http://Stoppbedwetting.com

Chapter 1
A New Town

[size=12pt]“It is all too easy to relate a chronological and intellectual age to the child’s size without recognizing the fact that they are truly older and more understanding than one realisms. It is fairly obvious that the child may resent being treated as younger than his years and as being less responsible than he feels he should be. What is not so obvious, but equally damaging, is that a child continually treated as younger than his age may indeed regress and behave as expected... It is surprising how many parents themselves come to treat their child as if he were younger.” Problems of short stature, Br Med J (Clin Res Ed). 1981 July 4; 283(6283): 43-44.

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http://Stoppbedwetting.com

Chapter 1... “A New Town”[/center]

When people see me, they usually react in one of two ways. They act like I’m perfectly normal with no troubles at all, or they treat me like the cute adorable, tiny handicapped kid and equate my size with my intelligence... you know, talk to me with that sweet, cute voice, want to help out... too much. There never seems to be any middle ground.

The first group is afraid to offend me by “noticing” that I am different. You know, the overly politically correct type. This results in me having a hard time opening doors, getting stuff from high places or carrying around big things. I guess they want to "help me" be normal. My mother desperately wanted me to be normal. She went out of her way to cut my hair such, and make sure there were no questions that I was dressed exactly like every other teenaged girl. Dress up the little doll girl like a real person. She pretended like I was just normal. It made life hard and ended up with me revolting... I turned out to be the tiniest Emo girl in school.

Now, my father throwing his money around has managed through a long drawn out nasty court battle, to get custody of me. He has drug me halfway across the country, far away from my friends, to live with him, his wife Sondra, and their “new” daughter Lily. Lilly just turned 3 and Sondra runs a daycare down the street from my dad’s house. My dad spends half of his time in Europe (the reason my mom divorced him) and Sondra falls into that second category. The one time I met her she wasn’t sure at all how to act, I can tell she has a kind heart, but I can tell the only kids she has been around are Lily and the kids from her daycare.

When I got off of the airplane at 6am I was exhausted. I was dressed in my regular emo fashion, a lot of black, not quite Goth, lot of pockets, red streaks in my hair. My dad was off on some business trip (like usual) so Sondra was at the airport to meet me. I could tell that she was less than pleased with my outfit. She didn’t say anything at first, we loaded my suitcase into the car (the rest of my stuff was going to get shipped by my mom later that month) and we proceeded to a nearby IHOP for some breakfast.

When we slid into the booth Sondra asked me if I needed a booster seat. It was the first time she had ever mentioned my... disorder. I could tell that she was a little embarrassed to have ask. I almost felt sorry for her, she had no idea how to handle me. The truth of the matter was that I did need the booster seat to comfortably eat at the table. I told her yea and she seemed a little proud of herself for gracefully approaching the subject. She discretely asked the waitress for a booster (Lily was in a high chair) which only drew a slight glance from the waitress. You wouldn’t believe how often I get the cup with a lid reserved for those most likely to spill at the table. Worse than that is how often I have trouble with the regular glass because of the height of the table or size my hands. It is a catch 22 for me... adult glass or toddler cup, I cant really win. When the waitress brought booster seat to our table, me she asked how old I was... not to me, but to Sondra. That is another problem I tend to have. When someone isn’t quite sure how to deal with me, sometimes they just ignore me completely and talk about me instead of to me. I was pleased when Sondra frowned to her ignoring the question, when the woman went away Sondra asked if people treated me rudely like that a lot.

Over breakfast she told me about their little town. That’s what she called it, her "little town." it wasn’t the big city like I had grown up in and was used to. We were going to have to drive about three hours to get there, there wasn’t really a lot there to speak of, about 3000 people, they did have a Wal-Mart and a McDonalds... I think everywhere does now. The further on she went, the more dreadful it sounded. Not just because I was giving up the city, my friends, and the mall... but I was giving up my anonymity as well. In the big city, the people who stared at me everyday were as anonymous to me as I was to them. In a town of just 3000 people, everyone knows everyone. I will be a town freak for sure. I could feel the butterflies building in my belly and started to loose my appetite.

Then she dropped the bomb about my clothes, telling me that they were simply inappropriate for someone of my age. I could only hope that she meant 14 when she said that. I explained to her about emo and that it was a style that kids wore today. She said that there was none of that in their little town, that while it might be ok in the big city, the people there just wouldn’t understand. There was that term again, "little town." Then she asked me if I wanted to attract attention to myself by dressing so differently... Who did she think she was talking to. No way the first thing people think of when they see me is that my clothes are black and my hair is dyed.

Anyway she says, where did I find clothes like that in my size? Well my mother prided herself in her ability to take clothes made for bigger kids or petite women and alter them down. And sometimes that was quite a task, much more than just taking in the waist or hemming the pants. Sondra just started laughing and told me that she would have know idea how to turn on a sewing machine. Then she asked me if I had any more appropriate clothes in my suitcase... If she didn’t like what I was wearing she wasn’t going to like anything in my bag. That’s ok she said. My dad had left her plenty of money to take care of that and later and that she needed some things at Wal-mart anyway, she could pick me up a couple of outfits there. I figured I would probably be safe with my clothes when she realize that the juniors department at a Wal-mart wasn’t going to have anything for someone like me. Not wanting to argue with her, I didn’t get into it, I just told her that we could probably find something in an online specialty store if she wanted to buy me some clothes.

Before we left the restaurant, Sondra suggested I go to the "ladies room." She explained to me that she wasn’t trying to treat me like a child, but out here it is different than in the city. We were going to be on a very long stretch of highway and there weren’t many places to stop. She put Lily into her car seat and I got into the front and off we went. Apparently I dozed off because about an hour and a half I woke up and really need to go. I told her about it and she said that there probably wasn’t another spot for about thirty minutes. That would have been fine. Unfortunately, trying to be helpful, Sondra was driving a little too fast to get to the next truck stop so I could go. Well, she got pulled over by the State Highway Patrol. He took his sweet time walking up to the car, I guess he had been running the license plates or something. When he finally got there Sondra explained to him that she was real sorry but her daughter had to go to the restroom so she was hurrying. He said he had kids and understood, so he was going to just give her a warning, but that he was disappointed with her for not having me in a carseat or a booster. Sondra tried to explain to him that I was 14 but he stopped her in mid sentence and told her that state law required children who are not yet 4 feet 6 inches and 60 pounds to sit in the back seat and use an appropriate booster seat. Then he went back to his cop car to write her a child safety seat ticket. It probably took him another ten minutes to return. It might as well have been ten years.

Because of their color, you probably wouldn’t have been able to tell just by looking at my black pants that they were wet, but when Sondra asked me to go to the back seat with Lily, the spot where I had been was terribly obvious. I didn’t cry out loud, but I’m sure the tears in my eyes were obvious. Sondra just said its ok honey, spread one of Lily’s blankets on the back seat for me to sit on, took her ticket and we went back to the road. I have a lot of close calls with the bathroom. But this is the first time since the fifth grade that I had wet my pants. People don’t understand, not only am I short, but where in my body are you going to put the bladder of a regular sized person? You aren’t, my bladder, like the rest of me is small. I have to go more often than other people. I didn’t say a word for the next fifteen minutes until we got to the truck stop. Sondra walked around to the trunk and came back with some clothes for me... more embarrassment. First off, she brought back pajama pants, "they will be more comfortable for the trip", second of all she had seen my underwear. I know that isn’t something that would bother most people, but since your underwear are something that most people don’t see, I usually just buy my underwear in the kids department. No, they don’t have cartoon characters on them, I get plain colors or patterns, but they are still kids clothes. I mean the size says 3T/4T on the tag. That’s something you don’t want anyone to see. And to add insult to injury, she grabbed the package of baby wipes out of Lily’s diaper bag beside me.

She told me that she knew I could handle it on my own, but that the wipes might make it easier to, “freshen up”. So humiliating. I know they probably didn’t know what was going on, but when I came back out of the bathroom wearing my pajama pants and carrying my other rolled up pants (the underwear were tucked inside) I just knew that everyone knew exactly what had happened. I gave her back the wipes and she took the clothes and put them in a plastic sack from the diaper bag. Nothing else was mentioned about the incident.

It took about three minutes to drive through the entire town, a few shops, a school, couple of churches and like she had said, a Wal-Mart and a McDonalds. When we got to their house... well, I guess now it was my house, Sondra showed me around I was pretty impressed. My dad had done well for himself. It was small but pretty nice. There were three bedrooms and two bathrooms. Sondra and dad had a room, there was an office, and a room for Lily. Sondra told me that when he got back home from his trip they were going to turn his office into a bedroom for me, but for now I would sleep on the new bunk bed in Lily’s room... well I guess it was my room now. Not exactly what I had hoped for, but I was trying to stay in a positive frame of mind.

I put my suitcase on the bed, set up my laptop, and Sondra asked me if I wanted to run with her to Wal-Mart to pick up some clothes. I wasn’t ready to go out shopping and have these small town people staring at me. I’ve had to endure it my whole life, but you never really get used to it. I didn’t want to hurt her feelings, so I just told her I was exhausted from the trip and wanted to watch TV for a while. I told her that if she ran across something she thought would work for me she could pick it out.

I expected her to realize that my size was a problem and decide that I was right and to shop online. No, she actually went to the toddler department and no, she didn’t just pick out a few outfits, she bought everything in the department that didn’t have teddy bears or duckys on it. I haven’t had that much color in my wardrobe since... well since as long as I could remember. There were jeans, tshirts, sweaters, more pajamas, it was all size 3t or 4t, I guess she got that from my underwear, most of it was wearable and she was so proud of herself for the little shopping spree that I couldn’t even say anything bad. I spent the rest of the afternoon trying on clothes for her. It was like my own little fashion show. At first I was going into the bedroom and closing the door to try on a new outfit, but at some point, she started helping me out. It was pretty nice. She was really trying hard. She never gave me a hard time for my accident and she was wonderful with Lily. I decided I was going to like Sondra.

After dinner I sat there and watched TV and Sondra spent some time checking her email and doing some things online. She read everything. I even saw her reading a sight about short statured kids. She really was trying to be as accommodating as possible. After dinner she drew up a bath and got out some of the new pajamas for me. I told her that I could handle these things myself, but it was really nice to have someone doing that for me. My mom had always made me be so self sufficient so I could be like normal kids.

Somewhere through out the evening, I developed what I now know was a terrible plan. I decided that I didn’t want to be stared at anymore. I like the way it felt for Sondra to treat me like she was, I wanted her to keep doing things for me. I decided to implement a plan that will embrace Sondra’s methods. That night and for the next four nights, I did something I cant remember having done (although I’m sure I have)... I wet the bed. It was the only thing I could think of that would put me back on that juvenile level with her. It was no where as easy, or as comfortable as I imagined it would be, I slept terribly after I did the deed.

When she came to wake me up the next morning, I had a moment of doubt and decided to try and hide the evidence. I gathered up my bedding and took it to the laundry room. I was looking for a stool so I could reach the top of the washer when she came in. I started crying. I didn’t even mean to, I had just realized that I had done something terrible and the tears came. Sondra was so sweet. She pulled me to her and gave me the first hug I had gotten in a long time. Hugging just didn’t fit with my style before. I didn’t even hug my mom when I got onto the plane. She ran me a bath and sent me in there to clean up telling me that she didn’t mind if I had troubles like that. I told her it happens to me sometime and as I put on the jeans and t-shirt that she laid out for me I regained the courage of my plan.

That night Sondra got an interesting junk email...

I know she got it because I sent it. You see one skill that I had acquired at my old school was webdesign... I had the coolest myspace page. I had decided to use my skills for evil instead of good. Just kidding. Anyway, I know that she got it, because I sent it, and I know that she read it because the next night I got an email that my online questionnaire had been completed by Sondra@cablexvvi.net. Some of here answers were interesting to say the least. I had no idea she knew so much about me or my condition. Before replying to her, the “webmaster” at stopbedwetting.com carefully read the questionnaire.

1. How old is the bedwetting child you are seeking help for? 14

2. Sex - F

3. Weight - 46 lbs

4. Height - 3 ft 5 inches

5. Has your child experienced any of the following traumatic events recently:

Divorce of parents; Long distance move

6. Have there been other bedwetters in the family? Check all that apply: No

7. How many times a week does your child wet the bed? 5

8. How many hours does your child sleep before wetting the bed? Unknown

9. Does your child wet his or her clothes during the day? Occasionally

10. Do you do any of these things now to help treat the problem? Limit Fluids

11. How do you currently plan to deal with your child’s bedwetting:

Use diapers or other absorbent undergarments

12. Please tell us about your living situation and any medical condition that you think may contribute to the wetting?

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