abcde12678 said:
I was an every night wetter for quite a while.
My parents kept me in Goodnites, and then until I started boy scouts halfway through 5th grade when I was 10. At that point I was still an every night wetter.
They felt like I was too old at that point to still be in pull-ups at night and that I would be made fun of in Boy Scouts.
They got me a bedwetting alarm but it didn’t really do me much good. It helped a little—it turned me in to a 4-5 nights a week wetter.
I still soaked my sheets just about every night. And when I started Boy Scouts, I continued to periodically wet my sleeping bag, in turn having to hide it.
Fast forward to summer after fifth grade. I was sleeping over at a friends house. This friend was my same age, and I’d known him since kindergarten. As it so happened, this friend also wore Goodnites (although he was only a very occasional wetter compared to me).
Neither of us—or our other friends—ever judged each other for wearing them. I think it’s actually sort of why we were such good friends. It’s was a common thing to bond over.
At the point of this sleepover I had been out of nighttime pull-ups for about six months—but still frequently wet the bed. Meanwhile my friend was still wearing them even though he rarely wet the bed. (Like seriously of all the years I’d known him and had sleepovers with him, I’d NEVER seen him wake up with a wet Goodnite. Evidently he must have needed them though because he wore them through at least the beginning of middle school. Still—just weird that throughout the probably 30+ total nights we’d spent together between Kindeegarten and Fifth Grade, he never woke up wet. Maybe I brought him good luck lol.)
Anyway, I wake up in the middle of the night to find I soaked his bed. I was so embarrassed and called my mom to come pick me up. I didn’t even tell him I’d wet the bed. I just left.
That friend never talked to me again after that.
I lost a lifelong friend all over something that could have been prevented if I’d just been kept in nighttime pull-ups because I still needed them.
I relived that night (and still do) and often thought about “what if I’d just been truthful with him and asked him to borrow one of his pull-ups” “what if my parents never stopped buying them for me? Would I still have my best friend?”
Later that summer, I went on my weeklong first Boy Scout summer camp with my new troop.
To my surprise, my tentmate had a package of Goodnites in his trunk and confessed he still we the bed. I’d been sharing tents with him the past five months and never knew! He still wet his bed every single night at this point. But meanwhile all this time he’d been keeping his sleeping bag dry because he wore protection for his bedwetting—while I (the occasional Bedwetter) was embarrassed and found out multiple times because I did not wear anything to prevent me from soaking g my sleeping bag… and those of the other kids next to me.
This again made me realize I could have totally still been wearing them this entire time and not been found out of made fun of.
I also went to a weeklong summer camp every summer starting the summer before second grade. I wore pull-ups at night my first three summers and was never found out.
But the summers before 6th and 7th grade, I didn’t wear any sort of pull-ups, but did wet my bed a couple times. Super embarrassing!
I continued to sporadically wet the bed until middle of 8th grade until one day it just all went away for good.
In hindsight, I wish my parents would have kept me in them—at least when I was away from home—until 8th grade.
It could have saved me my lost friendship, and saved me the embarrassment of some occasional wet sleeping bags.
Late here, but I feel your pain...
I was only ever invited on one sleepover, and I was still wetting regularly. I'd desperately wanted GoodNites, Pull-Ups, diapers, anything more than just a plastic sheet for as long as I could remember. I never asked, though. I came so incredibly close that day, but instead, I awkwardly whispered in my mom's ear, right in front of my new friend and his mom (I cringe to think how obvious it was), asking her to tell them I couldn't, because I had math homework. I don't think I ever spoke to him again. I was supposed to get his contact info (they were moving away), but I think my dad misplaced it.
The problem was, my liking of diapers started before I'd even finished potty training, and while I didn't let it be an issue, didn't let it interfere with training, I don't think it was much of a secret that I liked diapers. From pretty much the moment my parents took me out of nighttime diapers, Pull-Ups, whatever they used (it's funny, I was a '90s kid, but I never remember actually wearing Pull-Ups; my earliest memory is of having my diaper changed—which might be part of why I ended up liking them—then I have a couple memories of being in diapers, and then...poof, underwear), I was utterly miserable with my bedwetting and daytime accidents, and desperately wanted to be back in diapers. My parents didn't make a big deal out of any of it, at least. At night, they would just wipe down the plastic sheet and we'd make my bed together, but...it was still miserable. I always felt bad about waking them up, and was often too embarrassed to do so, so I would just sit in the bathroom with my pajamas on the vent, drying, and put them back on after an hour or two of waiting for them to dry (the room must have smelled awful). Or, more often, my parents would catch me right as I was about to put them back on or just after I had. I really hated having to get a bath in the middle of the night, which they always insisted on (they kept a stock of baby wipes, for wiping down my plastic sheet, but...they probably thought using them on me would be infantilizing, so a bath it was; baths were loud, time-consuming, and rarely the perfect temperature right away, so they always woke me up the rest of the way and ensured a rotten, tired day the next day). All I wanted was to sleep. I was far more content to put dry PJs back on, no matter how smelly they were, and just go back to sleep, even if it was on the floor (I very rarely, if ever, managed to actually make it back to my room without getting caught; I distinctly don't remember ever sleeping on the floor, so...they might have just caught me every single time).
I would get excited every time we went down the baby aisle, forgetting that that's where the baby shampoo and body wash were, thinking instead that they were finally putting me back in diapers, and I would excitedly ask if they were... While I wasn't too ashamed of my wanting diapers to ask if they were putting me back in them, I very much
was too ashamed to actually ask them to do just that (it's a silly distinction, in hindsight). I was embarrassed about how obvious it had been that I'd wanted diapers, and wanted them to think I'd outgrown that desire, so I never asked for them. I honestly think the vast majority of my desire for diapers came from my bedwetting and daytime accidents. It was almost entirely practical, I think.
I remember reading GoodNites ads (as well as those for diapers and Pull-Ups) in my mom's magazines, and desperately hoping they'd get them for me, but never daring to ask. Meanwhile, they'd run a GoodNites ad on TV, showing a kid piling up blankets and sleeping on the floor, and at least once, my mom said "Awww," and I swear she might have even looked at me, as though she wanted me to say something, but...I didn't dare.
We had a babysitter once, and as she was taking me upstairs to get ready for bed, she asked, "So, what do you wear? Diapers? Pull-Ups? Panties? 'Cause I've got a pack of Pull-Ups in the car..." Mind you, being a boy, I'd never heard of panties at that point, and was rather confused... I desperately wanted those Pull-Ups, but I knew she would get in trouble, and probably so would I, if I accepted her offer, so I told her I was a big kid...
Then there was a time I was out grocery shopping with my grandma while we were visiting her. At some point during the trip, she stopped and asked me if there was anything I wanted. The GoodNites were probably four feet to her right. We were quite possibly even in the baby aisle and surrounded by diapers, I'm not sure, but I zeroed in on the GoodNites on a shelf on the back wall of the store (we probably weren't in the baby aisle; the entire back wall itself was probably the baby aisle, and that's not where we were)...and said nothing. I then proceeded to wet the futon she'd gotten, just so I would have a decent place to sleep. I probably wet it that very night.
I similarly gave my uncle a lovely surprise while staying with him and my aunt... He walked into the bathroom in the middle of the night to find me drying my pajamas... He seemed rather baffled by such a spectacle. He wasn't mad, though. I think he was more annoyed that I hadn't asked for help.
I desperately wanted diapers, and arguably, needed them, but was also just so ashamed of those desires. My bedwetting was kind of intermittent, anywhere from one to three times a week to once a month, so diapers would have been quite an expense, but...sheesh. They would have made life so much simpler. I would have been so much happier, and so much more well-rested.
I was crazy enough to get involved in Scouting, despite being a bedwetter, and amazingly, only ever had one accident, in my entire time in Cub Scouts and Boy Scouts (despite being a regular wetter for most of that time)... It was absolutely roasting in my canvas tent at summer camp, even at night... I was staying up late, taking observations of my terrarium I'd made for the Environmental Science badge. I'd either gotten a late start on making the thing, or had simply been too busy that day to take the day's required number of observations during daylight hours, so in order to cram in all the observations I needed to make, I stayed up most of the night, taking notes at regular intervals. I was just chugging water left and right, because I was sweating bullets in that tent. The tent flaps were closed to keep the bugs out, and keep my flashlight from disturbing anyone, and if I'm recalling the right year, the tent was...no longer breathable (not that canvas tents are particularly breathable from the start). It was an old canvas tent, and at the start of the week, you could see straight through the thing when you looked up from in bed. Not great in a locale and season where it usually rains (pours) four days out of the week. The canvas was more of a heavy mesh at that point. By the end of the week, it had more duct tape than canvas. I'd forgone patching individual leaks, and covered the entire upper surface of the tent, turning the tent into a veritable oven in the process. This led to my drinking a ton and taking repeated trips to the latrine, much to the annoyance of the Scoutmaster, whose tent I kept walking past. Darn crunchy...pine needles? There really weren't any deciduous trees around there to drop crunchy leaves... How on earth he heard me, let alone woke up, I don't know. He eventually barred me from using the latrine any more that night (I think I did sneak one more trip, much to his frustration), and sure enough, I woke up soaked.
I still feel terrible about how I handled that. When I woke up in the morning, I pretty much immediately made threatening remarks toward my tent mate, imploring him never to tell a soul. He was an incredibly nice guy, who I'd never had trouble with, one of the only such people in the troop (I was utterly terrified of the thought of the not-so-nice people finding out...I have PTSD from the things they did to me, without knowing I was a bedwetter) and was new to the troop. He also had Asperger's (that's what they called it back then, anyway), so...who knows what he thought of my actions. I think that might have been part of why I reacted the way I did. I think I was afraid that, possibly not fully understanding the social implications of things, and certainly not yet knowing just how brutal the rest of the troop could be, he might let word of my accident slip. I would never hurt a fly, but...I instantly had a fear response and resorted to (empty) threats, for pretty much the only time in my entire life, and I just feel awful about it.
I wasn't wetting frequently at that point, in fact, it was probably my first accident in months, but...I wish I'd just had GoodNites, and not felt a need to react that way. Of course, the likelihood of wearing them in that particular troop and getting away with it, was low.
On the other hand... One of the pseudo-bullies (there were a couple ringleaders that just dragged everyone else along for the ride) once pulled me aside and mused about pulling a prank on the ringleader that was terrorizing the troop, to knock him down a peg, pouring water on his sleeping bag and putting Pull-Ups among his things, where they'd be visible... The way he talked, it sounded like he had some with him, or knew someone who did. Alas, as much as I hated the guy...that was a little too cruel and hit too close to home for my taste, and I talked the kid out of it.