Alternative Therapies - Chapter 6

"Look, your sister is waking up too," greeted me my mother the next morning as I began to stir. Briefly, I tried to open my sleepy eyes, but was immediately blinded by the morning sunlight, so I decided to close them again. I was still too tired to even think about getting up.

Half-asleep, I carefully felt the area of the mattress that had been wet every morning for weeks. This practice had become a kind of routine for me after my first nighttime accident. But unlike before, I couldn't feel any moisture this time. I seemed to have stayed dry this night. I felt pure relief. I had almost forgotten how pleasant a bed could feel in the morning when you weren't lying in your own puddle of urine. I enjoyed the warmth under the soft blanket and could have continued dozing for hours if my stupid mother had let me.

"Emily? Hello? It's time to get up," she persisted. I reluctantly opened my eyes. "Alright, I'm already awake," I grumbled annoyed. When my eyes finally adjusted to the bright sunlight, I was initially surprised to find myself in Sophie's room instead of my own. It wasn't until I recalled the events of yesterday that I realized why I hadn't woken up in my own bed as usual. Unfortunately, that wasn't the only realization that came flooding back with the memories of the previous night. The scene on the changing table immediately came to my mind, and suddenly I suspected that the dry bed may not have been my achievement after all.

In quiet hope that my bitter suspicion would prove to be a mistake, I reached down to my crotch and cautiously felt the bulky plastic monstrosity between my legs. It was incomprehensible to me that I hadn't noticed the diaper before, considering how voluminous it was. Was I imagining things, or had the diaper gotten even thicker? But before I could investigate further, my mother yanked the covers off me, and the subtle odor that emanated from it left no doubt about the situation. "Come on, Emily, Sophie and I want to have breakfast," urged my mother, but after the bitter realization that I had wet myself again while I slept, I was too frustrated to even want to move. Why did this have to happen to me, why did I have to suffer from bladder weakness?

Annoyed that I didn't get up, my mother reached under me and lifted me onto the changing table before I could even react. It wasn't that my mother was particularly muscular, she was of a similarly slender build as me, but at her height of six feet (180cm), she was able to easily carry someone as small and delicate as me the short distance. "Mum, let me go. I'm not a baby, I can walk on my own, I don't need to be carried!" I screamed in horror. "You've had enough time to get up!" she responded angrily.

Roughly she pulled down my pajama pants and exposed my soaked diaper. Without further hesitation, she then proceeded to undo the adhesive strips on my diaper. "Mum, I can take my diaper off by myself!", I interrupted her ashamedly, holding the top of my diaper with all my strength so that she could not open it. I was far too proud to allow her to see the inside of my urine soaked diaper. “If you manage to go to the potty at night like a big girl, then you can also take your diapers off yourself," she mercilessly rebuffed my objection and gruffly pushed my hands aside. Accompanied by a rustling sound, she opened my diaper and pulled it out from under me before folding it up and tossing it into the diaper pail. She meticulously removed the last bits of urine from my crotch and buttocks with a wet wipe before pulling out a pair of panties and putting them on me.

My joy about the panties, which ensured that I no longer had to lie naked in front of my mother, was short-lived. She even seemed to have bought my new underwear in the children's department, where else could you buy panties with a large Snow White on the front. I was about to protest against the childish, red underwear when my sister, who was already fully dressed and curiously watching the proceedings from the side, spoke up. "Why does Emily get to wear real underwear and I don't?" she complained, visibly offended. "If you manage to stay dry for three days during the day, then you can also wear panties for big girls, you know that Sophie," my mother recited the rule that she had explained to Sophie countless times before. I looked down at Sophie haughtily. She had never managed to get through three days in a row without a single accident. Suddenly, I felt a lot more comfortable in the childish underwear, because at least my underwear was still much more grown-up than the pullups Sophie wore. Sophie, on the other hand, looked as if she had lost a shilling and found a penny.

However, my arrogance was to take revenge in the next moment. My mother swiftly tore my pajama top off and pulled a purple dress over my head. The dress might have been quite pretty if a colorful unicorn hadn't spoiled the entire front. "So cute," my mother exclaimed, clearly pleased with my new outfit despite my obvious dissatisfaction, "now you two almost look like twins." At first, I didn't understand what she meant. Technically, my sister and I were only half-siblings and I didn't think we looked particularly alike, although many of our acquaintances thought otherwise. But when I looked down at my sister and took a closer look at her, I understood what my mother meant by the term "twins."

Sophie appeared to be wearing a similar dress to mine. The colors were the same and even the unicorn print on the front seemed to be similar. I kept looking from her dress to mine, hoping to spot some difference, but there was none. Our dresses were not just similar, they were exactly the same, only the size differed. I was wearing the exact same children's dress that my damn four-year-old sister was wearing. Disturbed, I scrutinized Sophie and her dress. Did I look just as childish as she did in that thing? Impossible, it couldn't be. I had a much more mature face and I had breasts, even though they weren't particularly pronounced and barely showed in the dress, which had a loose cut. Hoping to make the dress look at least slightly less childish on me, I asked my mother for a bra, but she flatly refused my request. "Emily, your breasts aren't really big enough to need a bra. Bras are only for big girls, little girls like you don't need them yet," she explained to me incomprehensibly. I glared at her darkly. I was offended. My breasts may not have been as big as hers, but they were certainly big enough to wear a bra.

"Alright, let's have breakfast you two. I made pancakes," my mother interrupted my sulking and took Sophie and me by the hand. "Yummy!" exclaimed Sophie, and together we walked out of the room towards the kitchen. As we passed a large mirror on the way, I couldn't resist taking a look. I stopped in disbelief, and inadvertently stopped my mother, who was holding my hand, and my sister, who was holding my mother's other hand. "You both look very pretty today, Emily," my mother misinterpreted my prolonged gaze in the mirror. Meanwhile, I couldn't believe what I was seeing. The reflection showed a girl who was supposed to be me, but it couldn't be right. With her childish dress and next to my tall mother, the girl staring back at me from the mirror looked no older than ten years old. But I was an adult, not a child. "Come on, Emily, I’m hungry," my mother urged, pulling me towards the kitchen and away from the mirror.

The breakfast went surprisingly uneventful. If it weren't for the sight of Sophie and her dress, which she wore, reminding me of my silly outfit and therefore my current role, I might have actually enjoyed it. After all, I loved pancakes just as much as Sophie did. But my thoughts kept circling back to the image of the little girl I had seen in the mirror, and I still couldn't believe that was supposed to be me.

"Mum, can Emily and I go play in the garden?" begged Sophie after she had swallowed her last pancake. Sophie seemed to have grasped my new role surprisingly quickly and not only that, she seemed delighted that there was finally a playmate her own age in the house. "Alright, but if you two need to go potty, you come to me. I'll stay in the kitchen and start preparing lunch," she told us. I didn't say anything and let my mother believe that I, like Sophie, would come to her if I needed to use the restroom. Unlike Sophie, however, I was perfectly capable of visiting the restroom on my own without any help, and she would hardly be able to prevent me from doing so.

Sophie was so excited to play with me that as soon as our mother gave us permission, she grabbed my hand and started dragging me to the garden. "Hold on a moment, you two," our mother stopped us before we could leave the kitchen and grabbed a damp cloth to clean Sophie's syrup-stained face. Once again, Sophie, now with her face free of the sticky remnants of her breakfast, wanted to head to the garden with me in tow, but was stopped once more. "Wait a moment, Sophie, I need to clean up your sister too," and before I knew it, she wiped the cloth across my face as well. I glared at her angrily. "Don't make such a face, Emily. What kind of mother would I be if I let you leave the house all dirty?"

I doubted that my face had been dirty at all, but before I could say anything, Sophie ran off and pulled me out of the kitchen and away from my mother's sight. Perhaps it was better that I didn't get the chance to speak up, after all, I didn't want to ruin my chances of studying in England, which was the only reason why I was going along with all this nonsense in the first place.

Outside, the weather was radiant. The sun was shining, birds were chirping, and not a single cloud could be seen in the sky. Sophie and I went to the sandbox and started building a sandcastle. The pure delight that Sophie exuded during the construction seemed to infect me. I couldn't remember the last time I had been so enthusiastic about an activity. I had never played with Sophie so intensely before. Although I had watched over her countless times, I had usually been preoccupied with homework, my smartphone, or the TV, and only occasionally checked on her. Sometimes our mother did the same with us, checking up on us, making sure everything was okay, but otherwise she was busy preparing lunch most of the time.

As I was adding another tower to our sandcastle, an unpleasant pressure began to build up in my bladder. I was reluctant to interrupt the fun I was having building the sandcastle with Sophie, but ever since my first nocturnal accident, I had been having problems holding my urine not just at night but during the day as well. With each passing day, it seemed like the time I had left to make it to the toilet in time was getting shorter. Luckily, so far there had been no accidents during the day, unlike at night, and I wanted it to stay that way.

I jumped up frantically. "I'll be right back, Sophie," I apologized to my sister and ran towards the bathroom with my knees clamped together. I breathed a sigh of relief as I reached the door, as the pressure in my bladder had increased with each step. I pushed down on the doorknob, but the door wouldn't budge - it was locked. I cursed inwardly. My mother must have been using the toilet herself; why else would the door be locked? After all, there was no one else in the house. "Mom, are you in there? Are you going to be long?" I called out, pressing my knees together even tighter to support my muscles. But my mother didn't answer; it remained silent. "Mom, I really have to go, can you please open the door," I begged, but still, there was no response. We only had one bathroom in the house, so I couldn't just go to another one.

As I stood there listening for any sound coming from inside the bathroom, I was inevitably reminded of my locked bedroom door from the previous evening. She wouldn't have, no, she couldn't have dared. Upset, I ran into the kitchen and found my mother calmly filling a baking dish with lasagna sheets. "Mom, why is the bathroom door locked!?" I angrily shouted at her. My mother looked at me calmly. "Do you need to go potty, Emily? You should come to me when you need to pee or poo."

I was so angry that I couldn't hold it anymore. "I don't need to go potty, I need to use the toil," I blurted out, but before I could finish my sentence, it happened. At first, only a few drops escaped from my bladder and were caught by my underwear. Panic-stricken, I squeezed my knees together as tightly as possible and grabbed my dress to cover my crotch, trying to stop the impending disaster, but it was no use. The frequency of the drops increased until it turned into a full stream, making the yellow puddle forming beneath me grow larger and larger. In the end, not only my underwear and the floor beneath me were completely soaked, but also large parts of my dress.

I stood there petrified, staring at my mother with sheer horror, who seemed equally shocked by what had just happened. I felt like I had to do something, something that could undo what had just occurred. But even if I could travel back in time, this shameful memory would remain in my mind. Despair filled me, and tears began to flow from my eyes uncontrollably as I stood motionless at the scene of the accident.

My crying seemed to have an effect. The silent signal of my helplessness not only released my mother from her shock, but also activated her maternal instincts. "Oh Emily, it's just an accident, the world isn't going to end because of it," she began to comfort me lovingly. "We'll quickly change your clothes and you'll see, the world will look completely different afterwards." She tenderly took my hand and led me into Sophie's room to lay me down on the changing table. Despite the incredible shame I felt towards her because of what had just happened, I was glad she was there. That someone was there who knew what to do, who cared for me, because I wouldn't have been able to do it myself in that moment.

Tears were still rolling down my cheeks when I was freed from my dress. With a saddened look, my mother put the soaked garment in the laundry basket. "Too bad, you looked so cute together in that dress," she gushed, lost in thought. My underwear followed the dress and as soon as it happened, my mother began to remove the remaining traces of my accident from my body. I was so overwhelmed with the whole situation that I didn't revolt when she conscientiously began wiping my butt and crotch dry for me, nor when she put me in one of the pullups she had originally bought me for the night. "Just to be on the safe," she explained to me the reason for my new underwear.

My mother was rummaging through the wardrobe, looking for a replacement outfit for me, when my little sister marched into the room. "There you are, Emily! I've been looking for you everywhere!" she announced upon spotting me on the changing table. "Where were you all this time?!" she demanded, offended by my sudden disappearance. I was determined to come up with some lie to explain my prolonged absence, just to prevent her from finding out about my embarrassing accident. But the mere thought of what had happened caused me to break down in tears. "Is everything okay with Emily?" my sister turned to my mother, concerned. "Emily just had a little accident, nothing dramatic," she explained. For a moment, my sister seemed puzzled about what had happened, but then her eyes fell on my crotch and my new underwear. Now she was the one who smirked at me arrogantly. Sophie's smug facial expression did not go unnoticed by my mother. "Why don't you go play in the garden, Sophie. Emily will come out when we're finished," she ordered Sophie out of the room. Obediently, Sophie left, but not without taking one last satisfying look at my new underwear.