the paper cover stretched over the ring that I was face down in. She worked my lower back and upper butt, and then she went and got "the thumper" (an energetic massage device) and applied it to my back, lower back, and right down my butt to my thighs, then she pulled the waistband of my shorts back up, rolled the sheet up to my midback, and came around to massage my head. I felt at that point like it might have been perceptibly warmer than the rest of me, and I was concentrating on not reacting - part of me wanted to say "Yeah, listen, this is the first time I've done this in 5 years, and I've never done it in a nappy before, so I apologize if this is awkward... I don't really know the protocol...". But doing that would probably have made it even more awkward. Also, I have no idea why, in my head right now, it would have somehow been better to say "nappy" than "diaper". When she was done, she said "You can get up," so I rolled over onto my back, sat up, and pivoted so that my legs were hanging off the bed. She advised me to be careful standing up, lest I get a head rush and lose my balance, then asked me "How was that?" I told her it had felt great, and that I could tell by the trauma she'd inflicted that my muscles had gotten what was coming to them, and would likely feel better in the coming days, if not immediately after their tenderizing. She said that I should come in more often, and that for this particular complaint (sore back), I should come again in a week or two even if it feels like it's getting better. She was very pleasant and not at all awkward, throughout the whole thing, even though I felt like I was working diligently not to sound flustered. She left the room and closed the door so that I could get changed, at which point I allowed myself to pee - I'd been holding it for most of the treatment. I think I maybe peed a little bit while I was getting undressed - that was it. I met her up by the reception desk and she asked if I wanted to schedule another appointment. I answered truthfully that I had to consult my calendar first, thanked her, paid the receptionist, she gave me the receipt for my insurance company, and I left.

I had cause to revisit my thoughts on this recently when I'd stayed in the same diaper for probably longer than was strictly prudent, and then my wife and I got home and both headed up to the bedroom to get into comfy clothes, and I dropped my jeans and my diaper was shouting "Help Me!". Although to be honest, at that point, you could tell it was pretty wet, anyway. The indicator was somewhat redundant. Still made me a tad self-conscious, but that's the diapered life, isn't it?

I understand how you feel. I spent over 30 years thinking I was alone on an island of one, with "this" secret. I was a DL even before I could spell "diaper" - my earliest memories of my fascination with them are from the dawn of my consciousness, essentially. I didn't even Google it, believe it or not. Then one day I decided to see if anyone sold adult cloth diapers, and I punched that into Google, and I came up with Rearz, and, a bit below that, Daily Diapers. It was like wandering over a distant hill on my desert island, and finding a civilization I didn't know was there. It was a massive paradigm shift for me - I literally had never talked to anyone, ever, about my fascination with diapers. I suspect my parents knew, but we certainly didn't discuss it. Coming here has been world changing and very psychologically beneficial for me (I believe, anyway...). However, I have relied on the community as a whole, and interacting with a number of people, to fulfil my desire to explore my own and other people's thinking around this topic, because it would be too much of a burden for any one person, just as I don't have the time to be someone's best friend, online, when I also have a family and a job and friends in my real world. I have had people come and go, ghost me, break conversational chains, or, in the other direction, deluge me with messages to the point that I couldn't deal with it. My strategy these days is to communicate lightly with some select people who are on the same wavelength I am. I have some friendships here that are half a decade old now, smart, interesting people who's input I enjoy reading, and who have helped me advice on situations I've faced, etc - but I'm careful not to ask them for more than it would be reasonable to expect, and they, in turn, give me the same respect. However if you're looking for the intensity of a strong interpersonal relationship, I think you need (with a truckload of caveats involving being careful meeting strangers...) to try and find someone within this community whom you can spend time with in person - all online relationships, even the best ones, pale in comparison to direct human contact. I wish I could meet up with some of my friends here for a beer, but they live all over the world! Maybe someday. Gotta run - work calls. We can talk more if you like. All the best.

I had a taste of a simpler/more difficult lifestyle when my parents were developing the land that we eventually built our cottage on. We had no power up there for the first couple of years, so we heated the one-room cabin with a woodstove, and used honest-to-god oil lamps occasionally (kerosene actually), along with candles while we played cards at the table at night. We used a chemical toilet that was placed in a crudely-built outhouse, fetched drinking water from a local spring, and used lake water for washing. Everything was either cooked on the woodstove, or over an open fire. However, we drove up there in modern cars, town was a half-hour away if things got too rustic, and I was wearing modern disposable diapers - we did our laundry in a bucket with lake water so cloth diapers weren't a consideration up there.

An interesting experiment, @oznl. I suspect I would have similarly inconvenient, but survivable results. Unless I got drunk and was sleeping on a friend's new couch. Then, all hell would break loose, undoubtedly, flooding of biblical proportions. The "12 Month Guide" appears to be a "12 Year Guide" for me as well, although I rather suspect that both of us are also poor candidates for hypnosis. There are people who believe in themselves more than we do, I guess is what I'm saying, and for them, we are still proclaiming the universe to be geocentric, whereas they know the truth. I was also thinking not too long ago about the interesting world that I've put myself in, where my wife and daughter going away for the weekend (other daughter remains away at school) is no longer a big deal. I even missed them a bit. Whereas in the before times, I would have been marking off the minutes until the car rolls off the end of the driveway, so that I could gleefully and unabashedly dress like a toddler or a geriatric, around the house. I still have some of those abysmal Depends pull-ups I used for doctors appointments a few times... I could easily conduct a similar experiment in one. An oopsie would merely cost me a pull-up that I'd rather burn for heat than wear, anyway, whereas a true lapse in continence would have me looking for the paper towels and the disinfectant spray.

After further testing, I now feel kind of bad for maligning the BeDry Elitecare... as noted previously, the first one I wore leaked prematurely at the back of the thighs, and the inner liner also pulled away from the clover, although that didn't really cause any problems, it's just notable. Well, I wore another one for a good part of yesterday... and it performed great, ended up damp almost all the way up the back, weighed as much as a dead raccoon, and it didn't leak. I almost felt bad taking it off, but it was too swollen to wear out of the house at that point. The analogy that came to mind in considering the quite-variable performances I have experienced with both the Rearz Select, and now, their Incontrol BeDry Elitecare, is this... which is worse, an unreliable lawn tractor, or an unreliable helicopter? When you're driving a lawn tractor, you know you're driving a lawn tractor, and you don't go very far from home. When you're driving a helicopter, you assume you're driving a long-range performance machine, so you don't take it to go get milk, you take it to other cities. A helicopter failure can be a great deal more inconvenient, or even fatal, versus a lawn tractor failure, which is more of a nuisance. A failure in a Select is a failure on a lawn tractor. A failure in an Elitecare is potentially a helicopter accident. I have to test more Elitecare's and see if that first result was an anomaly.

They had a page with about 40 boxes you could tick, everything from heart disease to chronic injuries to pregnancy (nope...), allergies, etc. So I didn't have to write anything in. It was kind of an impulsive decision to tick that box - we'll see if I end up regretting it! On another topic, now I feel badly for maligning the BeDry Elitecare... I had one that leaked prematurely at the back of the thighs, and the inner liner also pulled away from the clover, although that didn't really cause any problems, it's just notable. Well, I wore another one for a good part of yesterday... and it performed great, ended up damp almost all the way up the back, weighed as much as a dead raccoon, and it didn't leak. I almost felt bad taking it off, but it was too swollen to wear out of the house at that point. The analogy that came to mind in considering the quite-variable performances I have experienced with both the Rearz Select, and now, their Incontrol BeDry Elitecare, is this... which is worse, an unreliable lawn tractor, or an unreliable helicopter? When you're driving a lawn tractor, you know you're driving a lawn tractor, and you don't go very far from home. When you're driving a helicopter, you assume you're driving a long-range performance machine, so you don't take it to go get milk, you take it to other cities. A helicopter failure can be a great deal more inconvenient, or even fatal, versus a lawn tractor failure, which is more of a nuisance. I have to test more Elitecare's and see if that first result was an anomaly.

Here's a new one for me... for some of you who have done doctors appointments for years or decades, wearing your favourite ABDL diapers proudly, this isn't going to be a big deal, but it is a big deal for me. I've mentioned before how my wife has been after me to start using my massage benefits, but I haven't been for one since I started wearing diapers 5 years ago. Well, it just so happens that my back has been sore this week - I have spent a LOT of time in front of the computer, mostly for work. So, I signed up for a massage, however my account at the place we go to has been out of use for so long that it's expired, so they needed updated health information. I took a deep breath, and ticked the box that said "lack of bladder control" and then "intermittent" as the frequency. I have been ambushed by a urologist and requested to drop my trousers when I was wearing a pull-up, and I've been thrust into a crowded waiting room while wearing a diaper under a transparent disposable gown, during a medical imaging appointment at the height of the pandemic (they've since ditched the transparent paper gowns, I'm happy to note...), so this isn't technically the first time I've allowed this side of myself to be subjected to examination by the medical profession (and I've been diapered at dozens of doctors appointments where my trousers did not have to come off - I like those better...). But, this is the first time I've put it down on paper. I doubt whether the RMT will care or even notice it, and I hope that they don't care about, or notice, my underpants, either, but here we are.

When I have my own hotel room and car, it's relatively easy - I can keep a bag of diapers in my car or in the hotel room in a drawer and take a couple with me in a backpack. When I am travelling with friends and sharing hotel rooms, it gets more complicated. Some things that have worked well for me: taking the lead on managing the garbage cans. I always turn myself into the guy who tidies up - puts the beer cans in the recycling, puts the dishes in the dishwasher, wipes the counters. So nobody is surprised when I'm also emptying the garbage cans... and you can guess what's in them. I always learn the "trash flow" of whatever hotel suite or apartment we're in - where the dumpster or garbage room is. I carry opaque plastic bags with me and then I bundle up the diapers, trash them, bury them under other trash, and take the bags out frequently. I've gone for a walk to "get some air" or to look for gifts for my kids, and bought diapers in a corner drugstore, then unpacked them into my backpack, and then stashed them in my suitcase. I carry a nondescript black cloth bag that says "laundry" on it, but I keep diapers in it, on the theory that nobody is ever likely going to go through my laundry, even if they were, say, looking for the sunblock or something, and went into my suitcase. Most of the time, it's not a big deal, because I don't fight with my spouse a lot, but sometimes she can be a bit controlling and I'll feel like I have to defend my territory, so to speak - but it's almost like I'm crossing my arms and saying "You're not my mom!", while I'm standing there looking like an overgrown toddler. But I just push through it. I can look stupid, while at the same time sounding smart (at least in my own mind...). I've definitely questioned this decision before - it's hard to argue that putting myself back in diapers permanently was a "great idea" or a "logical coping strategy", but, the idea of not wearing them is deeply depressing to me now - I primarily did this to myself to improve my mood. As far as I'm concerned, the side effects of this are less profound then taking psychoactive medication, or self-medicating with recreational drugs. The backstory to it is long, and I won't bore you with it here, except to say that part of this journey has been "taking back", enjoying and normalizing wearing diapers - I wore them as a kid, and I knew I liked wearing them from as early as I can remember, and I knew that was "weird". I also had a lot of anxiety over wearing them, I was terrified of anyone finding out, even more terrified that anyone would figure out that I liked it, and, I still had many of the normal childhood feelings of wanting to be perceived as a "big kid", wanting to grow up (why was I in such a hurry?!?), and wanting to make my parents proud of me, so it was a very dissonant feeling to want to be diapered and babied, but also, wanting to stay up later and be allowed to ride my bike on busier streets and to watch movies with mature themes and to get more grown-up toys etc.

I actually started writing in that direction, then had to change course, because it accelerated this act in the storyline - if Kelly had found out that Zack was already in police custody, her hand would have been forced.

I'm wearing a PUL diaper cover today because I'm burning through some unreliable diapers while working from home. I don't wear a lot of PUL, or plastic pants in general, really (other than if I'm wearing cloth), but my experience is definitely greater with vinyl/plastic pants than it is with PUL. So far, I'm impressed with the material - they move more freely and don't feel plasticky, they don't make any noise, and they almost don't read as a waterproof fabric, or not any more so than Gore-Tex or similar "dry-feel" wicking fabrics that a number of athletic or causal "sport" (golf etc) clothes are made from. However, these are cut like plastic pants, IE, like underwear - they are not designed for wearing uncovered, outside of the confines of your home. This got me to thinking... in the summer, on the golf course, or even just around the town... what about PUL walking shorts? Does anybody manufacture anything like that? If I were designing them myself, I'd probably go with an inner and an outer layer, almost like how men's bathing suits sometimes have a mesh inner "panty". There'd be an elastic-cuffed inner panty or boxer short to provide the leg seals, and then the outer shell would be free-hanging, like any other pair of walking shorts, but with the added protection of being of a waterproof material. I could see something made of PUL as being relatively light and comfortable, while obviating the requirement to wear an additional layer over your diaper and your diaper cover - now, your diaper cover could also be your outer layer. Whereas vinyl walking shorts... yeah, people are going to be giving you perplexed looks down at the boardwalk.

Toddler. They can do more, they have some agency, they are starting to be aware of themselves and they can be a bit self-conscious about wearing diapers, which is me!

Good tip! I hate lugging a backpack around a concert, and not all venues even let you have a bag that size anymore, unless you clear it with security, which means having the dreaded conversation with some person, usually in their 20's, who had about a half-hour of training and works for some faceless contractor... "Yeah, so, I wear diapers...", as they open all the pockets on your bag to make sure you don't have drugs or weapons with you.

I watched the eclipse... sorta... we experienced the darkness of totality but, contrary to predictions, the sky above our viewing point remained largely clouded, so we only got glimpses of the solar ballet. However, it was pretty cool. We saw coyotes running down the middle of a residential street at 3:18 in the afternoon, clearly looking to get out from under the clouds so that they could realize some ROI on their eclipse glasses. For the historical record, I was wearing a Rearz BeDry and was not being dry. In an effort to continue to be dry, at least externally, I'm wearing PUL underpants over my Rearz Select this morning - the Select being an homage to vintage plastic-backed single-tape diapers from the turn of the century and before. I've had scattershot results with these diapers, as I reported before - on a good day, they've worked as a low-to-medium range daytime diaper, and on a bad day, they've leaked somewhere within a half hour of being called into work. The single-tab configuration works better on people who don't have a two-digit age, is my takeaway. Something about the ratio between one's torso length, leg diameter, and (I'm assuming) wetting volume changes as we cross into our two-digit years, which made single-tab diapers unreliable for me back then, and still unreliable for me now. Having two tabs on each side allows for a better fit, apparently, although as a kid, I never got to try that, because my parents never looked beyond what was available at the local stores. Or, they did look, and the cost was prohibitive. In my mind at the time, I only knew of two options - overburdened XL toddler diapers that sometimes required Scotch tape to stay in place, or cloth diapers - but I'd outgrown the plastic pants that they necessitated, even if the diapers themselves could still be pinned on. So why did I buy the damned things, if my memories of them, then and now, rotate around failure? Because Rearz put them on sale a couple of times recently for what amounted to less than $2 a diaper, making them a direct competitor to the likes of the 3-tab Depends - and even the mercurial Select is the diaper equivalent of a 10-speed bike, versus that tricycle-with-a-flat-tire option. (In this metaphor, a Mega Inspire+ or a MegaMax would be a diesel pickup truck). So, I'm in PUL underpants that go halfway up my back, to prevent mostly-inevitable dampness at either the back of my thighs, or, the front of my shirt, after a few hours in the Select saddle. I'm not as familiar with wearing PUL as I am with plastic pants - it strikes me that the elastics on these, which seem to be cottony, might wick if I let things get that damp in there. We'll see. Maybe the elastic material is actually PUL as well, and won't do that? I slept with the Fixx giant size 10 pacifier in my mouth for two nights. I don't think it's going to become my go-to, first of all because they still cost like $25 each, versus the $5 Rearz size 6 adult pacifier that I own about 30 of, and that I find completely functional, but also, because the Fixx feels a bit like trying to fall asleep with a squash ball in your mouth. I was curious as to what my wife would make of the massive shield on it, which is about the size of a teacup saucer, but she made no comment. I had another thought when I was contemplating her thoughts (always a dangerous avenue) on the giant pacifier... that being, does she have any preferences, with respect to my diapers? Does she prefer white ones to printed? Or does she find some of the printed ones cute, or at least less absurd, than others? Larger vs less bulky? Plastic vs cloth-backed? Or is her thinking on this strictly binary - given a choice between a husband in diapers vs a husband not in diapers, she'd obviously go with the latter? And a diaper is a diaper is a diaper, like a bullet is a bullet is a bullet, for the one receiving it? Or, would it come down to asking which ones were the cheapest? You can see why I haven't posed the question. Or is it like my socks - she has no preferences, presumably? Do I have any preferences regarding her socks? Not really. But when it comes to her, underwear, I guess I prefer the sportier and/or more petite ones, to the giant grandma knickers she sometimes wears - but that is strictly up to her, and I, in turn, would prefer that my daily diaper selection remain largely up to me, although certainly, if she said, "Hey, wear those monster-themed ones when we go out for breakfast...", I would accommodate that. But opening the door to such considerations could lead to... "And when we go out for dinner with Mark & Kim, maybe don't wear baby's underpants...?", which I would not be interested in considering. Kim is boring, except when she's making impolite comments, so she'd probably crack a joke about my age and my prostate, if I got up from the table five times, to go pee.

Chapter 61 - Off the Radar “You want me to what? Drive into the city – now? It’s after eight, Kel. The girls are diapered for bed. Elaine is twelve – I don’t know how comfortable I am leaving Sam and Maddy with her while I drive for ninety minutes, to what, scour Seattle? Looking for one kid? That’s nuts. Call the police. That’s who you need.” Kelly pulled her phone away from her ear, to get’s Kim’s hectoring voice our of her head for a moment. She needed to think, damn it. Chris was in Los Angelas at some ritzy restaurant, thinking that the situation was well in hand. Calling in the police would inevitably end up involving him – wouldn’t it? Or, could she keep him divorced from the situation? She chuckled at her choice of wording. Divorced. No way. “You’re right, Kim – you’re right. I can’t drag you all the way back here – there’s no point. I wasn’t thinking. I’ll ask security to call the police.” “I’ll pack the kids up and come out there first thing tomorrow morning, Kel, wherever you are, and I’ll help you as much as I can, if you haven’t located him by then. But I think you will have. He can’t have gotten far.” “Thanks, Kim, I’ll keep you posted.” Kelly hung up on Kim. She looked across the lobby at the security desk, but decided to walk over to the information booth instead. Reese had no lineup in front of him and seemed to be packing textbooks into a backpack. “Is there any place around here to get a coffee and a bite to eat?” she asked him. “At this hour, everything in the building is closed except the vending machines. You’ll have to walk for a bit – everything close to here requires reservations. But there is a shawarma and bagel place on Forty-Second St, a few blocks over. If you turn right out of the main exit, and right again, you’ll see it on the North side, eventually. You might want to take a cab at this time of night. I’m not sure when they close.” Kelly walked back out the front entrance of the hospital, ignoring the security guard who opened the door for her. She surveyed the streetscape, brightly lit below a dark night sky. The main streets seemed friendly, populated, alive, but Kelly knew that the back alleys and sides streets would have a different feel to them, shadowed and empty. Zack is going to stick to where it’s well lit, if he’s left the building. She turned right and headed up the main street, feeling almost under-dressed in comparison to the theatre goers and dining crowd that were filing past her. The night air was cooler, but not cold, typical for the Pacific Northwest. At least it wasn’t raining. She turned right again at Forty-Second, and walked for a couple of minutes, scanning the storefronts and parking garages for any sign of a kid on a scooter. Eventually, she gave up on a foot search, and waived at the next cab she saw, rather than using the rideshare app again. A tan Toyota Camry with a taxi sign on top of it pulled up to the curb, pointing the wrong way, and she opened the back door, and dropped onto the vinyl bench seat, which was mismatched with the cloth front seats. “Turn it around, please, and head East – I’m looking for a little sandwich shop on the North side, a few blocks over.” The driver looked exasperated, and hesitated for a moment, before resetting the meter. He wanted to pick up over where the crowds were, hopefully someone headed out to one of the hotels by the airport, or right downtown, not some lady trying to save herself a ten minute walk. But, it would be a quick run. Maybe she’d tip well, in deference to the $6 fare it would probably add up to. He pulled a sharp U-turn and headed East. The buildings got shorter and the storefronts got dark, and then there was a rectangle of light, spilling onto the sidewalk, which he knew to be the kebab shop she was likely looking for. He cut across the opposing lanes and parked facing the wrong direction, hoping that not making her cross the street when she disembarked would please her. Kelly eyed the meter, which showed $6.30. “Do you take American Express?” she asked the driver. The driver sighed audibly. ________ The restaurateur had begun cleaning his counters, in preparation for winding down. He didn’t get much of the post-club drinking crowd, this far up from the main drag, so he usually shut down at nine o’clock, although it was entirely at his discretion. He thought again about the strange kid on the scooter. He was running away from something. Alerting the cop to the boy’s situation had been the right thing to do; wading into it himself was potentially dicey – a lone child, approaching a man – a foreigner – later in the evening… what could he do? Anywhere other than in front of a group, it was potentially dangerous. He’d been a teacher in his homeland, back in another life. He knew where people’s minds went. He would have had to toss the kid back onto the street when his last customer left. Shaking his head, he sprayed sanitizer onto a stainless table. Then, he saw a car pull up in front, facing into oncoming traffic. A cab. Maybe he was going to get some drinkers after all. Instead, a tall, well-dressed woman with long blond hair, and a cold face, pulled his door open, and strode up to the counter. He put his rag down and walked over to greet her. “Hello, welcome. Can I get you something? We close at nine, but I can still make anything on the menu…” “Of course you’re closing,” Kelly said in an irritated tone. “Do you have anything vegetarian?” “Our falafel is vegetarian – you can have it in a wrap, or on rice, or, I can put it into a salad.” “Fal..afall… yeah, no. Something normal. Just put vegetables into a wrap for me. Do you have cheese?” “Of course we have cheese – what type?” “Something low fat. And light mayonnaise, or light ranch. Do you have that?” “Regrettably, no, no light mayo, no ranch of any kind. I do have a garlic sauce that is light in taste…” “No, it’s fine, just the veggies and cheese in the wrap. Heat it up for me – you can do that, right?” The man smiled and shook his head slightly. “Of course,” he said. He turned around to retrieve a pita from a lidded stainless-steel bin. ________ [8:30 PM] Kelly sat down at a table, distracted, then stood back up. “Give me some water with the wrap. Not from your tap – something closed. Flat or sparkling is fine.” The man looked over at her, gave her one nod, and then went to a fridge behind the counter, selecting a lime-flavoured sparkling water, which he then placed on the counter, with a napkin beside it. Her wrap had been carefully folded into a paper sleeve, and was in a sandwich press, warming up. Kelly strode over to the counter and snatched the water and the napkin. This lady seems upset, even erratic. Hopefully she finishes her snack in peace, and departs. Kelly sat back down at the table, just as her phone vibrated. Martha: Are you with Zack yet? She grated her teeth. Kelly: He’s fine. I know where he is. Very kind of you to ask. I am handling this. Martha: Please let me know when he is available to speak to Chris. Chris would like to talk to him. Kelly grimaced and flipped her phone upside down. She picked up water and held it in both hands, as though trying to draw inspiration from its cool exterior. What do I do? A couple of minutes passed, and then the man walked over from behind the counter, and positioned a plate with her wrap on it, in front of her. “Do you need anything else, madam?” Kelly barely looked up, and then shook her head. ___________ [8:45 PM] The restauranteur wiped down his countertops, hoping that the lady eating at his table might be finished soon, so that he could close up. He heard her shoes tapping across his floor, and wished that they might be carrying her to the door. But then, the blond lady snapped her fingers behind him. He paused, waited a moment, and turned his head. “I have a question for you – is there much else open around here? Any malls or arcades or other restaurants?”” He examined the woman in front of him, and considered replying why do you ask? But then he thought better of it. I want to close shortly, and I do not want to spend a great deal more time in this lady’s company. “Most of the businesses that are still open are over in the entertainment district, which is by the hospital. If you proceed back the way you came in your taxi, you will come across an intersection…” “Yes, yes, I know where that is!” Kelly said, with a note of irritation. “I don’t need you to direct me to the hospital – that’s where I came from. There’s nothing else around here? A movie theatre, perhaps?” The proprietor raised his eyebrows and tightened his smile, but did not erase it entirely. “There is a sports bar up the street, I think that it is still open?” “I’m not looking for a bar,” Kelly snapped. “I’m looking for a public place, a concourse, a, I don’t know, a department store, something walking distance from here.” “I think you need to look around the hospital area for something like that. You won’t find any department stores downtown, but, many of the hotels in that area have lobbies and restaurants, and there is also a twenty-four hour drugstore near the hospital…” Kelly rolled her eyes. “I get, I get it, everything is over by the hospital.” Without saying another word, she walked towards the door, and gave it a shove, letting it swing shut in her wake. He looked over at her table, and saw that the parchment paper he had enveloped her wrap in, was balled up on the floor next to her chair. __________ Kelly strode quickly along the street, looking for another cab. At one point, she could swear she saw the same tan Camry come by, but when she waved, it sped up. She felt that she had come to a decision as to what to do, but the more she pondered it, the more her certainty bled away. I have to get back to the hospital, and ask security to call the police. I can still tidy this up. And deal with Zack. She pulled her phone out, to try the rideshare app. At the same time, her phone buzzed again. Martha. Kelly swore under her breath and kept walking. She decided not to reply, instead concentrating on not missing the left turn she had to make in order to get back to the hospital. The walk back took her several minutes, and as the hour got later, there were fewer people walking the streets to get somewhere, and it seemed like, for some of the souls she walked past, the streets themselves were their destination. Finally, she made the left onto the arterial street that fronted the hospital, and she was once again approaching the security guard at the entrance. He stepped aside and held the door open for her without asking any questions, which was exactly what Kelly expected of him. The population of the lobby was thinning out, but there were still people talking on their phones or looking about, trying to determine where they needed to go within the labyrinthine structure. As there will be all night. Hospitals don’t close. Kelly walked purposefully toward the security desk. The woman in the yellow shirt was still in there, making notes on a pad of paper as Kelly walked up. She looked up, and Kelly thought she saw a bit of anticipation in her face, and not just irritation. “Hi, I was just going to call you,” she said to Kelly, before Kelly had a chance to speak. “I was going to page you, as well,” Kelly responded. “I take it you’ve heard something about my son’s whereabouts?” The guard nodded. “One of my colleagues reported hearing from a staff member that an emergency exit had been opened briefly, not long after your son left the lobby. I took the liberty of asking my supervisor if we could pull the tape from the loading dock gate at the back of the property. I didn’t actually view it myself, but I am told that a child on a knee scooter went past the gate some time ago. We believe that he is off the property.”

Pampers started distributing a size 8 of their Baby-Dry diapers in Canada a few months ago. They're only a fraction of an inch larger than the size 7's, but they're rated to 46 lbs+, although the waist size on either the 7's or the 8's, by any growth chart you can find, would shows as capable of fitting a typical 8-year-old at their maximum extension, and that's without stretching them. At that point, they are well overlapping the pull-ups market, which starts at toddler sizes and goes up to 140 lbs+. The Pampers size 8's, unstretched, have the same waist diameter as an S/M (small/medium) Goodnites pull-up, also unstretched, and those are rated up to 68 lbs. But they'd have to get to making a size 16, based on the differences between a 6, 7, and 8, in order to fit even a small adult - it would be nice to see a more substantial delta between the sizes. I was talking to a guy I know who works in supply chain for a major grocery retailer in Canada, and he said that the size 8's have not been stocked everywhere (which my observations so far prove out), because some store managers thought they would be a specialty product and wouldn't sell enough to justify being given shelf space. But, at the stores that stock them, they have sold better than anticipated.