Adult incontinence in the good old/bad old days

Bit of an odd topic this but I got to thinking... it's a bad habbit of mine. I was reading that good adult disposable nappies/diapers came a long time after disposables for babies.

So if you were incontinent 24/7 as an adult prior to... I think it was the 70s, I would have thought you'd face a lot of challenges in terms of... well public life. Does anyone have any memories of negative reactions by employers or co-workers or just other people in general? If you weren't able to use disposables, or didn't have very good ones, do you think you would struggle more in work or recreation? I know for instance a lot of folks say they wear disposables when out and about and cloth at night.

Both my Mother and her mother were incontinent in later life it seems I take after them. I have no idea what protection if any my Grandmother wore. I know she always smelled of pee and her house stank of stale urine from her nightly bedwetting. At the time I never thought about it after all I was a nightly bedwetter and my room always stank.

By the time my Mother became incontinent tena products were available and I think she wore pads most of the time from being in her ate 50's

I do recall my Grandmother had continence issues dating back to her child bearing days, I know that when we emptied her house out there were an abnormal amount of towels around the place and I always remember towels on a cloths horse every time we visited, makes sense to me now but in those days it was just what everyone did in their houses.

I would think that whatever time it was, whatever was used for babies was somehow fashioned for adults in a larger size, including back before mass-produced towels.

Back then we didn't have disposables (at least in our area). Even for babies. Everything was cloth. I was in cloth diapers and plastic pants as an older kid. As I grew, we just got bigger plastic pants. So I'd assume, you could just get bigger diapers and bigger plastic pants.

I do recall my love affair with the Sears and JC Penney catalogs. Mall order and medical supply stores were about the only way to buy plastic pants and diapers. I bought my first pair of plastic pants at a medical supply when I was 20. I was disappointed to find they were a plastic coated cloth. I wanted the good old fashioned baby pants plastic. My dreams came true when I found the lined plastic briefs in the Sears Medical Supply Catalog. Then, again in the Penneys Catalog. They were flannel lined plastic just like toddler trainers. I removed the lining and pinned on my Curity 21x40 flat diapers. I still recall the dread of walking into the Sears pick up store to face the older adults when I picked my plastic pants up. The strange look they gave me. Considering the state of shock look on my face it was probably no wonder they looked at me strange. …But, I found heaven….

Obviously this was how incontinent folks dealt with their problem. There were no doubt a lot of older folks with very bulky pants walking around. But when you’re young and horny the last thing you looked at was to see if some old guy was wearing a thick diaper.

😄😁😆 Thanks for giving me a laugh!

Lol… no problem. Like they say, what goes around comes around. Now I’m the old guy with a puffy butt…

I do recall my love affair with the Sears and JC Penney catalogs. Mall order and medical supply stores were about the only way to buy plastic pants and diapers. I bought my first pair of plastic pants at a medical supply when I was 20. I was disappointed to find they were a plastic coated cloth. I wanted the good old fashioned baby pants plastic. My dreams came true when I found the lined plastic briefs in the Sears Medical Supply Catalog. Then, again in the Penneys Catalog. They were flannel lined plastic just like toddler trainers.

That takes me back to the mid-70’s when I started ordering through Sears. I still remember when I went to pickup my diapers and plastic pants, I gave the lady my name and phone number, she looked at the order and then did a double-take and looked me over. I thought for sure she would start questioning me about why I was buying adult diapers. She finally turned around picked up the packages and checked me out with no comment. When I got home I tried everything on and really enjoyed the flannel lined plastic pants. Still remember the great feeling trying them on!

Always a topic that has interested me. And it wouldn't just have been old people either. A lot of women who had difficult births, for example, would have been left incontinent without the treatments (or disposable products) available today, and their only option was probably adult terry towelling nappies and plastic/rubber pants. Of course fewer women worked outside of the home in those days, and I suspect a lot who were in this situation would rarely leave the house.

My my how things have changed over the years. I remember back then when there was basically department stores. There wasn't a Wal-Mart in every bigger towns.

I remember the thick Sears and JC Penny catalogs. They had many items that you didn't find in the department stores.

It was normal at the time to order those items from the catalogs. Obviously there wasn't any internet like today.

I do remember seeing many incontinent related items for babies and adults. There where the all the cloth and terry diapers and plastic pants. I'm sure there wasn't a ABDL items.

I'm sure there where medical supply stores that carried those items in the bigger cities. However there wasn't any such store in the area at that time.

When I was 12 in 1958 I was amazed that they had diapers and plastic pants for older children and adults in my mom's Wards catalog . when I was 16 I ordered my first flannel lined plastic pants with a snap in liner.

]My my how things have changed over the years. I remember back then when there was basically department stores. There wasn't a Wal-Mart in every bigger towns.

I remember the thick Sears and JC Penny catalogs. They had many items that you didn't find in the department stores.

It was normal at the time to order those items from the catalogs. Obviously there wasn't any internet like today.

I do remember seeing many incontinent related items for babies and adults. There where the all the cloth and terry diapers and plastic pants. I'm sure there wasn't a ABDL items.

I'm sure there where medical supply stores that carried those items in the bigger cities. However there wasn't any such store in the area at that time.[/quote]