www.incontinentsupport.org

Hello,

I was looking for some kind of introduction topic but couldn't find one so I hope this is a good place to say hello!
I'm Katelyn from the Netherlands, I found this website and forum because your Diaper FAQ was mentioned on our Dutch incontinence support forum. That FAQ is excellent, my compliments!

I’m a girl born with a congenital developmental issue that manifests mainly as severe urinary incontinence. I’ve never been dry at night. In daytime the severity varies, though I’ve never been able to discover a pattern in there. Some urologists label it primary enuresis and others functional incontinence, or a mix thereof. I don’t expect that I will live to see this fixed in any case! I do keep an eye on possible new developments .. but I’m holding my breath.

I guess that the upside of having been born with something is that there’s no loss to deal with. Of course I’ve always been aware that other girls of my age didn’t wear diapers but I never felt inferior because of it.
Dealing with the hassle can be frustrating: the extra work, the explanations, working around other people’s ignorance or strange ideas … well, no need to explain that here I suppose

I’m also a dedicated reusables fan, and found that where it comes to finding good solutions for incontinence it pays to question everything and figure things out yourself. I don’t know any other area in life where assumptions are challenged so rarely, being burdened by shame and taboo as they are.

- Katelyn

Welcome to our little leaky corner of the Internet. I share one small issue with you, in that my incontinence is caused by a genetic disease, which, however, does not compare to your situation. We have fewer females here than males; perhaps your presence will add to our depth of experience and diversity. I too prefer washables when I'm at home; however, disposables are indispensable when I travel. Again, welcome.

Let me be the first to welcome you to incontinent support.

It sounds like you've got a good handle on everything, and we could always use another person who can give out advice.

Hi Katelyn Welcome to the Group

you will find lots of great support and info here

Rob

Welcome aboard! You are among friends with the same problems! Puffy

Welcome Katelyn to our little family here.

It sure sounds like you have things covered on dealing with your incon.
I too prefer cloth diapers over disposables.

Im glad to hear that you enjoyed our FAQ. and that you found it helpful
Im always glad to hear that our website got out to someone and helped them, even in a small way.

Its hard to deal with incontinence as it is, let alone "going outside and being around someone", its even worse if you know that other person.
With the development of the internet, people are starting to know that they are not alone. There are other people out there in the world that also have the same problems. Reading up on how other people deal with incontinence, and the associated problems that go with it, just goes to show that everyone can relate to each other here.

LOL We are all here for the same thing, we have problems controlling our bodily functions.

So welcome to our family here.

Schoppy

Thanks for joining. I hope you can take away an added measure of information and support from those here, just as you'll add
dimension and input to our varied forum topics.

...j

Wow, thanks for the warm welcome!

... our leaky corner of the Internet ...

LOL I love that expression!

Like Patrick and John, I also find disposables very convenient when away from home, for instance when I'm staying with family and especially on holidays. We like to make long bicycle trips through Germany, the Czech Republic, Belgium and the like. Having good disposables available is great because they take up much less of the little available space on a bicycle. Of course a reusable diaper would even be better but yeah, washing and drying would be challenging

Even then I can't take everything I need, so I usually have to restock at a pharmacy or, when in Germany, one of the ubiquitous "Sanitätshauser" (sanitary houses) that often sell incontinence supplies.

@Brian: I can of course share what I've learned over the years but as far as I've seen you all seem very knowledgeable already, way more than I've seen on our Dutch forum.
I'm not sure if I could tell you anything new, but you never know how a cow catches a hare (I suppose that's an extant expression in Dutch only ... )

@Schoppy: it struck me how many people don't seem to understand how diapers work in a technical sense: for instance, they think that a plastic pant’s function is to contain free liquid - I always have an image of a mannequin wearing a plastic pant filled with water and some fishes swimming around in it, like an aquarium.

Actually, just the other day I was having a discussion with another member on our Dutch forum, who told me he needed snug-fitting plastic pants to prevent leaks. He uses plastic-backed disposable diapers, and I tried to explain that when used with looser-fitting plastic pants, the waterproof backing might actually promote leaks because if there is a leak, the liquid has nowhere to go to and will wander around between pant and waterproof backing until it finds a way out.

With non-waterproof pads it could just be re-absorbed and actually improve the overall capacity of the disposable, because the liquid doesn’t easily spread through the whole diaper with disposables. The problem is though that there aren’t any non-waterproof-backed disposables of any serious capacity around that I know of.

I think people would be able to make better choices if they understood these things better. That is why I appreciate your FAQ so much: it doesn't beat around the bush, it's straightforward and clear where so many other resources that present as independent pay lip service to diaper manufacturers.

welcome to the group Katelyn. You definitely have a lot of knowledge dealing with this since you been dealing with it since birth. Great place to come and discuss those situations or just to vent about things.

Thanks, Batman
I've been reading a bit and I'm surprised by how many people are using cloth diapers here, while I'm practically the only one on the Dutch forum (though that population is a lot smaller as well).

@john1050 - thanks for your welcome pm!
The "compose message" tab says "We are sorry, but you are not authorised to use this feature. You may have just registered here and may need to participate more to be able to use this feature" so that's why I cannot answer it at the moment.