Back to Basics

J. Nash

           

 

“I can’t believe you’re fourteen years old and you still wet your bed! Man that’s so lame!” my brother said. Well, my step-brother, Adam. He’s a couple of months younger than me. His Dad had met my Mom at a condo time-share sales meeting; they fell for each other, and just got married. So now it was a summer of love. We had been a happy family for only a week. Well, I don’t know about happy. Since finding out about my chronic enuresis Adam was constantly teasing. “You need to be put in diapers like a baby,” he said. “Wayne’s a big retarded bedwetting baby!”

 

            I had been a bedwetter all my life, fourteen soggy, smelly years, some worse than others, but right now was as bad as it had ever been, and my brother wasn’t helping. I was wetting almost every night. I had always refused to wear Goodnites or diapers, a refusal that was barely tolerated by my Mom, who had often threatened to put me back in them. (‘You wet like a baby, you should wear diapers like one…’) I had become good at hiding wet sheets and underwear and tee-shirts or whatever (I never wore pj’s), and doing laundry when my Mom was out, so she had no idea how often I was wetting. She only insisted that I have a plastic sheet on my mattress, and while I sure didn’t like the idea, I accepted it as a necessary embarrassment. Now, suddenly, I didn’t have a room to myself anymore, and Adam was constantly complaining about the smell of urine, and of being woken up in the middle of the night when I had to change my sheets. Lately he complained that he had done badly on a test at school because of interrupted sleep thanks to me. He really wanted my Mom to put me in diapers, and was pushing for it. He had a point, but just the thought of being put back in diapers made my knees go weak. I couldn’t wear diapers! I wasn’t a baby!

 

            I soaked my whole bed, even my pillow. It was 2 a.m., and I was exhausted. My blanket was wet as it had got wrapped around me, but my comforter was mostly dry, so instead of changing the bed I got rid of my soaked boxers for a clean pair and tee-shirt, lay on half my comforter on the floor, and covered myself with the other half.

            “Man, it stinks in here!” Adam woke up complaining again, but he was right. My bed had stayed wet all night, and worse, I had wet again, as I soon discovered, right through my comforter and into the carpet. It really did smell bad, and I was very embarrassed. At breakfast Adam told my Mom what I had done.

            “Really, I can’t stand it anymore. The carpet’s going to stink for weeks. How can I invite anyone over? Charlie’s always letting me sleep over and I can’t return the favor ‘cause Wayne pees the bed. It’s not fair!” Adam said

            “I have to agree with him, dear,” my new step-Dad said. I knew he saw my bedwetting as a sign of weakness, something that should be corrected somehow, or at least controlled. He had mentioned more than once that when he was young, some kids got spanked for it. “Adam is losing sleep, they both are, and the room does smell bad, in fact the whole upstairs does. How long are you going to let this go on?”

            “Well, I see your point. And Wayne, you were irresponsible not to change your wet bed, and then to wet on the carpet. Enough is enough. It’s time for a change.”

            “Yeah,” Adam said, “a diaper change. It really is about time!”

 

            My Mom left it at that, but I was afraid of what was coming, and Adam immediately began taunting me out of earshot of my parents. “Hah, you’re finally going to have to wear diapers! Just like a baby! Finally! YES!” Just before I left for school, my Mom called me. “Wayne, I want you to come straight home from school this afternoon, ok?” I thought I knew why. “Gotta go get some diapers!” Adam said. Of course he was right. All day in school I had trouble concentrating, dreading what I knew was going to happen. Three o’clock finally came, and I slowly made my way home. With Adam. “This should be fun,” he said as we arrived.

            My Mom was waiting. “Do you want a compression bandage for your knee, Adam? If so you can come with us to the medical supply store, or I’ll just get you one.” Adam had hurt his knee a couple of days earlier playing basketball.

            “Sure, I’ll come,” he said. I wasn’t counting on this. My shame would likely be bad enough without another witness, this one in particular.

            We drove mostly in silence for about fifteen minutes, and my Mom pulled into the lot at Regency Medical Supplies. I was a bit numb, scared. We went inside. Adam immediately found what he was looking for, as I pretended to myself that this was the only reason for our visit. Then before I knew it we were standing in front of a large selection of adult and youth diapers. It was awful. I wanted to cry. There were disposable diapers, cloth diapers, plastic and rubber pants, waterproof sheeting, bed pads. Everything you could think of for incontinent people or bedwetters. I wanted to sink through the floor. A young man came up to us, he was older than Adam and me, but not that much, maybe twenty.

            “Can I help you?” he said to my Mom.

            “Yes. There’s no point in beating around the bush. I need to buy some diapers for this young man here,” she said, indicating me. “He’s a chronic bedwetter.” He looked at me. So did Adam. “He’s still a bedwetter.” Adam repeated, just to rub it in.

            “Ok, would you like disposable or cloth diapers? Is he a heavy wetter?”

            “Yes, he is, and he’s wetting almost every night. What would you recommend?”

            “Well these youth disposable diapers are popular. They come with leg and waist gathers, and have a wetness indicator, although I guess that’s not important if he’s just going to be in diapers at night.” I couldn’t believe it. They looked like Pampers, and they were talking about putting me in them. Adam was smirking. I was quaking. I felt like I needed to pee. Badly.

            “Or we have these cloth youth diapers, by Babykins,” he continued, demonstrating. “They call them ‘Kins’ when they’re for youth or adults. They’re flannelette, and as you can see, quite thick in the middle—six layers thick, for great absorbency, and you can add folded cloth baby diapers inside if you require even more. Of course with these he’ll have to wear plastic or rubber pants, but most parents of bedwetters find it’s still cheaper in the long run, and you get fewer leaks with cloth diapers and waterproof pants.” It was such a shock to be referred to as someone who would be wearing diapers and rubber or plastic pants! I felt like such a baby! A helpless freak! I wanted to ask my Mom if we could just leave, forget about it.

            “I think we’ll go with cloth.”

            “Fine, I suggest a medium. Plain white, or would you like colors or prints?”

            “White is fine. I’ll take six of them for now.”

            “Ok and what about waterproof pants? We have Babykins vinyl and also a very good and durable rubber pant, also by Babykins.” I couldn’t believe this was happening!

            “I’ll take two plastic and two rubber pants for now.” Rubber pants! For me!

            “Fine. Again, size medium. I assume he already has a plastic sheet on his bed?”

            “Yes he does thanks. Do you have any diaper pins?”

            “No ma’am, we don’t carry those. You just need to pick up some diaper pins for babies. They work fine. Any pharmacy or department store will have them. But I would suggest a change pad. They can come in very handy. We have them in a size that’s suited for youth or adults.”

            We paid for the diapers, pants, change pad, and Adam’s bandage and left the store. I couldn’t look at Adam, who kept smirking at me. Well, at least I hadn’t wet my pants like I thought I might, but I dreaded what would happen in the evening.

            “Mom, are you actually going to physically diaper him?” Adam asked.

            “Yes I am, and we’ll see how it goes from there.” And now a big surprise: “You’ll have to learn how too, but don’t worry; it’s not exactly rocket science.” Great! My mean step-brother was going to diaper me! My humiliation was complete! Let me just die and get it over with! My step-brother was going to diaper me like a baby! No! Mom stopped at a pharmacy.

            “Adam, run in and get some Tylenol for your knee. Oh and some diaper pins, and some baby powder.” He went, and came back with Johnson & Johnson baby powder and two packages of blue diaper pins. He waved them under my nose. “Blue, ‘cause you’re a boy!” he laughed. “They had pacifiers too; I should have got you one. And Mom, they had diaper rash ointment. Shouldn’t we get him some?”

            “We will if and when he needs it.”

 The smell of baby powder seemed to fill the car, and filled me with shame.

 

            That evening I felt every second ticking by, bringing me ever closer to my doom. My diapers and waterproof pants (Adam couldn’t resist calling them my ‘baby pants’) were still in their bag on a chair in the kitchen, a reminder to me whenever I came near that this nightmare was real. My Dad examined one of the diapers and a pair of the rubber pants and shook his head, as if I was the most pathetic creature he had ever seen. Adam saw the disappointed look.

            “Well, at least now his bed will stay dry,” my brother said.

            At around eight o’clock my Mom appeared with the bag of my supplies plus the diaper pins and powder and said “Ok, it’s time. Let’s go upstairs. First go and get your brother. Like I said, he needs to learn how to diaper you. She never minced words.” So I had to find Adam and somehow tell him that it was time for me to be diapered. He didn’t make it easy, and made me almost spell it out. “Mom wants you to come upstairs.”

            “Why?”

            “You know why.”

            “No I don’t. Why?”

            “You know. The bedtime thing”

            “Oh right! I forgot! She’s going to put you in diapers, ‘cause you’re a big baby bedwetter. Ok, let’s go.”

 

            I had just assumed my Mom would change me on my bed, but I guess she considered it too low for her sore back, and decided to use the much higher plain work table that was in our room. It’s about 5 ½ feet long, the type you might buy at Office Depot or whatever, and it easily doubled as a change table. This sort of threw me for a loop, especially when she placed my new quilted change pad on it. It really looked like an oversized infant’s change table. She chose a diaper, and a pair of rubber pants, and then took some diaper pins from one of the packages. The baby powder was standing nearby. All this ‘baby’ stuff and my unwilling role in it was overwhelming, and I was numb. Again. It was all happening before my eyes, but I still couldn’t believe I was about to be put in diapers. Sure I was a bedwetter, but this was too much.

            “Alright Wayne, take off your pants and underwear, and hop up on the change pad. You can keep your tee-shirt on.” My brother had a sadistic grin on his face. “Adam, I want you to observe how I do this, so that you can diaper him as well when I’m not available, or just to give me a break. And here I thought I was all finished with changing diapers.”

            “Why can’t I just do it?” I asked pathetically.

            “Because I’m taking control of your wetting because you won’t. Later on, if you show you’re responsible, you might earn that privilege, but for now I will do the diapering, and your brother will help.” So I could ‘earn’ the ‘privilege’ of diapering myself if I was lucky. Some privilege! But I still hadn’t moved.

            “Did you hear what I said? Pants and underwear off! Now!”

            I guess the shame of it all was making me slow, almost paralyzed. Having to submit to the indignity of being diapered like a baby in front of my mocking step-brother was too much for me. He had never even seen me naked, even though we shared a room. That’s how shy I was. And of course my mother hadn’t seen me without pants on for a long, long time. Things were happening too fast.

            “Very well. Young man, you just earned yourself a spanking. Darn it, you’re going to see that I mean business. Adam, please go to the closet in my room and get the leather strap you’ll find hanging there.” This hadn’t been used before. It had been my real father’s, and was apparently used occasionally on him and his brothers as boys. Just the faintest hint of its possible use had always been enough to keep me in line. Now it was actually going to be used on me for the first time. I was shocked, scared, and horrified. A real spanking! With the strap! What a disgrace! Was this really happening?

            “Wayne, you can do like I said, or I’ll get your father and Adam to help me, and you’ll just get extra, believe me. It’s up to you.”

            It finally sunk in that it was futile to resist, and in a moment I was wearing only my tee-shirt and socks. I was hugely embarrassed, and I think probably crimson from head to toe. I was shaking.

            “Fine. Now you can lean over the table and wait for your spanking to begin.” I did as I was told, excruciatingly conscious of my nakedness, and in a few moments Adam was back with the strap. He didn’t say anything, but I figured he must be very amused. I stole a disbelieving backward glance at it as he handed it to my mother. It was of dark brown leather, about 2 ½ feet long, four or five inches wide, and looked quite thick. It had a wooden handle. I had seen it before, of course, but it never looked so menacing, so scary. My Mom made me wait what seemed like forever before I felt the first bite of the leather on my butt. (I later found out that this delay was a deliberate technique to increase the anticipation and humiliation of the ordeal.) After the first slow ten strokes I was crying from both shame and pain, and at fifteen I wanted to beg her to stop, but the spanking continued for ten more stinging whacks. My butt was on fire when she finally stopped and told me to get on the ‘change table’. I had no fight in me and just lay there on the change pad as she picked up a diaper. My brother seemed sort of in awe of what he was seeing.

            Mom moved the bottom of my tee-shirt out of the way. “Ok, Adam, here’s how it’s done. Sprinkle some powder on the diaper where it will cover his rear, then sprinkle some on his front, then get him to lift up--lift your butt, Wayne—slide the diaper under him, like that, bring it up between his legs, and pin it securely on either side, there…and there. Be careful with the pins, and make sure you pin it tight to avoid leaks. Then just slide his rubber or plastic pants all the way up—lift up again, Wayne---making sure the diaper is completely inside. Like so. Think you can manage that?”

            “Duh, I dunno,” Adam said, and laughed. “Man, does he ever look like a dweeb! A baby dweeb!”

            “And if you have to spank him, don’t spank harder than I did, and no more than thirty strokes, maximum.”

            “So I actually get to spank him?” Adam asked. “Bonus!”

            “Only if he gives you good reason, and only after consulting with me or your father.” This was incredible. Not only was my technically younger brother going to be putting me in diapers, but he even had permission to use corporal punishment on me, something I had no doubt he’d take advantage of. Too much!

 

            So here I was, totally defeated, humiliatingly spanked and in diapers in front of my mother and step-brother. The diaper felt really thick and bulging on me, and felt very strange between my legs. The rubber pants made noise at the slightest movement, and I reeked of baby powder. This was total and complete mortification, with no end in sight.

            “Now let that spanking be a lesson to you, Wayne,” my Mom said. “We have better things to be doing than to be changing your diapers, so you just cooperate fully or you’ll get a spanking every time. Is that clear? The strap is going to stay right here in your room as a reminder.” She put it on top of my dresser; later it would hang in my closet. I wasn’t thinking clearly, but I had already decided that whatever happened, I would do whatever it took to avoid another spanking.

            “Can I have pants?”

            “No. I think until further notice you can just wear your diapers and rubber pants and think about why you need to be in them. None of your pants would fit over them anyway.”

            “But everyone will see me!” This made Adam laugh.

            “Well that’s your problem. The solution is to stop wetting the bed and then you won’t need to wear diapers.”

            “Or baby pants,” Adam helpfully added.

 

            When my step-father saw me in my diapers later he just shook his head. It was clear he thought I was some kind of disgrace, while his precious Adam could do no wrong. It made me feel even worse to see the waistband of Adam’s boxer shorts peeking out of the top of his jeans, a reminder of how low I’d fallen. It didn’t help when he ‘playfully’ swatted me on my sore backside through my rubber pants. For once I couldn’t wait for bedtime, but had a hard time falling asleep. Partly it was the intense shame of my spanking and my first night back in diapers, but also from the bulk of the diaper and the heat from the rubber pants. I woke up in the middle of the night temporarily forgetting about my awful new situation until my hand touched my smooth rubber pants, and my shame came flooding back to me (no pun intended). Now I had as just much in common with a baby as with the fourteen year old I wanted to be. I was also soaking wet, but for once the bed wasn’t.

 

            After a few minor leaks and more complaints from Adam about imagined urine smells, my Mom decided to add flannelette baby diapers to what I was already wearing. She made me go to Wal-Mart after school and buy a package of 10 Snugabye 27x27 inch diapers, two of which she (or Adam, but my Dad has never changed me) would fold in thirds lengthwise and add to the inside of my Babykins. It added some bulk, but it’s not as if someone was going to notice because of that when I was already obviously wearing thick diapers and plastic or rubber pants and was waddling around like an infant. But buying diapers is risky and embarrassing, and there’s a rule that if something can go wrong when the stakes are that high it will, and it did. I was waiting in line at the checkout, doing my best to hide the package of diapers. To my relief they finally ended up in a bag, bought and paid for. But when I left the store I ran smack into three kids from my school, Kevin Jones and two other boneheads. The problem was that the logo and lettering on the Snugabyes were visible through the thin department store plastic bag. I did my best to conceal it, but Kevin noticed. Maybe he had a baby brother and recognized the package.

            “What you got there?” he said.

            “Nothing.”

            “Looks like something. Looks like you bought yourself some diapers. That right, Wayne? Did little Wayne get some new diapers?” He said this in quasi baby talk.

            “No.”

            “Oh. ’Cause I heard you still wear diapers. That right?”

            One of his friends grabbed the bag from my hands, and soon the three of them were passing my package of diapers around like a football. The bag was on the floor.

            “I heard you still wet the bed every night still and need to wear diapers like a baby. That’s what I heard, anyway.”

            After awhile a security guard approached and they got tired of the game and threw me a pass. “Here you go, baby.” But they knew. The whole school knew.

 

            To prove that rule is true—I had another embarrassing similar incident—my Mom sent me to a medical supply store to buy rubber pants. I hung around outside for almost an hour before working up the courage to go inside. I waited until the counter didn’t look too busy, grabbed the three pairs of Babykins (or ‘Kins’) rubber pants I had been told to get (my Mom seemed to favor them), shakily paid and left the store with my purchase in my backpack. An alarm sounded, and I was escorted back inside by a security guard. The clerk said there must be a theft-prevention tag inside something that I bought, so before I knew it he had my three pairs of rubber pants out of their packaging and on the counter, and was examining each pair, holding them up, sticking his hand inside, searching. The commotion had alerted everyone nearby, and they all watched as this happened. There was a boy around twelve who looked at me wide-eyed, as if he couldn’t believe what he was seeing. I heard his mother (I presume) say, “They’re like baby pants, but for big boys who still wet the bed or their pants.” Big boys like me. Turned out the alarm was set off by a rental DVD I had in my packsack. All that embarrassment for nothing!

 

            Being a bedwetter is bad enough, but you can hope it doesn’t happen, or if you do wet you can change the bed and get past it, and tell yourself maybe it won’t happen again. But when you’re made to wear diapers the shame continues on whether you’re wet or dry. That’s what I was finding out. Every night from 7 o’clock (or whenever my Mom or Adam arbitrarily decided), my dignity and self-esteem plunged to zero and stayed there while I spent the whole evening in my diapers, a walking advertisement that I was still a baby/bedwetter. The odd night that I stayed dry I still spent in diapers. I can see that someone might give up even trying. They say ‘clothes define the man’. Well diapers are clothes too, and in this case you could say that they re-defined the ‘man’ backwards, all the way back to babyhood. They are what everyone notices, and no-one looks beyond. Wayne isn’t the boy who’s good in math, he’s the fourteen year-old kid who still wears diapers and wets them.

 

            Getting changed by my brother was very very hard to endure, and he was now doing most of the diapering. My Mom had increased his allowance to compensate him for it, and she diapered me only when he was away for the night, for example. If he was going out early, then he ‘took care’ of me early, and if he changed his mind about going out, too bad. Usually he had diapers ready and powdered on the change table (as they now openly called it), and a pair of waterproof pants selected. I was expected to quickly undress, get on the table, and cooperate, which I always did. If he forgot the powder, then when I was standing he’d insert a finger or two inside the waistband of my plastic pants, inside the top my diapers, tug a little, and dump some in front, then in back. Then, sometimes with a swat on my plasticized (or rubberized) butt, I was ‘free’ to go. “My work here is done,” he might say, laughing.

 

            So far I hadn’t received a dreaded spanking from my brother, but I came close. Some of his friends had been over at various times and seen me in my diapers, and all had been fairly cruel in their comments, in one way or another. I could hardly even blame them. His friend Bryce never failed to call me ‘Baby Wayne’ for example, while others just laughed or made stupid comments ‘Man, wearing diapers is so retarded!’ Charlie said when he first saw me. Or, ‘I think someone needs his diapers changed!’ But the first time he actually had a friend in the room at change time, I balked. I didn’t even know Axel was there. I got called to the room, where as usual a thick diaper with inserts was waiting on the change table, and Axel was at the far end with a disbelieving look on his face. He hadn’t yet seen me in diapers, much less the process of being put in them. I stopped dead.

            “See? I told you,” Adam said. “Ok Wayne, go ahead.” I didn’t.

            “Look, Wayne, we have stuff to do, so either cooperate right now or you get the strap.” He told Axel to look in the closet.

            “Man, oh man! That looks like it must hurt! It’s wicked!”

            “I’m sure it does. Up to you, Wayne. Right now or you get a spanking. It’s a no-brainer, bro. Either way you end up in diapers, as usual.” He would have to ask Mom to authorize a spanking, but I knew my odds wouldn’t be good. So I reluctantly complied. It was tough.

            Axel watched the whole thing in fascination, as if it were a freak show, which I guess it was. This was one of the times my brother forgot the baby powder, and remembered as I got to my feet. As I hung my head in shame he inserted some into my diapers, front and rear.

            “Now get lost, Wayne, we have stuff to do,” he said, smacking my behind on the plastic, making a loud noise.

            “Man, I can’t believe what I’m seeing,” Axel said. As I crinkled away to try to find a hiding place to die in, I heard Adam say “We’re not trying to be mean. He wets every night, and if he’s not in diapers the smell gets putrid.”

 

            The Axel incident may have prepared me for an even worse one. Adam had a new girlfriend, Rachel. She had already made it clear that she thought I was an infantile geek, and I tried to keep my distance from her, especially when I was in diapers. She could be scathing about my wetting and the fact that I still wore diapers. (‘My brother is three and even he doesn’t wet the bed.’) One evening Adam was in the process of diapering me when she walked in. The diapers were covering me, but weren’t yet pinned on. His cell-phone rang, and I was left lying there like that. I tried to think of something to say, but there was nothing, and I probably wouldn’t have been able to speak anyway.

            “Adam, we have to go.” She was looking at me with the look she reserved for the lowest of the low—a pathetic diapered bedwetter. She resented the fact that her boyfriend had to ‘baby-sit’ me, as she put it, something which was sort of true, as I was never allowed to be alone, and sometimes this interfered with Adam’s plans. Adam was in a deep discussion with his friend Charlie, which didn’t sound like it was about to end soon. He motioned to her.

            “Hook him up will you?”

            “What?”

            “Pin him up him for me, and put him in his plastic pants. I have to talk to Charlie about later.” He went back to his conversation. She didn’t hesitate.

            “Have you been powdered?” I couldn’t answer. She lifted my diapers and saw that I hadn’t been. Then she grabbed the Johnson & Johnson’s and sprinkled powder all over my front. She repositioned the diapers and pinned them on me, first the left side, then the right. Tight. My eyes were closed, but I felt as my feet were inserted into the pair of plastic pants that Adam had selected. I felt them go up my shins and calves, my thighs. They crinkled a lot.

            “Lift your butt.” I did as I was told, and she pulled the plastic pants over my diapers. I felt her checking at the legs and waist to make sure I was completely covered.

            “There. You know, I’ve changed lots of diapers on lots of babies, Wayne, and so far you’re the biggest one.” I got off the change table, and on shaky legs slunk out of her sight just as Adam ended his call.

 

            I was standing in the den where my parents were watching TV when Adam and Rachel came in to announce they were going over to Charlie’s.

            “Don’t you feel a bit silly being in diapers in front of Adam’s girlfriend?” my Dad asked. He never missed a chance to shame me, maybe thinking it would somehow help me stop wetting.

            “Um, I guess so,” I answered lamely. He couldn’t possibly know how foolish I felt right then. Adam and Rachel started to laugh.

            “What’s so funny?” my Dad wanted to know.

            “Guess who diapered him?” Adam asked. My parents looked at Rachel quizzically.

            “Adam was on the phone, and we were in a hurry. Don’t worry; I’ve changed lots of babies. I know what I’m doing,” Rachel said. I thought my parents would be upset, but they laughed.

            “So you were changed by an expert,” my Mom said to me, and they all laughed. “Rachel, we should hire you to baby-sit.” I didn’t know if she was kidding.

           

            Adam’s new girlfriend inspired him to new heights of hygiene, with not very happy results for me. I had to have a shower in the mornings, for obvious reasons, but now as often as not I couldn’t get in the bathroom because Adam was suddenly so meticulous about cleanliness. That particular problem was solved after I came home with a note for my Mom from Mrs. Collins, my home-room teacher. More than once I had been forced to go to school without showering, and as the day wore on my urine smell became obvious and offensive, not to mention the source of much ridicule from several students, including Kevin Jones and his brain-dead friends from the mall (‘I think Wayne forgot to wear his diapers last night…’) But then there was another problem. Adam had been complaining about my doing diaper laundry in the washing machine. He claimed that my diapers left a ‘pee smell’ in the washer, and he didn’t want his clothes to become, as he said, ‘contaminated’. He argued and harangued until my Dad cut him off by announcing that from now on I could wash my diapers in the laundry room sink and hang them to dry on the rack that was there. This was a pain, of course, and time-consuming, but the fact was that I could never get them as clean as the washing machine, with the result that they always had a slight but unmistakable smell of urine. So when I was in my diapers I always smelled of pee and baby powder only sweetened it a little.

 

            The inevitable finally happened, as I knew it must sooner or later—I got a spanking from my brother, but that was nothing compared to what would come later.

            My mother was never shy about talking to other mothers (or anyone at all, for that matter) about my wetting, and she discovered (maybe at a PTA meeting, I don’t know) that Mrs. O’Connor’s thirteen year old son Richard (I knew him) a chronic bedwetter, had now been dry for almost four months. Convinced her son was now over his problem; Mrs. O’Connor offered to give all his diapers, plastic pants and other stuff to my Mom to use on me. ‘No point in letting it go to waste,’ they had apparently agreed, although the plastic sheet would stay on Richard’s bed awhile longer, just in case. They agreed on a date and time to drop off the supplies.

 

            They came around 4 pm on a Tuesday. I didn’t know Richard very well, (and hadn’t known he was a bedwetter) and was surprised that he would show up with his Mom to give me a bunch of diapers and plastic pants that he had worn. But I guess she made him, because here he was, carrying an oversized diaper pail that looked heavy. His eyes were on the ground as small talk was made. Of course my brother had to be there, and was already amused.

            “Do you already have a diaper pail for Wayne?” Mrs. O’Conner asked my Mom.

            “No, actually that will come in very handy,” my Mom answered. “He’s just been using garbage bags. I was thinking of getting one. It’s more hygienic.”

            “Now there are all these diapers, some of them quite new,” Mrs. O’Connor said, reaching into the diaper pail and retrieving one. There are Babykins, which I know Wayne already wears, and also diapers from RP Diaper Designs which are ten layers thick in the middle. There are also various pairs of plastic pants, pins, and whatnot. Change pads, wipes, and medical gloves for changing wet diapers.”

            “Richard, you must be happy to be giving all this babyish stuff away?” my Mom asked. He just nodded. “Maybe someday we’ll be able to give all Wayne’s diapers away.” I had been squirming uncomfortably since Richard and his Mom arrived, and especially so since she started talking about my getting Richard’s diapers and plastic pants. I guess it was just too much, and now I realized what had almost happened at the medical supply store had now happened for real. My pants were wet. When my mother noticed, her jaw went slack. Adam said “Holy cow, Wayne peed his pants!” Everyone looked at me in disbelief. I didn’t know what to say. My Mom was furious. She could hardly speak.

           

“Adam, I want you to take your brother and his new things upstairs, clean him up, and diaper him. But before you put him in his diapers, I’d like you to give him a good spanking.” Upstairs we went. It turned out that there were some Huggies wipes in the diaper pail, and my brother made me wipe myself off with one of them while he waited with the strap. I was very upset that I had wet myself, that I was about to be spanked for it, that my brother would be delivering the punishment, and that Richard was aware that I was about to be spanked, and that he’d be seeing me in diapers after my spanking. I hoped that he and his mother would leave, but I knew that it was unlikely. Adam had placed everything from the diaper pail on my change table, and had put my wet jeans and underwear in it. Now I stared at my shameful new diapers and plastic pants as I leaned over the table, arms outstretched. My brother made me wait, and just as I thought the first stroke must come, his cell-phone rang, and I was kept waiting even longer.

“Charlie. Hi. Listen, I’ll have to call you back. I’m just about to give Wayne a spanking. Oh, he peed his pants. Yeah, I know. Ok. Talk to you later. Bye.” Another few moments and I felt the stinging leather against my skin. He spanked me a full thirty times, and by the end of it I was a quivering mess. I honestly didn’t think I’d be able to sit for a long time. On the change table I already knew what would happen. Adam grabbed one of Richard’s really thick diapers, added a couple of baby diapers, and pinned them on me. Then he took, as I knew he would, a pair of yellow snap-on plastic pants and snapped them on over my diapers. They were one of several pairs of ‘nursery print’ pants, basically yellow with koala bears on them. Another pair was blue with other animals on them. When I was on my feet he added baby powder. “How does it feel to be wearing another baby’s diapers?” he taunted. I was still crying.

 

Back downstairs, all eyes were on my plastic pants. My diapers bulged even more than normal, and I was painfully conscious that everyone knew that I had just been given a spanking. Richard avoided eye-contact, and so did I. except for the carpet.

“Oh I see you found the nursery prints, Adam,” said Mrs. O’Connor. “Poor Richard hated wearing those. They came by mistake with an order of plain plastic pants, but they’re perfectly good, and I wasn’t going to throw them away.”

“Well, as long as they’re waterproof, what’s the difference? He can wear them,” my mother added. Richard and his Mom stayed for another excruciating half-hour. Before they left my mother thanked them for the baby stuff and I was forced to thank them as well. I was changed into diapers for a week as soon as I got home from school, and was in them twenty-four hours for two whole weekends. On one of the afternoons I got home before my brother, who had some work to do at the library. Not knowing this, Rachel came over to wait for him. My Mom complained about having to make a bunch of phone calls on behalf of the PTA, and of having to diaper me. “I never thought I’d still be changing diapers when my kid was fourteen,” she said.

“Don’t worry, I’ll do it,” Rachel said.

“You don’t mind? It would be a big help. You don’t think it’s sort of improper? After all he’s a boy…”

“Not at all. For me it’s just a simple matter of putting a baby in diapers, that’s all. It’s no different. No problem.’ She prepared my diapers on the change table, and then looked away while I got undressed and climbed onto the table. She powdered me, pinned my diapers on me, and put me in plastic pants. “There,” she said when she was done. “Baby’s got his diapers on. No big deal.” Later, downstairs my Mom thanked her, and asked me if I had.

 

My Dad dropped a bombshell one evening.. “Adam and your mother tell me that you’re wetting your diapers every night. Is that right?”

“Well, not every single night,” I protested.

“Pretty darn close,” Adam said.

“Here. Take this. It’s a calendar. From now on every morning when you get up you’ll mark a ‘W’ for wet and ‘D’ for dry on the appropriate date. Adam will check you. Keep it on the wall near your bed. At the end of the week, on Sunday, before you get diapered, Adam will count up the ‘W’s for the previous week, and for every one you’ll get five strokes with the strap. We’ll see if that smartens you up any.” I knew he was upset with my wetting, but a weekly spanking! And potentially 35 strokes, which was five more than the maximum I could get now! Adam was snickering. “I’m going to love this!” he said.

From then on I had to report to Adam in the morning, and it was he who marked my calendar. So far there wasn’t one ‘D’ for dry. A couple of his friends had noticed it on the wall and inquired about it, and Adam gleefully explained that it was my bedwetting calendar, and that at the end of each week I’d be getting a spanking administered by him. “Looks like he’s getting the max this week,” Charlie observed. It was Saturday, and so far I had been wet every night. So I could expect thirty strokes, and maybe five more.

 

I wet my pants again. My aunt Jane had come over with my twin cousins Brad and Rick. They are my age. My Mom mentioned the new disciplinary policy regarding me, and the fact that I would be spanked the next day. She said this right in front of the twins, and Adam was there too. I guess the dread and embarrassment made me wet my pants. I didn’t even know I had done it until Rick said “Aunt Ellen, Wayne just wet his pants!” So in addition to my Sunday spanking, I got a Saturday one as well. Adam delivered thirty with the strap, after which I was put in diapers and my yellow ‘baby pants’ and made to face my cousins like that, with the sounds of my spanking still fresh in their ears. It was especially unfortunate that I wet my pants again, because my Mom was planning to send me and Adam to Aunt Jane’s for ten days while she and my Dad went on a trip, and now my Aunt decided that I would have to wear diapers the whole time. “We finally have nice furniture, we just got new carpeting, and I’d just feel so much better if Wayne wore diapers. And given what’s been happening, I think it’s more than just a precaution.” Her sons looked at me as if I were the biggest baby in the world. Maybe I was.

           

            My first ‘scheduled’ Sunday spanking was to be the worst I had so far received. Not only was I going to get thirty-five strokes with the strap (seven wet nights), but my backside was still red and sore from my Saturday misadventure. To make matters worse, Adam’s friend Charlie was over, and would witness the whole thing. The anticipation of being spanked had been terrible all week, and was worse on Sunday because of Charlie. Finally the time was at hand, and I was called upstairs.

            “You know what to do,” Adam said. Diapers were already on the change table. He went to the closet and got the strap. Seeing it made me feel shaky.

            “Spare the rod, spoil the child,” Charlie said. It was hard to undress in front of them, but I knew I had no choice. I leaned over the table, arms outstretched, and waited for my punishment. I was crying after five strokes. The pain was bad, but as usual the feelings of shame and disgrace also contributed. Charlie counted. “Thirty-three, thirty-four, thirty-five.” It was over. Now, as I lay on top of my diapers, Adam was called downstairs. I knew what would happen.

            “My Dad needs me for something. Diaper him for me, Charlie.”

            “You want me to diaper him? I’ve never even diapered a baby.”

            “Well now’s your chance. Powder him and diaper him, ok?”

            “I guess there’s a first time for everything. Man oh man!” My brother left, and Charlie managed to awkwardly pin my diapers on me after smothering me in baby powder. I felt very infantile to be diapered by my brother’s friend, just as when Adam’s girlfriend had done it.

            “Where are your baby pants—in the drawer here?” I guess he got the term from my brother. I hated it.

            “Yes.” I was dying of embarrassment. He reached into the drawer and selected a pair of my rubber pants, which he then put on me. It was a clumsy operation, but I did everything I could to cooperate to get it over with. He finally had me stand up so he could pull the rubber pants over my diapers.

            “We’re done. Don’t you feel kind of dumb to be wearing diapers and rubber pants after being spanked?”

            “Kind of.”

 

            I was in for a surprise when I got downstairs. Suddenly there were Danny and Louis Chou, staring at me in my diapers. Danny is my age, Louis a year or so younger. They go to my school. They were here with their Dad, as it turned out, who was consulting my Dad about an upcoming construction project. I would have gladly sunk through the floor as the boys regarded me with open-mouthed surprise.

            “Why is he wearing diapers?” Louis asked Adam and Charlie.

            “Why don’t you tell him, Wayne? Why are you wearing diapers?”

            “Cause sometimes I wet the bed,” I mumbled.

            “Sometimes,” Charlie laughed. “I think it’s more like always.”

            “Did he just get a spanking?” Danny asked. “It sounded like someone was getting a spanking.”

            “Tell him,” Adam said.

            “I got a spanking.”

            “Why? For wetting your diapers?”

            “Yes.”

            “Cool. In that case you deserve it.”

            “He smells like pee,” Louis said. “Is he wet now?”

            “He always smells like that,” Adam explained. “There’s residual urine that stays in his diapers, and it makes him smell a little.”

            “Yuck!” the boys said.

            My rubber pants were very noisy whenever I moved, and the boys’ kept looking at them. I didn’t want to go and sit down because my backside was still so sore from two spankings in two days, so I just sort of hung around and endured the harsh comments and scorn of the Chous, my brother, and Charlie. Danny and Louis stayed for about another half-hour, but it seemed much longer to me. When their father joined them as they were about to leave, he gave me a startled look when he noticed I was in diapers.

            “He’s a bedwetter,” Danny said.

            “He’s a baby,” Louis said.

 

            I had hoped that my aunt had forgotten her resolve, but I wasn’t in her house one minute when she asked Adam if he’d please take me upstairs and diaper me. “I’m happy to have you here, Wayne, but I’m not willing to take a chance on having you wet the carpets or furniture, so you’re going to have to be in diapers. But you knew that. It’s too bad, but that’s the way it’s going to be.” We had come with a large supply of diapers, plastic and rubber pants, powder, pins, a change pad, and my diaper pail, all of which were now in plain view of my twin cousins Brad and Rick. “You guys go and watch how Adam does it, so you can help if you’re needed.”

            “We have to change Wayne’s diapers?” Brad asked. “No way!”

            “You might,” his Mom said.

            I carried everything upstairs. There was a spare room, but after prior discussion and over objections from my cousins, it was decided that Adam would have it, and that I would share with Brad and Rick. I would be using a single roll-away bed that had been set up, but not yet made. On its mattress there was a thick-looking plastic sheet. Then I noticed that a change table—I supposed from when the twins were babies—had been set near my bed. It was larger than normal, perhaps to accommodate twins at the same time, and would be large enough to for me to use. There was shelving under the changing platform, and Adam told me to stack my diapers and pants there. The diaper pail went beside the change table after Adam took from it my calendar and the strap. He explained the purpose of both to my cousins, who were fascinated. I was deeply embarrassed at the number of ‘W’s on the calendar, the strap, the change table, the diapers, the plastic sheet, and what was about to happen. My brother placed my change pad on the table.

            “Ok, let’s do it. Guys, watch, ‘cause if I’m not around you’ll have to do it.”

            “Man, I hope not. Are there gloves, at least?” Brad asked.

            “On the shelf, there.”

            “Ok, you fold two baby diapers in three lengthwise, like so, then lay them inside his big diaper, put some powder on it, lie him on it, more powder, then just pin it on tight. Wayne, get undressed and on the change table. Right now.”

            My cousins were enjoying themselves. The last thing in the world I wanted to do was to get undressed in front of them, but I knew what would happen if I resisted or even hesitated. The strap was right here, and Adam wouldn’t be shy to use it, especially in front of an audience. So I sheepishly got out of my pants and underwear, knowing that I wouldn’t be seeing either for ten days. I climbed onto the table and lay on the diapers. My eyes were closed, but I felt powder being sprinkled on my body, and I smelled it. Then I felt the diapers being brought up between my legs and felt as one side was pinned on, then the other.

            “Pin them on tight, guys, otherwise he can spring a leak.” I felt my feet being placed through the leg openings of rubber pants, and felt them being pulled up. I lifted up so my brother could pull them over my diapers, and then he was done.

            “That’s it. No big deal. Baby is now diapered.”

 

            I had no pants that would go on over my rubber ones, so I was obliged to walk around with my diapers plainly visible to everyone. Brad and Rick thought the situation was hilarious, and missed no opportunity to laugh at and belittle me. When I got downstairs I was shocked when I came face to face with a boy whose name I would learn was Christopher. He was a friend of my cousins and had come to borrow a book. I froze as he stared at me, mouth gaping open. He was blond, with blue eyes, and wore what looked like Calvin Klein jeans and a collar-less shirt tucked in. He looked cool. I was almost fainting with embarrassment.

            “Ohmygod! Why’s he wearing diapers?”

            “Oh that’s our cousin Wayne. He still wets the bed,” Brad said.

            “And even sometimes his pants,” Rick added. “He’s a big baby.”

            “Man, I’ll say!” I endured my shame as best I could, but it’s hard to keep cool when you’re in a room with three kids your age or younger than you and you’re wearing diapers. The conversation kept coming back to me.

            “Who changes him?” Christopher asked. “Man, it’s incredible. The guy’s in freakin’ diapers!”

            “Mostly his brother Adam changes him, but we might have to,” Brad said.

            “Well I hate to tell you this, but you might have to do it sooner than you thought. I’m pretty sure he’s wet. Smell.” Just as he said this, my aunt came in the room. I hoped she hadn’t heard, but of course she had.

            “What’s this? Wayne, did you wet your diapers?”

            “No! I didn’t!” But I had. The excruciating discomfort of being seen in diapers had made me lose control. I was soaked inside my rubber pants. My aunt walked over to me and as I stared hard at the floor, she pulled the waistband of my rubber pants and peered inside.

            “You did, you dirty boy! You wet your diapers! Well it just proves I was right to insist you wear them during the day.” The boys were snickering. “Now what’s going to happen is this. Brad and Rick are going to take you upstairs, they’re going to clean you up, and they’re going to change your diapers.”

            “Can’t Adam do it?” Brad protested.

            “Adam’s out and Wayne can’t stay wet until he gets back. I know it’s tiresome but we all have to do our part. And Wayne, one more thing. Before they put you back in diapers the boys are going to give you a good spanking for lying to me and for being such a baby.”

            “You going to put him over your knee?” Christopher jokingly asked.

            “I dunno. When he gives you the strap, how exactly does Adam do it, Wayne?” Wade asked. He was serious. I could hardly speak. “Um I have to lean over my change table,” I mumbled.

            “He has a change table!” Christopher said. “Does he sleep in a crib?”

            “I thought of it, believe me,” my aunt said.

            “Well I’d love to stick around for baby’s diaper change,” he said, “but I have to get going.” At least there was that.

 

            The whole degrading episode unfolded pretty much as I imagined it would. Upstairs, I was told to take my rubber pants off, to unpin my diapers and drop them in the diaper pail. I was really smelly, and very nervous about what was coming. And of course I was in total humiliation.

            “Rick, hand me the baby wipes off the shelf there. And get me the strap. Then get diapers ready for him like Adam showed us.” He handed me a Huggies wipe. “Here, clean yourself off.” I did the best I could, but it was hard with them watching, plus my hands were shaky and I did a bad job. I dropped the wipe on top of the change table. “There. Now get in position exactly as you do when Adam spanks you. I did. I felt cold leather as Wade lined up the strap with my butt. Then Whack! My backside was still wet from the wipe, thus adding to the sting. After fifteen blistering strokes he stopped, and thinking the spanking was over, I straightened up.

            “Lean back over, Wayne. We’re not finished yet.” Now it was Rick’s turn, and I got fifteen more with the strap, and was bawling by the time they diapered me. They used plastic gloves, and fumbled a bit getting the diapers pinned on, and put me in the same rubber pants I had been wearing, with the result that for the rest of the day I exuded such a strong smell of urine that my aunt checked me twice to see if I was wet again. Nothing would have surprised me at this point. My sense of shame at having been both spanked and diapered by my younger cousins was so strong anything could have happened. I couldn’t look them in the eye, and they couldn’t stop smirking.

 

            “I need one of you to baby-sit your cousin,” Aunt Jane said. That’s how she talked, right from the beginning; I always had a ‘baby-sitter’ and was never allowed to be in the house alone. Since my wetting accidents she had taken to checking my diapers for wetness quite frequently, no matter who was around, and she encouraged Adam and my cousins to do the same.

            “Can’t Adam do it?” Rick asked.

            “No. He’s at his friend Charlie’s for the night,” Aunt Jane said. “Whose turn is it?”

            “It’s mine,” Brad said. “Darn. We were going to see a movie with Christopher. Instead, I get to stay home and change Wayne’s diapers. Great!”

            After Rick left and my aunt went to her bridge club, Brad was still in a funk. “I’m warning you Wayne. If you make me change your diapers, I’m going to spank you first. Got it?” I stayed dry.

 

            The time slowly went by, and seemed longer because for the whole time I was unable to leave the house. I had one more wetting incident. On the second last morning when I was changed Adam put me in my yellow ‘baby pants’. Later in the day, when Christopher came to the house and saw me in them, I just lost it and soaked myself. Having learned from the last time, I nervously told my aunt I was wet. I was sent upstairs with Adam to be changed. He wasn’t pleased, but I wasn’t spanked; however he put me back in the despised ‘baby pants’. You’d think it wouldn’t matter—if you’re already wearing diapers and plastic or rubber pants, what difference does it make if the pants are yellow and have koala bears on them? But wearing them made me feel worse. It was like an extra little bit of ridicule. Christopher laughed at me and spoke in ‘baby talk’. “Did little Wayne get his diapers changed? Nice baby pants, dude!”

 

            And then it was finally time to go home. I had assumed I would get my pants and underwear back, and was really looking forward to feeling like a ‘big boy’ again, if only until diaper time in the evening. But it was not to be. Both Adam and Aunt Jane discussed the matter of my frequent day wetting with my mother, and she was convinced that I should stay in diapers until I learned to control myself. “I think he needs to be toilet trained all over again,” mused Aunt Jane. So when my Mom came to pick us up, I was wearing only a tee-shirt, diapers, plastic pants, and shoes and socks. My diaper pail was packed with all my ‘baby’ stuff. I said goodbye to my Aunt and cousins “Stay dry, man,” Bradlaughed. I guess they were glad to see me go. So I had to walk to the car carrying my diaper pail and wearing diapers. It was very weird to be outside in just diapers, and I felt very exposed. The car was close by, and I waited nervously for my Mom to open the trunk for the diaper pail and the suitcase containing our other clothes. Just then three kids came along on bikes. They seemed to be about thirteen or fourteen years old. I hoped they wouldn’t notice me, but one did, and they stopped.

            “Carl! Frank! Check it out—the guy’s wearing diapers!”

            “Man oh man, he is! He’s wearing diapers!” There was nothing I could do. They were laughing and pointing. Their ‘leader’ spoke to my Mom. “Lady, how come the kid is in diapers?”

            “Why do you think? Because he needs them, that’s why.”

            They thought this was hilarious. “Because he needs them, that’s why” they kept repeating. “Because he’s a pee-baby, that’s why!” Pee-baby or not, I was wet again.

            “See what you leave yourself in for?” my Mom asked as I finally stumbled into the car, on the verge of tears.

 

            Back home before taking my stuff upstairs my Dad examined my calendar. “You didn’t have one dry night while we were away. And why do some of these dates have two ‘W’s on them?”

            “Because he’s been wetting during the day, which is why he’s in diapers full-time,” Adam said.

            “Well you better be toilet-trained by September, or you’ll be wearing them to school,” Dad warned. “Are you wet right now?” I was pretty smelly, and my diapers were sagging.

            “Yes.”

            “Adam, deal with him, will you?”

            “I’m so sick of changing his diapers!”

            This time I did get spanked. I noticed that Adam didn’t ask anyone’s permission, he just gave me twenty with the strap before diapering me. I hoped that this wasn’t a new trend. My parents had to have heard what happened, but they didn’t say anything.

            I gradually reduced my daytime wetting accidents, and within two weeks I was back in ‘big-boy’ underwear during the day. It felt good. I did wet my diapers a couple of times when my brother had friends over in the evening and they teased me, but both times I managed to get away with it.

 

            After a routine visit to my doctor on a Monday during which he saw evidence of my regular Sunday spanking, he convinced my Mom to stop the practice. She made it clear that I would still be punished for defiance or non-cooperation when it came to being diapered, but the Sunday spankings were a thing of the past. What a relief! The calendar remained a record of my nightly shame, however, and I was still wetting as often. Then a bad thing happened.

 

            My Mom was always entering contests. Once in awhile she would win some small thing, but this time she won big. It was a trip for four to Disney World. For four days. All expenses paid. Everyone was excited. But then my parents gradually decided that it would be better not to have to deal with a diapered bedwetter in a hotel. I would stay home. It was actually a ‘lesson’ for me—there were consequences for being a bedwetter. At first my brother was very upset because he assumed he would have to stay and ‘baby-sit’ me, but my Mom assured him that not only was he going, but if he wanted, Rachel could take my place.

            “It’ll be a real holiday for you,” she said.

            “But who’ll look after Wayne?” he asked.

            “We’ll just have to find a babysitter for him,” she said.

            “Could Charlie do it if he was willing?”

            “I don’t see why not, and we could pay him. Would he be willing to change Wayne’s diapers?”

            “Maybe. I’ll ask him. I know he could use the money.” Adam called Charlie and invited him over.

            “Charlie, we need a favor. We won a trip to Disney World, but we need a babysitter for Wayne. It’d be for four days. Would you consider moving in and babysitting?”

            “I’d have to change his diapers?” He looked at me doubtfully.

            “Yes. But we’d pay you $200.”

            “Heck, for $200 I’ll change his diapers. Pass the baby powder, dude! Besides, I know how ‘cause I’ve seen Adam do it, and I even did it once. Deal!”

            On Friday Charlie arrived with a packsack around 4 pm, and my parents, Adam and Rachel left soon after. I had been instructed that Charlie was in charge, and that I was to mind whatever he said. This subservient relationship made me shy and nervous around him. I stayed in my room while he watched TV downstairs. At about 5 o’clock he came into my room. “Okay, Wayne, let’s put you in diapers.”

            “What? Now? But it’s only 5 o’clock.” I felt a sense of panic.

            “I have friends coming over. Would you rather I did it in front of them? Get yourself ready.” He was busy making up diapers for me on my change pad. I very reluctantly began to get undressed. Horribly embarrassed, I was about to climb up on the change table, but he stopped me.

            “Wait, there’s something I need to do first.” He forced me to bend over, in spanking position. “Wait.” He went to my closet, and I knew he was getting the strap.

            “But I didn’t do anything!”

            “Right, and this is going to keep it that way. Consider it a pre-emptive spanking, and maybe you’ll only have to get one. It was your brother’s idea that I show you who’s boss.”

            The injustice of it and the pain made me cry. Charlie spanked me hard, maybe twenty-five times, I’m not sure. Then I was on the change table. But before he could diaper me, the doorbell rang. “Don’t move,” he said, and went to answer the door. A moment later I heard him say “Hey Vince! Come on in!” I heard footsteps coming up the stairs, and then Vince, a total stranger, was staring at me, lying naked except for a Tee-shirt on my diapers.

            “I take it this is bedwetter Wayne that I’ve been hearing about?”

            “Yep. I just need to diaper him.”

            “You don’t look like the babysitting type, Charlie; gentle, nurturing…”

            “I’m not. I just spanked him. It’s the money, Vince.”

            “Oh, that’s why he’s blubbering. Sweet. And I notice he’s got no hair down there.”

            “Right. Adam calls it his ‘diaper-rash prevention program’. Seems he got diaper rash so bad one time he had to miss school. Imagine that—missing high school because of diaper rash!” They both laughed. So now he has to take a Bic razor into the shower.” Charlie powdered me, pulled the diapers up between my legs, and pinned them on.

            “Hey, this is good practice for when you have a baby of your own,” Vince said. Charlie had chosen a pair of clear snap-on plastic pants that had belonged to ex-bedwetter Richard, and he put them on me. I never felt so helpless and babyish as he snapped them on, with Vince watching. They were thick and noisy, and I crinkled as I climbed off the change table and waddled toward the door, my head hung in shame. I knew that if I committed the ultimate disgrace and wet my diapers, the result would be plainly visible through the clear plastic.

 

            The doorbell rang twice more. The first time it was Axel, who had seen me put in diapers by Adam. After greeting the others, he looked at me and shook his head. “I see there hasn’t been much progress on the toilet training front,” he said. The second ring announced two guys, Rich and Steven.

            “Man, shouldn’t he be in a playpen or something?” Rich said.

            “No offense, dude, but I can’t think of a bigger case of a loser than being a teenage bedwetter in diapers,” Steven said. I was taunted and teased through supper (Charlie ordered pizza), until around 8 o’clock Axel noticed something.

            “I think Wayne wet his diapers, Charlie.” It was true. I was wet, but not soaked. It showed, though. All the teasing and humiliation had taken a toll. I was mortified as they all stared and commented. “Man, he actually peed his diapers!”

            “Well I have news for you, Wayne,” Charlie said. “I’m not changing you. You can just stay wet. Now go up to bed.” I could feel their eyes on my diapers as I timorously left the room to head upstairs. “Nitey-nite, baby Wayne.” Laughter. A few other things happened while Charlie babysat me—his girlfriend came over and made merciless fun of me as Charlie diapered me and afterwards, and another time Charlie’s twelve year old brother came over just after I had been put in diapers, and he wouldn’t stop teasing. “Hey baby Wayne, how do you like wearing diapers?” Stuff like that, but I was used to it by now.

 

            In fact my life got quite a bit better—no more spankings unless I really mess up, in which case it’s my own fault, and I finally prevailed on my Mom, with Adam’s consent, to finally allow me to diaper myself, a vast improvement. There are strict conditions—I have to be in diapers by eight o’clock, no exceptions, and I’m still not allowed to wear anything over my waterproof pants, so it’s still very embarrassing and I still get teased, but it’s a lot better than it was. I get out of diapers when I’ve been consistently dry for 90 days. My record so far? I once had two consecutive dry nights. Well it’s nice to have a goal…