We went out into the hallway and to the elevator. When we got to the third floor instead of empty white walls this floor was painted with rainbows and had all kinds of kids stuff painted on them. We went to a door that was next to a row of windows were you could look in from the hallway.

A nurses desk was just inside the door and my parents talked to the new nurse and told her why we were there. She said hi to us and to go ahead and look around. There was about fifteen beds. A long row of them by the windows facing outside and smaller rows about half way down the two sides. In the middle was a play area with pads on the floor with books and toys on them. Most of the beds were occupied as it was getting late. Suddenly I noticed a girl about my age laying on her stomach in one of the beds by the window. She was looking at me through the bars on the side on the side of the bed and was wearing a gown like the one I had on. They were yellow with cartoon animals printed on them and came down just above the knees. Her gown was all scrunched up to her waist and she was wearing a diaper and baby pants. The back wall had a door leading to the bathroom. Next to it was a large cabinet with a padded top. The shelves below were filled with diapers and baby pants and on a smaller shelf attached to the wall a couple of feet above the pad was some powder and a bar of soap in a dish with diaper pins sticking all over in it. We went back to my room and after saying goodnight to my parents they gave me another shot and a fresh diaper. I started thinking about the girl in the ward. How could she do that? How could she just lay there with everybody seeing it? How am I going to wear them in front of all those kids? Wait a minute, why was I thinking about how I COULD wear them? And then it occurred to me that over the last couple of days while I was still terribly embarrassed that anybody especially my parents knew I was in diapers I was also beginning to feel a strange calm and soothing sense of comfort from them. Maybe I was brain damaged after all.

The next morning I had to drink some stuff that tasted like chalk and wasn't allowed to eat anything. A few minutes later we went to x-ray for some tests. the nurse pulled my gown way up by my chin and unpinned one side of the diaper and slid it down by my knees. As soon as they took the photos she pulled it back up and repinned it. Next we went to see the doctor and it was a new one I hadn't seen before. He told me he was going to do a test to check my bladder and that it might hurt a little bit but knew I was tough and could take it. I'll just say this, the test involved a tube in all the wrong places and he was almost right it did hurt, and it wasn't a little bit. That's all he said you did fine. Get me out of here. We went to the elevator and the nurse said she would get me some breakfast as soon as I was settled in the ward. I looked for the girl but she was gone. I wondered if she wore a diaper home. Both nurses took me to a bed by the window and put me in it. The bed was smaller than the one in the room and this one had sides that pulled way up. All the way around the top was a frame with rings like in a shower on it. They started taking the robe off me and I tried to both pull the covers up and the gown down at the same time to hide the diaper. The new nurse got my chart and reached up to a long plastic panel across the top front rail. It had a place for the patients name and doctors name. She filled all that out with a big blue felt pen. Next was a place for medications and she put that up there. Last was a big long square for nurses instructions. She wrote in great big blue letters DIAPERS. The only thing missing was the flashing neon arrows. The old nurse said goodbye and left. Next the new nurse came over to the a stand next to my bed and put down a stack of diapers and baby pants with a can of powder.

I quickly looked around and none of the other kids had paid any attention. When it came time for the first change she did it right there in the bed and I looked out the window so I wouldn't see the kids staring at me. I got a little teasing from some of the kids when the nurses couldn't hear but nothing like I expected. When I had to go number two they would let me walk to the bathroom and take the diaper off so I could do my business. When done they would take me out to the changing table by the door and diaper me where everybody walking down the hallway could watch. One day a kid in the bed across from mine started crying and having a fit and his mother said if you don't stop acting like a baby their going to put diapers on you like him. I loved the wearing them so much by that time I thought you should be so lucky.