Once again, I’m reminded that incontinence never stops

[Enthusi]

I may have wrote about this topic before on here. I can’t remember.  But, has anyone else had the unfortunate luck of wearing a premium diaper to bed, wake up dry, hope to save the diaper, but fail in the process? 

Most nights I get my money’s worth out of a Megamax and stuffer, so to speak.  Though every now and then I will wake up inexplicably dry. @oznl I believe it was him, shrewdly pointed out that your progress (regress) waxes and wanes. It’s just part of the process.   

The problem is that even if I wake up dry, the first thing I usually do is shower, and it’s impossible to make it to the bathroom, let alone the shower in time.  Between gravity, a full bladder, and running water, it’s a lost cause for me. Once the flood gate opens, the diaper is unsalvageable.    I wouldn’t care except that a Megamax and stuffer costs around $4. Had I been able to make it to the shower, I would’ve saved $4! 

Again I bring this up in the context of what it means by incontinence doesn’t end.  I think it’s the financial “waste” of situations like this that are most annoying for me.  On the bright side, it is extremely validating to know that I need to keep the diaper on right until I hop in the shower.    That’s worth more than the $4! ?

[oznl]

Yep.  I find it totally annoying to be changing a premium nappy that has had anything LESS than premium usage.

On the subject of bedwetting and its caprice (at least in its early days), in my case I believe that my bedwetting has very little to do with incontinence and quite a lot to do with patterned behaviour.

If it was some kind of incontinence, it would be predictable but it isn’t.  I also know that my bedwetting events are unrelated to urinary urgency or full bladders.

Apart from the waxing and waning thing, another annoying aspect is that attempts to corral it so that it can be poked, prodded and analysed send it into hiding.

For me, bedwetting only happens when I don’t think about it too much (although it DOES seem to be becoming less “fragile” over time).

An interesting insight into this was a famous therapist who controversially “cured” a married bedwetting couple by instructing them to deliberately wet their bed together every night before going to sleep in it for a period of weeks (this was a true story).  It seems that by moving a subconscious behaviour into the conscious domain it was able to be brought under control.

What I have done is the REVERSE of this.  I have followed a practice consciously to the point where it has become subconscious and slipped outside conscious control.

[Kif]

Hehe, yep! 

Gosh I relate so hard to this, but I've been too squeamish to dump money into some premium diapers...so I stuck with cloth...but every day, I sweeear I'll just say f**k it and do it. I mean, I like how disposables feel anyway...But then exactly what you described will happen to me, lol. Thaaaat said, it would feel pretty neat knowing I need the diaper for the distance between bed and the shower despite the buyer's remorse ?

For real though, I do agree in how it seems subconscious...there were soooo many cases where I reviewed my journals and wet nights, and there def was some connection for me between (low) mood and wet nights. Aaaaalso alcohol...I rarely drink, and everytime has been nearly a guarantee of waking up wet..

[CodHero24]

If I limit fluids before bedtime, and put on a fresh diaper right before bed...I usually will wake up dry.

BUT, I'll wake up with a horrible dry mouth and an incredible thirst for water.

Therefore, I'd rather drink plenty of fluids before bed, allowing me to be properly hydrated for sleep time.

Which of course equals waking up to a very swollen bulging wet diaper...

To me, the cost is worth it, because a good nights sleep is very valuable.

I'm not sure what I enjoy more, Winter nights sleeping in Footy Pajamas and a Diaper,

Or Summer nights sleeping in JUST A DIAPER... ✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨

 

[Little Cub Pants]

42 minutes ago, CodHero24 said:

If I limit fluids before bedtime, and put on a fresh diaper right before bed...I usually will wake up dry.

BUT, I'll wake up with a horrible dry mouth and an incredible thirst for water.

Therefore, I'd rather drink plenty of fluids before bed, allowing me to be properly hydrated for sleep time.

Which of course equals waking up to a very swollen bulging wet diaper...

To me, the cost is worth it, because a good nights sleep is very valuable.

I'm not sure what I enjoy more, Winter nights sleeping in Footy Pajamas and a Diaper,

Or Summer nights sleeping in JUST A DIAPER... ✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨✨

 

I absolutely agree with you buddy! That's the number 1 advantage about wearing diapers, and wearing diapers to bed. You can drink as much water as you want and still get a good night's sleep! And you wake up with a fresh wet diaper in the morning!?☺️????????? And daddy can try and change you. Nothing like a good warm pee-pee diaper to start the day!?☺️??♥️? And daddy always says how proud he is of his little man for making an pee-pee in his diaper. Followed by a nice pee-pee rub before the diaper change.☺️♥️???????♥️? I ALSO like it when the diapie's super thick and crinkly!???????✨♥️?✨

[Kawaharu]

Being incontinent, it doesn’t matter if I use my diapers or not. They are still gonna get changed regardless if I use them or not. One nurse told me that to change consistently because you don’t want to develop a diaper rash. Diaper rashes are a constant threat to incontinent folks like me. It’s why I change my diapers on a regular schedule and give them time to air out to prevent diaper rashes from attacking me.

[Enthusi]

10 hours ago, oznl said:

If it was some kind of incontinence, it would be predictable but it isn’t.  I also know that my bedwetting events are unrelated to urinary urgency or full bladders.

I’m not sure how I feel about this.  What you’re saying makes sense.  Though if it is a learned behavior then it means it’s just another form of bladder control.  Though after a while I suppose it’s arbitrary. I doubt I have the ability to tell myself not to sleep wet when I’m wearing a diaper. Which means it is involuntary even if it is an acquired behavior. 
 

Have fun with that rabbit hole! 

[gmcchamp99]

In my early years of wearing I would wake up dry every so often and have many, many failed attempts in saving my dry diaper to use again. It was always disheartening. Those days were long before the printed AB/DL diapers came out. Abena's actually said XPLUS on the diaper and molicares were still purple and much thicker. 

[FretaBWet]

I was a heavy bed wetter until I was 17. The thing was every once in a while for no apparent reason I would have a dry night. My parents limited fluids after dinner from when I was young and it never made a difference. You would think I would be thrilled at having a dry night ( well people not on this site likely would) but I hated it. Every time it happened it was an opportunity for my mother to point out that see, you can stay dry at night but you're just too lazy to get up.

Hugs,

Freta

[oznl]

11 hours ago, Enthusi said:

I’m not sure how I feel about this.  What you’re saying makes sense.  Though if it is a learned behavior then it means it’s just another form of bladder control.  Though after a while I suppose it’s arbitrary. I doubt I have the ability to tell myself not to sleep wet when I’m wearing a diaper. Which means it is involuntary even if it is an acquired behavior.

It really is a bit of hair-splitting I suppose.  I've reached a point where I HAVE to wear nappies to bed to ensure the bed stays dry.  It's no longer a voluntary behavior but I believe it to be a behavior and not some kind of physiological development.  I believe that I am still continent during the day (although I've not tested in more than 6 months, perhaps I'm in for a shock there).  Assuming that I *can* be continent during the day, it's hard to see how a physical development would work on one side of the clock and not the other.   Because of this, I conclude that my bedwetting is a "learned" behavior although that does not automatically mean that is is trivially reversible.

11 hours ago, Enthusi said:

 I doubt I have the ability to tell myself not to sleep wet when I’m wearing a diaper.

Does that mean that your sleep-wetting is conditional on there being a diaper?  I know from bitter experience that in my case, a diaper is no longer required for an unplanned nocturnal void to occur.

[~Brian~]

Incontinence is a funny thing: not in the fact that you can’t control it, but that it is something that you either have a problem with in someway, which you’re born with or you have some other issue that’s causing it or it is something that you strive for. In my case, I have cerebral palsy and that causes issues that are subsets: this means that I would have cerebral palsy as the main condition, and then I would have other conditions that are not related to it, but incontinence is one of the conditions that can happen. I started having problems in 2019, but prior to that I was totally continent. It got to the point where I just couldn’t stand the fact that I was just going whenever it happened, and I didn’t have any control. Diapers help me with this so much because now I don’t have to worry if I release. If I can make it to a place where I can release in a public toilet or a toilet of my own, that is optimum, but barring that my diapers are there. I’m also getting used to the fact that my diapers are there and I use them. It doesn’t bother me as much anymore, the only problem is if I’m out somewhere I don’t wanna end up where I end up releasing in an inopportune place if I can help it.

incontinence is something that is a condition, and it is common I understand for people that have disabilities to have trouble with this. Some disabilities are cognitive some of them are neural and some of them are physical, wow some are all three. There are other disabilities that are cognitive and they caused other issues such as autism, down syndrome, Angelman syndrome, and other type of syndromes. If a person has no ability to control themselves, or they don’t have the ability to deal with it, diapers are Used and it’s quite common for this to happen. I figured that incontinence would be something that I would be dealing with as I aged, but then I realized that even if I could get to the bathroom every single time, there is an impediment to this. As I age it takes me a little bit longer to be able to move, and I have to move very carefully so I don’t hurt myself. When I have to do it this way I might lose valuable seconds that would help me to maintain continents until I reach a place where I can release. There’s also a safety component where I don’t wanna fall or slide or otherwise hurt myself, so the best way to take care of that is to use a diaper. Everybody that I have talked to says “it’s no big deal don’t worry about it it happens“. Everybody has been telling me this and I believe it, and I don’t think that will change, and I don’t want to spend the rest of my life worrying about stuff that I don’t have to worry about.  I now realize that all these people that I have been talking to right: I do not want to be in a position where I will be uncomfortable, or Place or myself at risk trying to get Into a bathroom. My parents bathrooms are a lot smaller than they were when I was a kid, and they were a lot easier for me to access when I was a kid. All of the access points that were there at the house when I was there have been removed, so I end up having to walk into a small bathroom and not have enough time to be able to turn around. Because I have to use my crutches now it is quite hard to be able to use the bathroom even. Even  when I’m at my dad’s the same way, The bathroom is small, and this is because it was built that way, and because of my crutches, this can cause an issue, or because of my walker, it can fill up the entire bathroom while I try to get myself situated: if I had grab bars in these bathrooms this would not be an issue, but I don’t live there anymore with my mom, so these have been removed.

So officially I believe they would call me functionally and medically Incontinent:  With my disability, I wonder sometimes If as I age I would be incontinent anyway – I mean I’m already functionally incontinent because of my age and because of my disability and limited mobility, so I’m wondering if that is something that happens to a lot more people, or if it’s just people like me. I know that limited mobility can be an issue, so that is one of the reasons why I asked the doctor for help. I did not want to go through the hell of having to have no control. Incontinence is something that is not predictable, and it is not something that is inevitable, But as you add disabilities on top of what is going on, the likelihood of incontinence increases. Incontinence is nothing to be afraid of, and I have a grasp on it and embraced it - I actually feel better now that I have this diagnosis, and I feel more confident because I know how to handle it, and this is a decision that I made, and I am living the life I want to live.  Body changes can cause issues that can lead to this if there are severe enough, but in my case something started to happen that made me wonder why the heck I was running every few minutes to the bathroom, not being able to sleep well, and other types of things. When you add everything together, the best answer was for me to use diapers:  At first I would wear diapers as necessary, and as things kept proceeding, I found that I sometimes lose control and instead of using the toilet, or hitting the “target” I would end up releasing on the floor. This is a safety hazard, as well as some thing that you have to clean up. Sometimes it really sucks when you lose control, but a diaper is something that will help you take care of this.

After wearing diapers on and off in 2019 because of issues, I found that they were helping me in Immense ways.  I had a diaper on, I felt safe, I didn’t have to worry about a release, I had four pairs of incontinence pants, that I could put over my diaper, and I finally came to the decision that more likely than not I would be using the bathroom too much, and that would mean that I would spend more time in the bathroom than doing anything else. In 2020, I decided to make the jump to diapers 24 seven, and I told my doctor of this decision. I told him the reason is is because I cannot be continually waiting for my body to decide what it’s going to do, I was losing sleep, And they were other issues that were causing me problems, and I guess with all the stress and everything going on it really really ate  at me. When I decided to go full-time 24 seven, a lot of things changed: my doctor ended up getting me set up with a megamaxes, he made sure that the community health team office was aware of everything going on, and they have been amazing. I told him that diapers have really changed my life for the better, and I am not afraid of them anymore and I’m not embarrassed about them anymore, and I’m not even Worried if I have to use it – it’s just something that happens, and I have been having an accidents anyway, coupled with IBS and diverticulitis, which can be ridiculously hard to deal with sometimes. All in all a diaper is what makes sense.

Incontinence is not “predictable“ the only thing that is “certain“ is that you Don’t have control for whatever reason: whether you have an issue that causes it, or your “plumbing is broken”.  The other “Certainties” are that one, eventually you will release whatever you release, in a diaper, and that you will have to deal with it. The second “certainty“ is that you will have to change that diaper and clean it up, dealing with the garbage that is produced. You don’t know the next time that you will have to do this, but you will know that you have to, so you make necessary changes so that you can deal with this. If you get into a rhythm of things, you will know that there are times when you should change, or when you should “air out“, and that is part of being able to take care of something that you will not know when and where will happen, but you know that you have it, and you manage it in an appropriate manner.

I am glad: I am glad because I now have a way to deal with the situation that I thought was going to be a pain in the butt: I would rather wear a diaper like a mega max, rather than having to worry that I will lose sleep, or that I will have accidents somewhere, or that I’ll end up hurting myself trying to move around. Incontinence does not have to be something that is bad: once you realize you have it, and you have a way to deal with it, that is the best way to be able to.  @Kawaharudecided that The way that she is going to deal with her incontinence is to become “an adult baby“. This way, she can live her life the way she feels is appropriate, and she doesn’t have to worry- her diaper it’s not only a protection against the adult life, but it is a protection against incontinence. The best way to handle some situations is to embrace them and let it happen. Some people potty train, as she says, some of them pass as others say, and some of them fail. I believe @Kawaharumade the right choice: life is too short to be worrying about whether you can stay dry, and you have to be able to live the life that make sense to you. Most of the deal is that you have to decide for yourself how you were going to deal with it. You’re already incontinent, so the next step after acceptance is to figure out how you were going to be able to deal with it, and she has figured that out, as I have!

have no fear, because there’s nothing to be afraid of – that’s what diapers are for!

Brian

[Enthusi]

12 hours ago, oznl said:

Does that mean that your sleep-wetting is conditional on there being a diaper?  I know from bitter experience that in my case, a diaper is no longer required for an unplanned nocturnal void to occur.

This is a shockingly difficult question to answer.  I’ve tried going diaper-free at night on multiple occasions. Typically I wake up a few hours later, dry and with a full bladder. It’s uncomfortable and insanely frustrating as I want the “real deal” incontinence.  However, it could once again be part of the “observer effect.”  When I don’t have a diaper on at night I sleep like junk, so I’m more likely to toss and turn and wake up at the slightest sensation.  Plus, I still usually can’t make it to the bathroom on time even if I woke up dry.  Repeated testing would helped but that just means repeated wet clothes and repeated wet bedwetting mats.  No thanks. 

[Kawaharu]

Being an adult baby is how I deal with being incontinent and being kept in diapers. It makes me feel feel less miserable and much more happier that I don’t have to potty like an adult anymore. Like @~Brian~ you have to learn to embrace and deal with being incontinent and don’t let it hinder you. I know being kept in diapers permanently means I don’t potty like an adult anymore and I don’t have to potty train anymore. It allows me to have an adult babyhood and be an adult in my own way. 

[Little Sherri]

On 3/28/2022 at 3:40 PM, FretaBWet said:

Every time it happened it was an opportunity for my mother to point out that see, you can stay dry at night but you're just too lazy to get up.

I had a similar experience. My parents never expressly stated that they thought that I was "being lazy", but they were elated when something they tried produced results, however fleeting, such as limiting fluids after dinner, or waking me up at midnight and again at 5 AM. I used to wake up with a dry mouth and a headache. However, occasional "successes" would inevitably be eclipsed by a return to normalcy, which, for me, as a kid, was wetting the bed almost every night. But success was hailed as proof of concept, however fleeting. "See?!? You CAN do it!!!" 

They also experimented with just letting me wet the bed for a while, taking me out of diapers - they exchanged my bedding for an old sleeping bag that smelled like mothballs, so that there was just one item to throw in the wash in the morning (my bed had a plastic sheet on it). However after a couple of weeks of crappy sleep on my part, waking up cold in a wet sleeping bag at 3 AM, they abandoned the initiative. Apparently, wearing diapers to bed wasn't causing me to wear diapers to bed, to @oznl's earlier point. The sleeping bag had become essentially a big diaper. 

As to @Enthusi's conundrum, I also hate wasting a premium diaper, so I try to plan out my changes so that if I have a relatively short stretch before hitting the shower, I'll wear a low-end medical diaper that sets me back $1 or less, assuming it is safe to do so. I never put the same diaper on after a shower, either, even if it has some mileage left in it. I shower before going to bed, typically, so in the morning, this is less of an issue, and also, I can still walk to the bathroom without dribbling (although running water can set me off), BUT, were I to find myself in his situation, what about simply, literally, pinching it? Pinch the end before you get up, walk over to the bathroom, use your other hand to drop your diaper, then step into the shower. They actually sell plastic clamps for this purpose as well, for people who need momentary continence, such as at a doctor's appointment, where they need to be naked but would prefer not to be leaking. 

[FretaBWet]

My mother did take me out of diapers before I was 5. I too had a plastic sheet on my bed but they didn't put me back in diapers, they just washed my bedding every day. Even now I can't understand the insanity of that. It's not like everybody didn't know I was a bed wetter. I guess when you don't get what you need as a child you sometimes get later as an adult when you can do for yourself.

Hugs,

Freta

[oznl]

11 hours ago, Enthusi said:

This is a shockingly difficult question to answer.  I’ve tried going diaper-free at night on multiple occasions. Typically I wake up a few hours later, dry and with a full bladder.

I tried this experiment nearly one year ago.  The first night was even worse than you described.  I got up to pee three to five times and the night was largely sleepless.

On the SECOND night, I was exhausted (due in large part to the previous night's lousy repose) and fell asleep quickly only to be woken at 3am bewildered as to why everything around my hips and bum was cold and wet.  I remember vividly the genuine confusion I felt about what had happened.  It seemed impossible to me that my bed was wet because I had wet it.  This was something I hadn't done for well more than half a century.

To be fair, to protect the doona (duvet or coverlet, choose your vernacular), I'd worn a thin pair of training pants under my pyjama pants to make sure any pee that escaped would be deflected downwards and confined to the sheets and mattress protector.  These training pants however had minimal absorbency of themselves and so I woke laying in a large, cold, puddle in thoroughly wet pyjama bottoms.  The presence of the training pants was a mere technicality.

I guess it's possible that some part of my brain in sleep-befuddled-mode THOUGHT I was diapered but it's unlikely.  My rational mind was well aware that my underwear would do nothing more than deflect pee to hopefully save a heavy cover I'd have no chance to get dry before my beloved returned from her travels.

My rational mind also did NOT want a wet bed.

Opportunities for risky experiments such as this have been vanishingly rare in the pandemic so I've no idea into how much further things have developed.  Maybe now I'd be wet on night #1.

This reminds me however of something I'd read about bedwetting earlier in children.  Apparently it's not uncommon for children to have a dry night when away visiting however the advice of the author was never to trust this because if they were regular wetters, they'd invariably wet on the second night.

Perhaps you need to try TWO nights in a row?

[DLJeff52]

I just wanted to thank everyone @Enthusi @oznl for the great discussion thread here!  My 5 months is next Monday and I am finding that my first one or two wettings at night are now while I'm asleep but then I will usually wake up at 5-6am with the need to pee, but usually a semi-erection has prevented a natural release.  I'm not sure if my conscious is worried about a full diaper leaking (I use the babykins Terry-lined plastic pants over a Better Dry and it never leaks), or if the fullness of the diaper is causing a constricting feeling to create the semi-erection, but I am so encouraged by the many varied and lengthy ebbs and flows that people have shared around this process that it gives me peace to know it will happen in time.

Occasionally, I will wake up at the 5am with a dry diaper and I am torn about the idea of using the overnight diaper in that instance, but usually am still too groggy to care!  Haven't had an episode where I lost it on the way to the shower, but just the other day I noticed myself peeing in the shower and hadn't felt any urge coming on / wasn't aware before it started.

Funny how these little things become the big things!  Anyway, thanks again for sharing!

[Enthusi]

@DLJeff52 I love when you share your progress!  It sounds like you’re progressing at a nice pace (not too fast, not too slow).   How are you doing with getting comfortable being wet without a diaper on?  For better or for worse, it seems that’s part of the the untraining process.  For a while there I had a rule about not holding it in when not diapered.  It’s kind of annoying and for many people icky to think about, but it really did help me overcome the fear of having an accident.  Have you considered doing the same? 

[DLJeff52]

@Enthusi Great feedback and thanks again for your encouragement.  While I am committed to not holding back, diapered or not, I'm also not creating many chances for a "pant wetting" to occur, meaning I've been diapered pretty consistently!  In the first two months, I would intentionally not wear diapers so I would wet my pants to reinforce the need for wearing a diaper.  This led to me peeing in very public places and having the humiliation of not really being able to explain wet jeans etc.  I have since not created these opportunities, but am interested to explore if I should continue with these as a form of re-training.  Wide open to your (or anyone else's) thoughts and experiences!

Merci!

[Enthusi]

1 hour ago, DLJeff52 said:

@Enthusi Great feedback and thanks again for your encouragement.  While I am committed to not holding back, diapered or not, I'm also not creating many chances for a "pant wetting" to occur, meaning I've been diapered pretty consistently!  In the first two months, I would intentionally not wear diapers so I would wet my pants to reinforce the need for wearing a diaper.  This led to me peeing in very public places and having the humiliation of not really being able to explain wet jeans etc.  I have since not created these opportunities, but am interested to explore if I should continue with these as a form of re-training.  Wide open to your (or anyone else's) thoughts and experiences!

Merci!

I’ve tested myself by going without a diaper in public on a few occasions. I was extremely cautious to not draw attention to myself or leave an unhygienic mess for others to deal with.   Each and every time I soaked my pants.  It’s one of these things I’m glad I did it for the validation. It turned out fine because I was careful, but in hindsight it was horrifically dumb.   

[DLJeff52]

9 minutes ago, Enthusi said:

I’ve tested myself by going without a diaper in public on a few occasions. I was extremely cautious to not draw attention to myself or leave an unhygienic mess for others to deal with.   Each and every time I soaked my pants.  It’s one of these things I’m glad I did it for the validation. It turned out fine because I was careful, but in hindsight it was horrifically dumb.   

Sounds exactly like my experience.  On the one hand it mentally committed me to the goal I had set of not holding back, no matter what.  It also showed me that ultimately, it really isn't as bad as you think it will be when accidents happen.  I may incorporate something like this on a weekly basis so I can stay aligned with my goal and also to just get a sense of where my progression may be at!  

I know we are veering off the thread topic, but really appreciate the insights!