The Trying Policy (Chapter 10)
Monday morning started off just like any other, except that Julie started the day off by wetting her diaper as soon as she got out of bed. In so doing, she realized that she wasn’t able to tell if she had wet it during the night. She didn’t remember wetting at all, and had in fact slept all night long without waking up. Breakfast came and went and her mom changed her into a new diaper after she was finished. Then she got dressed and headed off to school.
‘Will people notice?’ Julie wondered. Julie had looked at herself in the mirror over and over after she had put on all her clothes. It really was almost impossible to see anything as far as she could tell so it seemed unlikely that folks would just notice from a visual of her. Julie had chosen a loose skirt for the day, one that didn’t hug her body much at all and came down well past her knees just to be on the safe side.
Her second concern was about having to use her diapers at school. Would people notice if I have a wet diaper? And what about a messy diaper? Julie decided she would just hold it if that became an issue.
By the time she got to school, Julie had thought enough about the situation to have come to a couple of conclusions. First and foremost, she was going to just have to ignore the issue a bit if she wanted to be able to pay any attention to her classes. It was really easy to worry about people noticing, and to spend all her time trying to listen to see if her diaper was making any noise. But after having spent all morning doing just that, she had decided that nobody would notice and that it really wasn’t going to be that big of a deal. It was only for a week, 5 days really, and she could make it though a week of just about anything. ‘If I really have to go, I will, but I’ll just try to wait until later in the day.’
First period came and went, and second period was also uneventful. Julie made it to lunch without much of any problem, but towards the end of lunch she knew she was going to need to pee at some point. On the way to class after lunch she decided to pee before it got to be too bad. She wet her diaper outside of the classroom and felt really confident that she could go at least one more time before she was going to have to worry about a leak.
Julie’s first class after lunch was math, algebra actually, with Ms. Niles. About 10 minutes into the class folks were going over the homework from last night and Julie was working with Judy, who sat next to her. Ms. Niles was at her desk looking at her computer and getting ready to talk about whatever new thing they were going to talk about that day. Julie was in the process of telling Judy how to solve an equation when Mr. Niles looked up from her desk and called her name.”
‘Julie can I talk with you for a second?
Julie looked up and nodded, expecting Ms. Niles to just say whatever she was going to say. But Ms. Niles waved for Julie to come up to her desk, so Julie got up and walked over.
“Julie, I just got a message asking for me to send you to the office.” Ms. Niles said questioningly.
“Really?” Julie asked in disbelief.
Ms. Niles had been hoping that Julie knew what was going on. She clearly didn’t like that Julie appeared surprised as well. “Yea, really.” Ms. Niles said in a semi confused, semi concerned voice. “I guess you better go. Here, take the hall pass.”
Julie’s mind had been on math, and she had been expecting Ms. Niles to ask her something about numbers and equations or something like that. She had not expected to get sent to the office.
The fact was Julie had never been sent to the office. Ever. Julie was a good student, and never got in any kind of major trouble. She wasn’t exactly a perfect angel either, she had gotten detention last year for being late to a class (she had been talking to Becky and never heard the bell) and she had got in a bit of trouble early this year in her history class when she told Jimmy Dart that he was an idiot for thinking that the French were responsible for the Boston massacre. But she had never gotten sent to the office. That was for people who got in real trouble, like cutting class, fighting, or smoking and drinking. And she hadn’t done any of that.
Julie was about half way to the office when a really scary thought hit her. She remembered a couple of years ago some kid, Barry she thought, got pulled out of class and sent to the office. She remembered it cause it Barry wasn’t the type of kid to get sent to the office either. It turned out his mom had been in a car accident and died. Barry didn’t come back to school for a week. Everybody felt really horrible for him and it was all just so sad. Julie thought about the possibility of something like that, and it really terrified her. She spent the rest of the trip trying to convince herself that there was no way it could be something like that.
When she got to the office, it occurred to her that she had no idea where she was actually supposed to go. She saw a door that said ‘front office’ and decided to try there.
Inside the door was a desk with a woman sitting behind looking at a computer screen. She had her hair up in a bun and wore half moon glasses. She stopped her typing and peered over the top of her glasses at Julie.
“Can I help you?” she said without a hint of expression on her face.
“Uh, yea.” Julie started a bit nervously. “I uh, was told I had to go to the office?”
“And what’s this for?” the woman asked.
“I… don’t know actually.”
Julie response threw the woman off and she actually sat up a bit and smiled. “Oh, well, let’s take a look quick. I’m sorry, I don’t think I have seen you before. What is your name?”
“Ok Julie, do you know your student ID number?”
Julie, always good with numbers, had long since memorized her student ID number, even though she hardly ever used it. She recited it back to the woman. “024768”. The woman typed in some numbers, and clicked the mouse a few times. She read and nodded to herself.
“Yep, it says here that Ms. Barnard needs to see you. Her office is past my desk down the hallway on the right.” The woman pointed to a hallway past her desk.
Julie felt a bit of relief and a bit of further confusion. The good news was that Ms. Barnard was not Mr. Trumble, or Mr. Wood, the assistant principals. Julie knew that when you were in trouble you went to see one of them. The bad news is that she didn’t know who Ms. Barnard was. In fact she had never heard that name before. What she really wanted to know is if Ms. was one of the councilors. She didn’t think so, but the school councilors tended to change over pretty quickly. Julie figured that if somebody was going to tell her bad news it would be a councilor. She started thinking that maybe it would have been better if she had been sent to Mr. Wood. But as she walked over to the hallway intersection she saw a sign that read “Counselors” that was pointing to the left. The lady behind the desk had said to go to the right.
“Huh, this is getting strange.”
Julie walked down the hallway, which turned out to be quite short. There was only one door at the end of it and there were a couple of chairs on the side of the hallway across from the door. Julie looked at the place where the office sign would normally inform you about who worked on the other side of the door. But the sign was missing, and in its place was a printed piece of paper taped to the wall. The sign just said “Ms. Lisa Barnard.”
Julie tried the door but it seemed like it was locked. Thinking that maybe the handle spun the other way she gave it another try, and in so doing confirmed that it was in fact locked. But apparently the noise she made had alerted somebody on the other side.
“Oh, sorry, I’m coming.” Said a female voice.
The door opened and Julie found herself looking at a woman, probably in her late 30s who was dressed in jeans and a button up shirt with pockets on the front. The woman smiled and held the door open and looked at Julie. There was a moment of silence, that dragged on to the point of being a bit awkward. Julie finally spoke up.
“That’s what the paper on the wall says.” She said with a roll of her eyes and a smile. “Hopefully one of these days they will get around to getting me something more official looking huh? What can I do for you?”
“Um, I was told to come see you.”
“Oh, are you, uh, what was it,” Mr. Barnard said. She closed her eyes and tried to remember something. “Julie?”
“Oh, OK, yes please come in.”
Julie came into the room and Ms. Barnard closed the door behind her. The room was pretty small as far as offices go, and it had what looked almost like one of the counters from her science classes along one side. Ms. Barnard was blocking her view though and she couldn’t really see very much of the room but she did see a sink along the counter.
“Is it ok if you have a seat Julie? There are a couple of chairs behind you.”
Julie turned around and saw a couple of old, plastic desk chairs along the wall with the door. She turned and sat in the first one. It occurred to Julie that whenever somebody had really bad news they always asked you to sit.
Ms. Barnard grabbed a clip board off the lab bench and came and sat next to Julie. She glanced at the clip board and nodded to herself and then turned to look Julie straight in the eye.
“I’m sorry, let me introduce myself since we haven’t met before. My name is Lisa Barnard,” she said as she extended a hand to Julie. Julie shook her hand.
“So,” Ms. Barnard set the clipboard in her lap and folded her hands together, “Julie, how are you doing. Is everything OK with you?”
Julie didn’t really think anything had happened to her parents, but she hadn’t been able to rule is out, so she was still thinking along those lines. “What do you mean?”
“Well, I got a message earlier today. I have been trying to get in touch with your mother, but she hasn’t been answering the phone. Do you know if she has a cell phone?’
Julie had been calm up to that moment. ‘This can’t be happening!’ “Yea, she does. What’s going on?”
“Do you know the number?”
Julie quickly recited her mom’s cell number. Ms. Barnard looked at her clip board. “Well, ok, that is the number I have for her. Is she normally good about answering it and returning calls.”
Julie knew that her mom in fact had a horrible habit of not answering her cell phone. Julie wasn’t even 100% sure that she knew how to check her voice mail. Maybe that was all that was going on. Maybe not though.
“Well, she isn’t always the best about it really. Is she OK? I mean, what’s going on here? Did something happen to her?”
Ms. Barnard looked up at Julie and in a second or two picked up on Julie’s fear. “Oh, no, no everything is fine. This has nothing to do with your family or anything like that I just wanted to talk to her.”
“You wanted to talk with my mom?”
“Well, yea I was hoping to talk with her before I talked with you, but I wasn’t able to get in touch with her. But it’s not a big deal, we can just talk about this right now.” Julie felt a wave of relief in hearing that this had nothing to do with her family. “So, tell me Julie, I know we haven’t met before, but how is everything going with you?”
“Me?” Julie thought about what Ms. Barnard might be looking for. Maybe this was one of those counseling sessions where they check in to see if you have friends and stuff. Julie had heard that after some of the school shootings and stuff that had happened in other parts of the country, that school were trying to do a better job of talking with students and trying to prevent kids from going nuts. That would explain why she had the temporary name tag thing on the door.
“Has anything changed recently for you? I mean have you started having any problems or anything like that?”
Julie felt bad for kids that didn’t have friends and was really glad that she did. Her dad had told her that the kids who went on those shooting sprees didn’t have any friends and had often been the target of a lot of bullies. It seemed like a good idea to have people like Ms. Barnard come in and talk to kids about problems. But the part Julie couldn’t figure out is why they would be talking to her. There were kids in the school who were loners and some of them did get picked on a bunch. Julie was not one of those kids.
“No, everything’s fine. I have a lot of friends.”
Ms. Barnard turned her head slightly and raised her eyebrows. “Well, I’m glad to hear you have friends. But what about you, everything normal?”
“Yea, I mean I guess so.”
“Huh, well I was worried that maybe this was a prank or something, which is why I wanted to talk to your mom about it. See, I got an e-mail forwarded to me today supposedly from your mom. It was kind of vague, but it said that you had started wearing diapers again?” Ms. Barnard’s voice trailed off and she looked at Julie, waiting for an answer.
Julie was stunned, and it showed. Obviously this wasn’t about bullies. She managed to mutter “Oh. Uhh….”
There was a pause, but quickly Ms. Barnard picked up on Julie’s state. “Julie, it’s OK, I’m a professional. I take it this not isn’t a prank after all?”
“Well, I guess, I mean I don’t think so.”
Ms. Bardard shook her head and obviously didn’t like that answer at all. “Julie, it’s OK. I just need to know what’s going on here. Just tell me the truth, are you wearing a diaper right now?”
Julie’s natural reaction was to lie, but she knew that was a really bad idea. Better to just be truthful about the whole thing. “Yea.” She said somewhat quietly.
“OK, that’s fine. Like I said, I’m a professional, and now I know that this note really is from your mom.”
Although she didn’t catch it the first time, when Ms. Barnard said professional, it finally clicked and the light went on in Julie’s head. Just to be sure, Julie asked, “What do you mean ‘professional’? Are you like the school nurse?”
“Well, yes and no. Yes, I do work here for the school and I take care or folks when they get sick and stuff. But I’m not a nurse, I’m a PA actually. That means physicians assistant. Its means I have had more training and schooling than a nurse, and I can do most things that doctors can. I know we haven’t met before, but I want you to know that you can trust me. This place is like a regular doctors office and all the rules that apply there apply here. So anything you tell me is totally confidential and will never leave this office. I am kind of new to this school, but I have actually been working in high schools for the past 5 years. I just used to work in a different school in another state. But I have seen a lot of students over the years, including a number of students who were either still in diapers, or had to start wearing diapers for whatever reason.”
“Oh, ok.” Julie replied. She didn’t really know what else to say.
Ms. Barnard picked up the conversation. “So, OK Julie, according to the note your mom sent me, you are wearing diapers full time?”
Julie felt a bit uncomfortable talking about this with a complete stranger, but since she said she was a PA or whatever, Julie decided to just to honest about everything.
“Yea.” Julie said with a nod.
“Ok, and how long have you been wearing diapers now?”
“OK. And have you had any problems before? I mean is this the first time you have had to go back to diapers?”
“No, this is the first time.”
“And when was the last time you saw a doctor?”
Ironically enough, Julie had been to the doctor just about a month ago for some shot she had needed. She told Ms. Bardard that.
“OK, so you last saw a doctor a month ago. So, are you able to use the bathroom at all now, or are you using your diapers for everything?”
Although it felt strange to say it, Julie replied, “No, I’m using my diapers for everything.”
“OK, and do you change your own diapers, or is that something your parents are doing for you?”
“Um, I don’t change myself, my parents do it.”
“OK, got it.” Ms. Barnard said. She had picked up the clip board and was making a number of notes. “And do you know if you are allergic to anything like talcum powder, or petroleum products or anything like that?”
Julie stared at Ms. Barnard with a look of confusion. “Talcum powder?”
“Baby powder. Some people are allergic to it and use a different kind of baby powder stuff that is cornstarch based. And just about all the diaper rash ointments are petroleum based. Does your mom use any of that stuff on you? If she does I am sure you are not allergic to it or you would know.”
“Oh, yea, my mom uses both.”
“OK, good no allergies then. Have you had any rashes or anything like that?”
“Well, that’s good.” Ms. Barnard stood up and walked over to the counter. She made a number of additional scribbles on the clip board and then set it down and walked over to the sink and started washing her hands. “Well Julie, I want to get you back to class as soon as I can, so I am not going to have you sit here while I fill out the rest of the paperwork. But there are a few things we need to talk about, and some stuff I need you to tell your mom. I will go over it with her too when she calls me back, but it’s stuff you should know as well.”
Julie understood that doctors had to keep stuff confidential, but she wondered what kind of paperwork needed to be filled out. She asked Ms. Barnard about it.
“Oh, half my job Julie is filling out paperwork for the school and for the state. Most of it is just for statistical purposes and is totally anonymous. They want to know how many kids come to see me, what they see me about, and stuff like that. But sometimes I have to fill out other kinds of paperwork. In this case I have to document that this meeting took place, and that I did in fact ask you if you have been to a doctor recently. And actually, since you are wearing diapers full time I also have to fill out some other paperwork. It’s required, but totally useless unless you plan to start going to special education.”
That surprised Julie enough to get her attention. She sat up in her chair “What?! No way.”
Ms. Barnard laughed, “Calm down, there is no way that’s going to happen. Believe it or not, it’s actually very hard to get into a special education program. It costs the school system a lot of money and requires a ton of paperwork to get you in. The whole process is really tightly regulated. It’s really sad because some parents with kids that have problems struggle to get them into a program. Anyways, having to wear diapers is one thing that can help if you are trying to get into the program. So the school system requires me to keep track of all the kids who wear diapers.”
“You have to keep track of everyone who wears diapers at this school?”
“Well, technically I only have to keep track of the kids who are diapered at all times. I am sure there are lots of kids who wear diapers at night and stuff that I don’t know of.”
It never occurred to Julie, but now that she thought about it, she asked without hesitation. “Are there other kids who wear diapers?”
“Well, keep in mind that I have to maintain people’s privacy, so I can’t really go into specifics. But yes, there are a number of people at this school who wear diapers like you do. Honestly, most of them are in the special education program. But not all of them.”
Ms. Barnard had finished washing her hands and had already dried them off.
“So, like I said I want to get you back to class as soon as possible. So, let’s go over the stuff I need to tell you. First of all, you need to know that the school will not supply diapers for you. You are going to need to bring your own. I recommend that you just bring a supply into my office and keep them here. You don’t have to do it that way if you don’t want, but most kids don’t like keeping them in their locker, or carrying them in their backpack. I have some storage space in the back room and can just keep them in there.”
Julie finally noticed that there was a door at the other end of the room. That must be the storage area she was talking about. Julie also noticed for the first time a small bed in the corner of the room opposite the door.
“The next thing I need to tell you is that while nobody needs to know that you are back in diapers, I am going to have to send a note to your teachers letting them know that you are going to need to see me at times, including occasionally during class. Now, teachers get notes like this all the time. I know because I send them. The note doesn’t go into any specifics, so they won’t know. Like I said, everything that happens in here is totally confidential. They are not even supposed to ask you about it, but some do anyways. You don’t have to tell them anything, and you can tell them that they can talk to me about it if they have a problem. I am happy to remind them of the rules. Of course, it’s not like you’re not allowed to tell them what is going on, but that is totally up to you.”
Julie thought about it for a second and came up with a question. “Well, can I just come in during lunch or something like that?”
Ms. Barnard was quick to respond. “Well, I personally suggest you come in to see me whenever you need to. I don’t recommend that you sit through class in a dirty diaper. But, I also want you to know that, like I said, you are not the only kid at this school in diapers. I don’t want to have a line of kids waiting to come in to my office or anything like that, so I don’t suggest coming in during breaks, unless like I said, you need to. Just come whenever you need to have your diaper changed. I guess I should say that, while I usually don’t have somebody else in my office, there is a chance that at some point you might have to wait a bit. The door to my office is always closed and locked from the outside, I do that to make sure somebody doesn’t come in when I am with somebody. That’s why there are chairs out in the hallway. So if you come and knock and I say to wait just a minute, you can just take a seat out there in the hallway and I will get to you in a minute.
Julie was surprised to hear that. “Do you really change that many diapers?” she asked in near disbelief.
“Ah, that’s funny. No, most of the people that come to see me don’t need a diaper change. But they are entitled to privacy too. So, speaking of changing diapers, do you mind if I take a look at yours?”
The question was so simple, and yet so hard to believe. ‘Did she just ask if she could check my diaper?’ Julie asked herself.
“Wait, do you mean, like, you are going to change me?” Julie realized immediately after she said it, how crazy it must have sounded. Here she just told this woman that she wore diapers all the time, and that she didn’t change herself.
“Well….. if you need to be changed, I would think so.” Ms. Barnard replied slowly. “The note from your mom,” she grabbed the clip board again “said that you were back in diapers and asked if there was somebody at the school who could help take care of that. I kind of assumed she was talking about me, but is there somebody else she might have been talking about? A relative or something?”
Julie felt really stupid. It just wasn’t exactly something she was used to or anything. “No,” Julie replied. “No there isn’t anybody like that. I just, I wasn’t really thinking I guess.”
“Well, that’s OK. I mean, if you just started wearing diapers last Friday I imagine this is all pretty new to you still. I can’t image what it would be like to have to wear diapers again, but I suspect at a minimum it would take some getting used to. But like I said before, I want you to know that I am a professional. I do change diapers all the time.”
“Are going to examine me too? Like a doctor?”
“No. I don’t do exams here. I am qualified to do a lot of stuff that doctors do, but I am no pediatrician or anything like that. And more over, the school isn’t paying me to do exams. No, my job is to deal with any student medical issues.”
“So,” Ms. Barnard began slowly, “do you mind laying down on the bed?”
Julie suddenly felt as if everything was becoming nearly surreal. The entire conversation was so far from anything she had ever imaged, that being asked to lay down on a bed and let a woman she just met check her diaper seemed no more outrageous than the rest of it. So she said sure, and walked over to the bed and lied down.
Mr. Barnard wheeled a chair over to the bed and quickly slid Julie’s skirt up just over her waist. “Huh, that’s a different brand of diaper than I have seen before.” She said with mild interest. “And I would say you could use a change, but looks like this will be a quick job. You obviously don’t have a diaper with you, since you left everything in your class. I am pretty sure I have a couple of extras around here someplace. They are not the best diapers in the world, but they are better than a wet one.”
Ms. Barnard stood up and went into the storage area. Julie could hear her rummaging around, opening and closing drawers and cabinets. After a minute or two she came back out with a diaper in hand. The diaper looked different then the ones she had at home. It was a light shade of green rather than white and looked smaller.
“I’m pretty sure this will fit you just fine.” Ms. Barnard said as she came back over to the bed. She set the diaper down on the bed and then grabbed a box of what must have been medical wet wipes. “OK, lets get you out of this wet diaper here.” Without any hesitation she grabbed the tapes of Julie’s diaper and undid them. In a flash, the diaper was off. A quick once over of the wet wipes followed, and then a second wet wipe covered the area again. Putting her hands behind Julie’s knees, Ms. Barnard quickly lifted Julie’s hips ever so slightly, just enough to slide the new diaper underneath with her other hand. Julie felt all her weight return to the bed and then felt the diaper come up between her legs. Julie heard the sound of the tapes tearing off of their backings and being stuck in place, and then her skirt was frisked back into place.
Ms. Barnard stood up and walked over to the sink and started washing her hands again. “Well, There you go.”
“Wow,” said Julie as she rolled off the bed and stood up again. “that was really fast. My mom is nowhere near that quick.” The whole thing had taken maybe 60 seconds.
“Ha, thanks I guess. I probably have a lot more experience than you mom, that’s all. Plus that was an easy one, wet diapers are no big deal. The other ones take a bit longer. Anyways, I think you should get back to class now. But please remember to talk to your mom. I am still planning to speak with her too, but just in case I don’t get in touch with her you need to let her know that she needs to either drop off some diapers for you here, or send you to school with them every day. ”
“I’ll be sure to tell her.”
“OK, well, I am sure I will be seeing you again soon enough, so go on back to class.”
Julie needed a second to figure out that Ms. Barnard was right, she would be seeing her again. She had been paying attention to the new diaper she had on. It felt different than what she had been wearing just a minute ago. The new diaper seemed thinner or something. Julie quickly decided that she liked the diapers she normally wore a lot more.
“Oh, yea, I guess so. Well, thanks and all.”
“No thanks needed Julie. Get back to class and remember to just come see me whenever you need to, OK?”
Julie opened the door and stepped back into the hallway. The door closed itself behind her, and she found herself standing alone in the hallway. The two empty chairs were still there, but Julie looked at them in a different way. She pictured herself sitting there waiting to have her diaper changed while somebody else was in the office. Even though she knew Ms. Barnard was serious about the whole privacy thing, she also knew that folks in the office here had to be able to figure out why some kids were always coming in and sitting there.
On the way back to class Julie learned that the diaper she had on was also a lot louder than the ones she normally wore. It made a loud crinkling noise when she walked that she could hear pretty clearly. Julie also thought about it and decided that Ms. Barnard was OK. She smiled a lot and seemed really nice. It was really cool how she didn’t make a big deal out of the fact that a girl Julie’s age was wearing diapers. She acted like it was pretty normal really. And that was probably because in Ms. Barnard’s world, it was pretty normal. Which made Julie feel a little bit better about the idea of spending the rest of the week in diapers.
The rest of Monday went fine. Julie got home and after her mom changed her diaper (she had wet herself on the way home) she had a talk with her mom that included a small daughter to mother lecture about answering her cell phone and checking voice mail. It turned out that Ms. Barnard had eventually gotten in touch with mom later that afternoon, so she was already in the loop about needing to drop off some diapers for Julie at school. They both agreed that was a better idea then having Julie bring them to school every day. Dad came home and they had dinner together. After dinner, Julie was upstairs on her bed reading a book for school when her body told her that she was soon going to have a stinky diaper. Unlike the previous couple of times though, Julie didn’t really worry about it at all. About ten minutes later she actually filled her pants without really even pausing from the book she was reading. Her mom changed her after she came down a few chapters later to get a drink. She watched a bit of TV after that and then headed off to bed.
