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Excellant "take" on right vs wrong when it comes to using a diaper, Dylan76! You've touched on something that will always bother people to some extent!

Being "like normal people" is another of those guilt laden concepts; I feel I would not be normal if I did NOT wear a diaper because I'd be wetting my pants, leaving a puddle on the floor standing in a line, and leaving wet furniture in my wake!

NO, I am "like a normal person" because I wear a diaper! I don't have wet pants, I don't leave a puddle on the floor or wet furniture in my wake....so I am just like a "normal person".......thanks to my diaper! Nothing "wrong" with that!

Rereading my last post in this thread brings up a few other ideas I wanted to explore. (I'm slowly getting used to the idea that this is a forum, and more shareing is good, since I tend to feel like I'm nearly spamming the place when I post.)

One concept that jumps right out at me is some variation on what the significance of wetting A diaper semi or totally intentionally is in the face of having wet thousands. Is a diaper truely only there 'just in case', worn only as a backstop to a complete inabilty to control, or is it there as a 'health aid'? If I may illustrate; should one take aspirin only when completely debilitated by pain, or is it ok to take some when one feels a headache comming on? Stated another way, if it is POSSIBLE to walk without the aid of crutches, but more productive and easier to use them, is it shameful or lazy to use crutches? I suspect these aren't even sensible questions to apply to using diapers if it weren't for the use of shaming in childhood toilet training, and victorian disgust with bodily function.
In the scheme of things, voiding in a diaper is such a minor and personal event that it's curious just how much emphasis is placed on not doing so. However, having said that I still myself fall victim to some degree of guilt and perhaps a twinge of shame regarding it time to time.

I think another enlightening way of examining the topic for concepts and social/emotional responses is this (and this is less an argument than a thought experiement): Externalizing and projecting, consider the case of someone you care about, a spouse, parent adult child. . . someone you wouldn't like to see in physical and emotional turmoil. Now imagine that the only means of relieving their physical and emotional pain is for them to void in a diaper. How shameful would you consider this act? Would you think of them as lazy, or quite reasonable under the circumstances?
I think that one must misunderstand the concept of 'caring about' a person to answer that they would still think it unreasonable and shameful. After all, it's not as if they have to drink the blood of new borns to reduce their own suffering, only to deposit waste in a receptical designed, produced and sold for the purpose of depositing waste.
Turn that around, especially my fellow urge sufferers and apply it to yourselves. I hope we all care about ourselves deeply, and if this minor ideosyncracy, this slightly different concept of elimination, wouldn't bother us if a loved one were doing it, why should we allow ourselves any less consideration?

I'm going to make just one more observation in this post, and offer one more perspective.

Firstly, and I throw this out as an insight into how my own mind works as a way of setting the context for what follows.
Personally, when wearing absorbent underwear, I'm thinking in terms of avoiding wetting unless it is just not reasonably possible. I'll readily interupt activities, put conversations on hold, and generally drop what I'm doing when the urgency hits to get to the bathroom in time. Failing to do so feels like defeat. That is, wetting in absorbent underwear engenders much more of a sense of failure and shame when it is in fact truely accidental and unavoidable. Further, if on occasion I decide not to rush off from something and semi intentionally wet absorbent underwear there is considerable guilt associated with it. Not the sort of thing that keeps me up at night, not after this many years, but it is a recognizable emotional response for me.
Conversely, when I wear diapers, I have generally already made the decision that unless the bathroom is very readily accessable (i happen to be standing next to one) or for whatever reason, it has been a couple of hours or more since I've gone and I'm still dry, then it is my intention to use the diaper and not seek out a bathroom.
Under this latter circumstance there is much less anxiety about wetting, little guilt or shame feelings. I suspect this says something about intentions and how they affect our thinking.
Thus I wonder if it's possible to say that a part of emotional acceptance of inco (and it's management) is intentional.
If it is I think that one must examine ones motives to see if we're seeking out the wrong thing. Is it 'staying dry' we're after, or is it resuming 'normal' life?
I think that (and I'm not saying it's this simple, because it hasn't been for me) if we're clear about what it is that we intend, what our goal is, that the emotional component of where wastes end up is greatly lessened, and the choice about whether to seek out a toilet each time the urge arrives (or for that matter each time the normal need is felt) starts to depend on what best suits the goal of enjoying life instead of the sometimes conflicting goal of staying dry.
I know that for me, the closer I get to redefining my goal as enjoying life, and the further I get from 'staying dry' as a goal, the less I stress, and the happier I am. After that it's all a matter of what is practical and convenient. If it turns out that's going to the bathroom, fine, if it's using a diaper, equally fine.
I guess what I'm saying is that the more I redefine my goal as enjoying life, the less I base my self respect and sense of maturity and 'normalcy' on where I pee. Really, if you think about it, something as insignificant as in what manner one eliminates ones waste, is that what we ought to base our self image on?

I think guilt feelings of wearing, and using diapers is probably very common for anyone that is incon. As such, it's all part of the emotional process of acceptance we experience as being incon and using diapers.

Everyone is different, and I know I had guilt feelings about weraing diapers when I first become incon. I found it more difficult to manage my incon by worrying about the timed use of the toilet, (aka bladder mgt). Bladder Mgt DOES work for many people depending on the type of incontinence they might have, but it doesn not work for everyone and can be more of a hindrance to many (in my opinion). The cause of my incon is spinal cord nerve damage so I have a neurogenic bladder, and bowel. With this type of incontinence, I'm wet most of the time so it's more a question of how wet I am at any given time. In many ways, incon Mgt was helpful, but it also brought a large amount of stress because I had to always make use of the timed toilet brakes in which I was usually wet to some degree anyways so I wore diapers as my means of protection.

If I ONLY had a small dribble, I would have used the pull-up style protection and used the toilet as much as possible. My incon was much more volume than most pull-up style briefs could absorb and little by little I was becoming bowel incon as well so I really needed to use a full matted disposable diaper for protection. I recall being very frustrated with the incon mgt, and the stress that came with it, Eventually, and gave up and just used the diaper all the time as my means of dealing with the problem. It was much easier to change when convenient compared to letting the toilet manage my life. The negative to this is I had the same feelings of guilt that you described because I was incon, and also used the diaper for convenience. I finally succumbed to the realization that I can't have it both ways, nor can anyone else that has a more severe loss bladder, and/or bowel control..

I found it much easier to manage my incon by changing the diaper. I don't give it much thought any more, and I don't have any guilt feelings any more either. I just change when convenient and move forward with life. I like not having the stress, or having soiled clothing so I wear a diaper and use it. When your already incon,.... Who cares if you use the diaper? Everyone is different, but this is what works best for me. You might want to read all the posts that were made in the topic "Am I Incontinent, or Diaper Dependent". Very closely related to this topic.

Hope this helps.

I became incontinent as the result of a surgical mishap when I was 14 years old. That was back in 1956, long before the development of disposable diapers. So I had to wear cloth diapers with plastic pants 24/7. As a result, I was bullied and became fanatically determined to regain bladder control. To do so, I practiced Kegal exercises (although we didn't call them that in those days) and timed voiding. I started out voiding every hour and then gradually increased the interval between voids by 10-minute increments until I got up to 2 hours. Following that regime, I got to the point where I could generally manage to stay dry without a diaper if I followed the regime and controlled my fluid intake. However, if I slipped up and didn't get to the toilet on schedule or drank too much of anything at one time, I had accidents; and I still needed a diaper at night. But I was conscientious and determined and didn't wear a diaper during the day unless some circumstance arose where I could not follow the regime.

However, when I reached my forties, my bladder control worsened despite trying to continue with the regime I had followed since high school. As a result, I was forced to return to wearing daytime diapers. And that return to needing daytime diapers seemed like a major defeat at the time.

However, after many years of trying to use my diaper as rarely and as little as possible, I finally smartened up. I now understand that wearing and using my diaper frees me from the often useless effort to always know where the nearest bathroom is and trying to get there whenenever the occasion arises so that my diaper stays as dry as possible. In fact, I've become quite lackadaisical and don't even try to use the toilet for voiding unless it happens to be particularly convenient to do so. Relying on my diaper most of the time is a great stress reliever. I go about my life without thinking about my bladder any more than a continent person would think about his bladder. What a relief!

Bravo to inconinmiss and johnstone.

When I said I felt a twinge of guilt I meant just that, the slightest tickle. While my inco sometimes under the right circumstances allows me to depend more on the toilet that diapers, other times one or the other (or both) don't allow this to be a viable possibilty. At such times I often rely entirely on my diaper even when it would (theoretically) be possible to get to the bathroom. I like was incoinmiss said about not thinking about bladder control anymore than a continent person, and I think that suggests something about the shift in thinking I mentioned earlier; that the goal eventually has to be de-stressing, getting on with life, and enjoying it, not about staying dry when doing so interferes with the first goal.

I've been dealing with some degree of inco for almost 17 years and I'm well adapted to it. I only thought that it was interesting that after all this time some echo of my long ago potty training would kick in and suggest a bit of guilt related to it all. It says something about how powerful the imprint can be, the force of the social taboos, etc.

I didn't mean to say that it should be shameful, nor that I suffered any from guilt about it. Only that I still recognized the feeling from time to time despite what should be plenty long enough to have left such thoughts well behind.

I am relatively new to the incontinence life style, I am urinary incontinence and wear a diaper 24/7. My doctor suggested a catheter which was fine for the first 10 minutes after that it became annoying and painful - despite the 'wonderful' urinary tract infection that I got. So, compared to a catheter I chose to wear diapers.

I take offense to being called 'lazy' for using my diaper versus me busting my butt to get to the bathroom. If I get the urge, the urine shortly follows. So it is difficult a majority of the time to even make it half way to the bathroom let alone make it and successfully use the toilet. Work is even further out of the question since my desk is about as far away from the bathroom as one could get. I wet at night, I have tried everything within my budget but again, diapers have made it more practical for my girlfriend and I to sleep through the night without me getting up a million times and waking her up and me not getting a good night sleep.

I work extremely hard, I have my masters degree and for me being titled as 'lazy' simply because I chose to use a diaper is not fair and judgmental. According to my doctor there is little I can do at this point for the incontinence .... so I have accepted my diagnosis and have made the best of it.

This is what I needed to see at this very moment, being new to this journey. Thank you very much!

Welcome to our forum, Borntoroam, and please know that we are here to lend an ear and support as best we can, others who like yourself, find themselves new to the leaking thing and wet spots and so on. It just doesn't seem fair that our body will double cross us like this and take away control we always took for granted.

But s___ happens and when life hands you lemons.....make lemonade.

I've read with great interest all the coments and replys regarding use of nappies or diapers as you lads and lasses from the US call them. This is my opinion and experience for what it is worth. I have been suffering from slight daytime incontinence for over a year and night time incontinence, bedwetting enurisis or what ever you want to call it for a little over 8 months. Waking up in a soaking wet bed that first morning was a shock I can tell you.
I now wear tena maxi pads or pull ups and sometimes tena slip nappies which keep our bed and my wife dry and me comfortable during the night. For the first couple of months I didn't sleep properly at all. I would get up to use the bathroom if I feelt the slightest twinge. Eventually my wife convinced me that my bedwetting didn't bother her and said to me "why worry we have a water proof cover on the bed. You are wearing a nappy and thre is a kylie under the sheet. Just go to sleep and if you wet so what." And then added "and for gods sake if you wake needing to pee just go in your nappy and go back to sleep." We now both get a good nights sleep and I shower and change in the morning.
I usually sleep like a log now and there are just sometimes I am aware that I am wetting. If that is lazy then so beit but for both my wife and I who need our sleep it works well.

ST50, I'm glad to hear that, like a lot of the rest of,us, you've discovered that a reliable, high-capacity diaper and not bothering to get up in the middle of the night are the keys to getting the rest you need.