matty444 said:
What can I do to avoid it?
- - - Updated - - -
I still feel anxious about changing my diaper in public. Sometimes I leave my diaper in the stall even though I know that I should throw it away. I just don't know what others think about someone as young as me carrying a dirty diaper to the trash. I don't know what to do
It takes time and practice to get over your fears and apprehension. Eventually, you will come to realize "Hey, this is who I am. Screw anyone else for thinking less of me because of a condition that I can't help!" You need to accept who you are as a person, that is the most important thing.
If you have a condition, and you are taking the necessary steps to mitigate accidents, what is there to be embarrassed about? Confidence is the key to overcoming all your fears. If you can confidently walk in, take care of business, hold your head high and walk out to throw your trash away wash your hands and leave, you've won. So now the question is, how do you gain, nurture, and develop confidence? Practice.
The only way that you will be more comfortable with changing in public is practice. Practice, practice, practice. When I was dealing with my IC at a younger age (I was 19-20 when my night issues came back and 22 or so when my daytime issues made constant protection mandatory...and I was active duty military) I was extremely apprehensive of changing in public at first.
But, I sought out public changes. I amped myself up like an athlete before a big game against an opponent that was all but guaranteed to win. I just got my self to a mental state where I wasn't trying to avoid or deal with adversity, I WANTED it. I sought IT out and met IT head on. I put myself in public areas areas constantly.
It was tough at first, really tough. I found that the easiest places to change in public are, actually, the busiest places. Any bathroom that has a constant and larger volume of users was an easier place for me to change at first. Why? The noise, the traffic, all the background activity comings and goings-on of daily human life. All that white noise made it easy to hide in plain site, as it were, and change in public.
Once you find a comfortable setting in a public place, it's like finding a weak spot in the armor. You just keep hitting that area over and over. Keep changing in that comfortable setting. Eventually, as you do this practice over and over, you gain more confidence and your horizons expand. Before TOO long you find yourself changing in more varied public setting, and then one day you'll just say F' it and change whenever you need to regardless of the restroom.
Now, you might not like an overly busy area to get your practice in, you might prefer someplace else. You just need to find a location and setting that you can tolerate right now and keep changing there. You'll get the reps in, and the confidence will grow. You can do it. Accidents happen, bit don't let them dictate your emotional wellbeing.
As for your leaving a diaper in the stall, please don't. It isn't very nice for anyone else. I'm not sure why you would as I would guess that you have a small bag with your changing supplies with you. If you don't have a bag, you need to make one (I could show you mine if you wish to see an example). If you have that bag, just put your used product in there before exiting the stall to dispose of elsewhere or you can reach in to discreetly on your way out and make the drop in the trashcan.
As for the unexpected leak when changing, that is something that you will get better with practice as well. I'm not entirely sure what causes it, just that based on my observations it seems to happen with temperature. If my skin is really wet, or the ambient temperature in the restroom is way cooler than wherever I was before, I seem to pee a bit when I expose my skin during a change.
So, knowing and recognizing that, I expose the front of the diaper slowly allowing for temperature acclimation and keeping the diaper there incase of a release. I also do this sitting on the commode in case of a full release (If I'm changing, chances are the diaper is not going to contain another full release) so that the pee will go in the toilet if the used diaper can't hold it. In fact, I always remove my diaper in public while sitting on the toilet. Sit, release the tapes, roll down the front, then (while holding it front and back) lift my butt a bit and slide the diaper out and reseat myself. You can then clean up with wipes and roll the diaper up all while comfortably seated.
I hope some of this can help you.