Beyond diapers and a waterproof mattress cover, what other accommodations would a character with incontinence have?
Hello,
The most immediate and universal step is destigmatizing incontinence. Talking about incontinence like it's the normal thing it is and not shaming people for having it or needing help with it is step number one. It's only gross as in "potential biohazard," similar to blood, there's nothing inherently gross about being incontinent. By making incontinence less of a shameful thing, we encourage conversations about the condition, what living with it is like, possible problems and solutions, and we make it easier for these people to reach out when they need help making everything work
To start, the plan is always going to be individualized based on the cause, severity, contributing factors, environment, and the person themselves. When I was trained on this, these are some "universal" accommodations that can be modified easily to suit a variety of clients-
Regularly scheduled bathroom breaks. When and how these are scheduled will depend- some people will need to schedule a break every two hours, others will have scheduled breaks at say, midnight or a certain amount of time after a meal, or they will have a more general scheduled time, like before they go to bed at whatever time they happen to go to bed, et cetera.
Bathroom breaks designed around possible triggers. Some people have stress incontinence, so recognizing when they are stressed and if they have a threshold they may be approaching can help prevent accidents
Sanitary discrete disposal for used products such as diapers or Depends. A trash can with a closing lid and a leak-proof bag that is emptied at a scheduled time or as needed (generally, at least once every twenty-four hours.) It helps with any smell, it helps with sanitation and bugs, it gives the client an embarassment-free place to throw their product away so they don't feel the need to hide it somewhere it may not get thrown out. Oftentimes with disposable gloves nearby so that it's easy to put them on before changing the bag. Both for sanitary reasons and for the reason that people will be more reluctant to change the bag without them for fear of germs and spills getting onto their hands. The can itself is often cleaned regularly for sanitation
Items such as absorbent matts placed under the sheets or on chairs, either disposable (less likely) or washable and reusable (more cost-efficient
Wipes for cleaning the skin after an accident occurs, in case the person is unable to shower. Getting themselves cleaned off is a must, urine and feces can damage the skin if not cleaned up promptly, but dropping everything to take a shower isn't always viable. While the wipes aren't as perfect as taking a shower, they're infinitely better than cleaning up with paper towels or the like, and better than not doing anything and waiting for the next shower to get cleaned up
Arranging furniture and other things in the environment to make getting to the bathroom as easy as possible
Hard floors. Flooring like hardwood, linoleum, and laminate are far easier to clean than carpet is. With hard floors, all you need is to throw some floor cleaner into the mop bucket and mop around real quick, cleaning carpet is far more complicated and that leads to the floor not being cleaned when it should be
Cleaning products that are specifically safe for cleaning up an accident. If you hit urine with bleach, you make mustard gas and you'll need to evacuate the building and the Poison Control people will have to come out and clean it before you cans safely re-enter the home. Urine has several components that can react badly or dangerously with certain household chemicals, and other chemicals will essentially just smear it around without cleaning anything. The safe cleaning agents are harder to find and might be more expensive or less effective, but you've gotta go with them. You don't want to evacuate the house at three in the morining during a snowstorm because you didn't read a label and accidentally created a weapon illegal under the Geneva Convention. I speak from personal experience here
Towels that are specifically for this. Both because no one wants to dry their face with a towel used to wipe up urine, regardless of how clean it is, and so that you're less likely to run out of the towels. These towels can often get stained, bleached, ratty, rough, and generally beat to heck, so they aren't fun to use as a bath towel. You've got the bath towels, which are purely for bathing and bathing-like activities and are more cared for, and then you've got the cleanup towels, where you just kill them dead and don't throw them out until they're completely unusable
Spare things. Spare sheets and blankets. Spare clothes whever they might be useful, like in the bathroom.
Motion-activated lights for when someone needs to get to the bathroom in low light conditions, like at night. Basically, there needs to be as few obstacles between them and the bathroom as possible
Portable bathrooms like handheld urinals or bedpans. Sometimes, it might be a catheter that works best for someone
And also, this might just be the company I work for, but we buy stuff like Attends in bulk. I'm talking you'll go into the basement and you'll see the New York City skyline made of Attends cases.
Again, these are all generic and not one-size-fits-all, how and if people use these will vary from person to person. There's also likely a lot of things that people do that I haven't covered here. But these are some basic and common starters for accommodations for people who are incontinent.
Happy writing!
Mod Aaron
