Teasing The Closet Door

[Baby Mommy]

I'm very much in the closet for the outside world, but sometimes the closet door won't stay very firmly closed. I'm finding that usually it's in the medical realm that I come dangerously close to being outed.

1.) About two years ago, I was having horrible migraine headaches. To rule out meningitis, I had to have a spinal tap. Let me tell you, that's one painful procedure. And it takes a while. So it wasn't very long before I'd gone from whimpering and whining to full-on bawling as loud as any two-year-old. To control it somewhat and cry a little quieter, I had to openly suck my thumb in front of a doctor and two nurses. Mind you, sucking my thumb is something I normally only do alone or in front of my Daddy, if I have one. But in this situation I was a baby either way. Either let them see a 40-year-old woman sucking her thumb, or let them hear a 40-year-old woman going WAAAAAAAH The reward came afterward, when they actually brought me ice cream and told me I'd been a good girl. My AB side couldn't help but like that part.

2.) Fairly recently, I got sick with what turned out to be a gall bladder infection. At first I thought it was my IBS acting up, and the stomach cramps would pass. But it got worse and worse, and finally I had to call for an ambulance to take me to the ER. Right after I got off the phone with 911, I started (I'll put it delicately so as not to gross anybody out) losing my lunch. With my bladder problems, losing my lunch always causes me to lose my peepee as well, and I very visibly wet my pants...right as the ambulance arrived. Looking back, I think the paramedics should have given me time to change my clothes, but the most they would do was allow me to grab something dry to wear home from the hospital. They put me in the ambulance and took me to the hospital still soaking wet, which soon became apparent to the ER personnel as well. At least they DID let me get that change of clothes. I had to ride home on the bus, with my wet clothes in a plastic bag.

And then it's fairly common for a gynecological procedure to reveal that I have no pubic hair. That's both for AB reasons and for practicality, since hair traps odor and I can keep myself cleaner if I shave. Another thing that's happened more than once is having to be diapered for an overnight stay in the hospital.

I like to think I'm in the closet...but I wonder if the medical profession thinks I really am only two years old.

[Red Barchetta]

People act diferantly to differant things - they know certaint things can be very painful - and people are going to react to it differantly.

As for the wet pants and the diaper when staying over night - they deal with people (of all ages) that have incont. problems all the time. (And an ambulance is never doing to want to wait - for one thing you never know someone else might need it, and those few mins. can make all the differance in the world - also when they show up, they really don't know what exactly is wrong with you, and they don't want to be responsable for a delay getting you to those that really know what they are doing AND have all the proper tools. Also the amout of time it takes them is logged, if the trip takes too much longer then it is estimated that it should........)

But even if they do have some sort of an idea - they are professionals, they are not going to care one way or the other - just take care of the problem.

I fairly recently had surery done, and have no clue why - but woke up with a teddy bear, that appearently one of the nurses had put there. And while I didn't stay over night, while I was waiting to leave, the nurses changed my diaper a few times (I do have inconnt. problems), I just hurt too much to even try to stand up - never mind try to change it myself.

Well, I have been back there a few times since, for other reasons, and saw quite a few of the same people, and none have said a word about it, or acted in any way other then with compleate professional curticy. And just talking to them, I could tell they do remember my being there for the surgery.....

Basic point, medical professionals are one of the last groups you need to worry about in any case. Even if they do have some sort of an idea (and the way you described that, I got my doubts) they are not going to care - they are not going to mention it to anyone that was not there at the time unless you give them specific permission to do so, because they would be breaking the law if they did. And whatever it is, ods are they have seen it before.

But just a reaction to pain, wet pants, and diapers dosen't mean anything, other than it hurts a lot, and you have a prob. that lots of others do to.....

[Baby Mommy]

You're probably right about the ambulance. A dear friend of mine (who had once been my husband, but that's another story) passed away about a year and a half ago from a ruptured cerebral aneurysm. He was only 47. God rest his soul. His wife after me had heard him collapse in the bathroom and immediately called an ambulance. He was entirely naked, but of course they didn't have time to worry about his dignity. They had to load him up as he was, and get him to the hospital with no time to waste, where he never regained consciousness and died the next morning.

It could be that the paramedics were worried about possibly serious causes for my extreme abdominal pain and didn't feel they could wait for me to change before taking me to the hospital.