Kids Can Be Mean

So I was doing some weekend grocery shopping at the newly revamped Fairprice at Jurong Point, and oh was it crowded on opening week! There were hardly any baskets at the entrance, had to take one from the cashiers.

Anyway I was passing through one of the aisles when I spotted this young kid, no older than 7 crying. Her face was red, and she looked genuinely embarrassed. Then I spotted the pack of Mamy Poko Pants in her mother’s hand.

I mean, which kid of her age would want to wear a diaper, for whatever reason? She looked so upset.

The poor kid’s older sister must have been taunting her, and that too in the crowded environment. But she wasn’t finished. She added “see, you cry like a baby, that’s why you wear pampers.”

Then her dad snapped. He knelt down, grabbed the elder kid by her shoulders and in a deadly serious fashion, looked at her straight into her eyes.

“Since you keep making fun of your mei-mei (little sister), tonight you are going to wear the pull-up too. I don’t care what…”

I couldn’t catch the rest of the scene because the mother shot me a glance and I had to walk on.

I mean, I couldn’t help myself, I felt really guilty for the younger kid, I really did. But the DL within me wanted to find out more about this strange scene which could have been plucked straight from an ABDL story.

But beyond the ABDL part, this incident reminded me of just how cruel young kids can be. The older sister wasn’t more than 2 years older, but she showed so much glee that her sister was being humiliated in the middle of a busy supermarket.

Kids are immature, and we have heard of stories where a child blurts out their sibling’s random secret to others, like the time my cousin laughed that his 12 year old sister peed her pants cos she couldn’t find a toilet during a holiday etc. It can be really stressful to be a parent.

I do not think that the punishment was carried out, after all diapers are expensive. But I do hope that those poor parents are able to instil within their children that it is not a nice thing to make fun of family members i.e. to not air their dirty linen in public like that.

– Selv

Time Heals Scars

I’ve been reading some old comments posted about my first ABDL story, The Girl Who Wondered If Only. The main criticism is that most people couldn’t find it plausible that such a thing could happen in real life. I admit that, yes it is an ABDL story after all. But I thought I’d share with you the basis for the idea.

It comes from the toilet training story of my second sister, who I’ll call Pri (P.S., read: Pree). I’m the eldest of three children, and I have two younger sisters. My first sister was toilet trained much quicker than me, by age 3 and taking 4 months. I took longer because I started late, I was done by 4.5 years and it took me 5 months. You can read that story here.

But it took my second sister Pri nearly 10 months! None of our cousins came close to breaking that record. I still remember the incident clearly.

We were staying over at my grandparents’ house. My dad and first sister were out of the house. I was playing with Pri, who had just turned 2. My mum was talking to grandma. Their conversation was along the line of when to start toilet training Pri. At one point, Pri stopped what she was doing and her facial expression became concentrated. Immediately, my mum, emboldened by the chat, stood up and pulled up her dress, and ripped off her diaper! Pri was wailing and crying, saying “no, no” as she was carried to the kitchen toilet. I tried to side her but grandma promptly sent me back to the living room.

For nearly 5 minutes, there was a lot of noise coming from the bathroom as the two ladies tried to coax Pri to poop. I guess a two year old could not understand what was going on, as she kept saying ‘no’, ‘no, ‘don’t want’.

I was sitting shell-shocked on the sofa. I had just started ‘borrowing’ diapers from her, and now they were going away? And what about Pri? I no longer had the job of telling my mum that she had pooped? It was officially Day 1 of toilet training, all over again. In hindsight, that was first time I ever did some soul-searching in my life.

But the ordeal hadn’t ended yet. Suddenly, there were really loud screams from mum and grandma, followed by throat-tearing screams from Pri. I ran to the bathroom, panicking. It seemed that they had put Pri on the toilet without a child-seat. And she had fallen in. My mum pulled her out and hugged her, but you could clearly see the fear in Pri’s face. Nobody else saw her pooping on my mother’s pants.

The damage was severe. Unlike for me and my first sis, Pri hadn’t been gradually introduced to the toilet. They had tried to toilet train her the olden way – by forcing it onto her when she was too young to realise. But it backfired. For the next few days, Pri was to scared to even go near the toilet during shower times. Eventually, my aunt suggested a potty chair and with much coaxing, two months later she was pee-trained in the daytime.

But she absolutely would not poop in the potty-chair. She started to hold it in, till her night time diaper, then she would go. When my mum realised the tactic, she would not put on the diaper until after she fell asleep. But she would then poop in her diaper first thing in the morning. This continued for a few months, I guess because my parents didn’t know what to do. Years later, I realised that she continued to bed wet because she was holding in her poop. See bedwetting for the specifics.

Anyway, six months after the initial incident, there came a short stretch where she was dry in the mornings. The result was that she no longer needed diapers but, still fearful of the toilet, she started to poop in her underwear. The bedwetting started again, but this time my parents decided to go cold-turkey. My father also punished her for this, so she clearly knew that it was wrong. However, with little progress, the diapers returned within a week.

I believe that she used the ‘Drypers’ brand. Pri slowly stopped her bedwetting, but she still got to wear a diaper at night, and was given one hour extra in the morning for her to do her business. By now she was peeing in the toilet, due to peer pressure in school, but she still refused to poop in it. The trick that had worked for me, that is a hole in my diaper on the toilet, and caning, didn’t work for her as she saw through that. I remember I used to ‘hide’ Pri behind the laundry basket, under a pillow in a sort of ‘clothes-fort’ while she did her deed. My first sis preferred to catch her red-handed, but it was rare as her school was in the morning session.

Eventually, the rules were tightened greatly, and her new Nursery 2 school teacher started to be more proactive. With great peer pressure, tight rules and time healing the scar, she finally decided that she didn’t want diapers any more.

You can see here that it took a lot of effort to undo the initial incident of falling into the toilet. It took a long time for Pri to get convinced that the toilet wasn’t going to harm her. That is the basis for The Girl Who Wondered If Only.

– Selv

When It Comes To Siblings Who Are Diapered

So, Siblings Day just passed a week ago, so I thought of writing about something different today.

Sometimes, I wonder what would life be like if either of my two younger sisters still need diapers to this day. I did come close to finding out, as my first sister was a bed wetter around the time she started having her first periods. My parents bought for her some goodnights, but thankfully, she didn’t need the whole pack.

But this is a topic which does get mentioned from time to time. What would it be like if a younger sibling needed diapers. Or even for that matter, an older sister needed goodnights for bedwetting? How would it affect the sibling relationship. Would it even be healthy? This is a topic which many ABDL stories love to explore. The younger sister controls the older sister’s night-time diapers. The twin brother wears diapers too to make his twin sister feel better. The older sister tries to be understanding of her younger brother’s ‘desire’ to wear diapers etc etc. But what about real-life stories?

Not surprisingly, it is very hard to find examples of sibling accounts on the internet. This is understandable, as they love their siblings too much to want to hurt them, or simply have been warned by their parents not to say a word. But from time-to-time, there are snippets of these type of stories mentioned on the ABDL forums once in a while. Things like “my neighbour once mentioned that his 8 yo sister still wore nappies at night. But I never asked him about it.” Never more, usually less.

Think about it – would you want to tell your friends that your younger sister still needs to wear diapers at night? Those friends will certainly laugh at her the next time they see her. No matter how much you profess to hate her, want to hurt her, you will never do it. Except, nowadays, it is getting very common for kids as old as 10 to still need pull-ups for bed. In that sense, some would be de-sensitised, and might end up telling their closest friend, much to the chagrin of their sibling. But hey, the paradigm, or view, that older kids don’t wear night-time diapers, is shifting.

But you see, bedwetting is a very common thing among young kids. In fact, when you go to gatherings, some mothers blatantly admit that their 8 yo kid still wets the bed, even as the poor kid looks on. On one count, bedwetting rates are going up. This is probably due to girls starting their periodic cycles earlier in life, and their young bodies are not able to cope, and absorbent disposable diapers hampering toilet-training.

On the second count, parents are no longer shying away from the fact, and are actively seeking advice on the matter. It may or may not be medical advice, but they are willing to shed the stigma and embarrassment to seek a cure their daughter’s (or son’s) condition. They are just concerned as any parent would be, and only want the best for their children.

The third count concerns those seeking to make money out of this situation. Mainly the diaper manufacturers. That is why they make Pampers up till size 7 (though these are very hard to get in Singapore), and even ‘young adult diapers’ (Dr.P Junior Size XS). Goodnights are very much preferred, as they work like underwear. Cloth diapers are cheaper over the long run, but nobody nowadays wants to deal with the washing. Then there are the under sheets, rubber sheets and things like bedwetting alarms. There are also the paediatricians…

As you can see, kids are slowly being desensitised to wearing diapers. Yet, they would never admit that they actually do. Why? Society still thinks that diapers are for babies and the elderly. Children, being afraid of ridicule by their friends, and trying to project a strong image in order to fit in, would never admit that they can’t control their pee at night.

Which brings us back to the topic of siblings. All people with siblings undergo their various forms of sibling rivalry. When they are young kids, say primary school age, they may not know the consequences of what they say. As such, in an act of spite, they might blurt out that their sibling needs diapers. There will be crying, a small amount of ridicule, punishment by the parent, the teacher might punish the group/class. But kids being kids, they would forget about the matter after a few weeks/months. The victim might be emotionally scarred, but they will heal after a bit. And usually, the bedwetting would stop by then.

Howeven when kids progress to secondary school and beyond, they get much more mature. They know that if they mention such a personal secret, their sibling’s future may be compromised. But usually, the real thing that would stop a kid from mentioning that secret would be that the other sibling would have enough dirt on him to cover himself/herself. Love would be the third thing that keeps them in check. They know that their sibling would be greatly upset, saddened and depressed by such a revelation, so, they wouldn’t tell on them.

I felt bad when my sister first stared bedwetting. I tried to comfort her, tried tell her that is was okay, but she beat me away… Mother told me and my then 6 yo sister to stay away, which we did. We felt even worse when the bedwetting didn’t stop after 3 days, and my mother turned up with a pack of goodnights. She and dad talked to her alone, and had to persuade her into wearing it. Then the 2 of us were called in and we were made to promise to never talk about the topic ever again. We promised.

Think about it. A young girl suddenly gets her cramps. Her body starts to change. Suddenly, she starts to wet the bed. And then she is compelled to wear things that ‘only babies wear’! How would you feel if you went through that much emotional trauma?

In my opinion, this is the reason why siblings don’t tell on their sisters/brothers. They saw them cry their eyes out, highly troubled by the fact. They saw them lose sleep, wake up wet and embarrassed. Then there was the horrid smell. They did not like their diapers one bit, and there was nothing that they could do about it. And there was nothing that the sibling could do to comfort them. That is reason enough to keep quiet.

All of these things that I’ve mentioned pertain specifically to the realm of bedwetters. I haven’t talked about people who need their diapers for pooping. So stay tuned for part 2…

-Selv