Tale #82: The Path Untaken (Part 1)

Tale #82: The Path Untaken (Part 1) (Part 8 to the 'As Before, Now Again' storyline) (Content Tags: Hypnosis, humiliation, messy diapers, brainwashing, braindrain, ongoing storyline) Matthew's thoughts had been consumed with his recent interaction with Bryce. For years, he'd preferred to keep his former friend out of his mind, perhaps because of the hidden guilt that would otherwise gnaw. Bryce had been his friend, even when Matty had been an accident-prone dork; there'd been no judgment or mockery over it, just acceptance and understanding. Once the accidents had come to a full close, and Matthew had started to feel like he deserved better, he'd callously cast the boy out. After years of his self-confidence being tormented by padded underpants and potty problems, Matty had yearned to be accepted by those who commanded respect. He hadn't set out with the intention to hurt Bryce, but that'd just been the way that things had gone. Slowly he had divested from the friendship, until a summer went by where he had totally avoided Bryce, and once school had started back up, he'd pretended that they'd never been close. That could have been it, but then he'd had to go and make up some nasty rumor about Bryce being a bedwetter. The hypocrisy didn't escape him, since it'd been Matthew who'd been the one with an errant bladder and unreliable bowels. Still, he'd justified it as the time as being a necessary evil, so that he could better distance himself from the last fragment of the kid he once was. Bryce hadn't talked to him since then, at least until their little discussion from the other day. A part of him had felt genuine reconciliation; on the downward slope of his darkest days, there was Bryce holding a torch of compassion, and Matthew had snuffed it out to save face in front of people who only saw him as someone to wreck havoc with. In a time where Matt really needed someone, he'd gone and squandered the only opportunity he would get. It was a self-reflection that'd become increasingly common since his therapy had started; all of his worst qualities were easier to see when they resulted in pungent humiliation. His violence, his rudeness, his need to cut others down... There was another component that made it easier for him to slow down and think things over, and that was the thing taped around his waist at all times. The resurgence of his toileting problems had made it hard for him to feel like a 'bad kid', and instead he felt like a fraud. He felt like he was playing dress-up and pretend, and that he wasn't the bad boy that he posed as. How rebellious could he feel or act when he was wearing the same undergarments that a common toddler would? How could he put attention on himself by acting out, when he wanted to be as discreet as possible? Matty had crapped himself while in line with his younger brother at Baskin Robbins earlier today; he'd cried when he realized what he'd done, and his mother had cleaned his mucky bottom in the women's restroom. He was about as 'bad' as a little kid with a 'tattoo' from a cereal box. Image problems aside, the real shock was that Bryce hadn't made any moves yet. The boy had a picture of Matty's diaper, while filling with poo at that, and it hadn't yet circulated around the school. There'd been no blackmail either; Bryce seemed to just be holding onto it, perhaps to make his bully squirm, like he was right now. "Matthew? The doctor is ready to see you now." The secretary called out, as a younger boy waddled out with his exasperated looking mother. Matty hadn't been the only one to think about what had happened the other day. Bryce had confided in his mother about his discussion with Matthew, which included the revelation that she was already well aware of. The sob-story of her sensitive son had actually come at an unfortunate time for her patient. Doctor Farren had again been weighing the merits of her work; it felt as if an endless tug-of-war was inside her mind, and it kept pulling her between her justifications and her principles. Ethics had been eating her alive, even though she was able to keep telling herself that what she was doing was for a good cause. So close she had been to pulling the plug on Matty's 'treatment', thinking that she'd done enough to put him on a better path... What Bryce had told her had changed everything. The emotional component, the thing that'd overruled her logical side, was given enough fuel to burn bright as the sun. Her son, infinite in his benevolence, had opted to give Matty another chance, when he didn't at all deserve it, and Matty had shown nothing but scorn? She'd reduced Matthew to a diaper-dependent crybaby, and he still thought he was too good for her son? It was beyond being maddening; it'd reached an apex that gave her all the reason in the world to triple down on her efforts. She'd put Matty in a position where he'd be begging for Bryce's friendship, for his kindness! She'd taken out some of this fury on her last patient. Poor little Tucker had already been reduced to daytime protection for his nervous bladder, but she'd veered away from the original course that she'd set for him. From this point forward, his anxiety disorder would include 'nervous bowels' as well, seeing as she'd ended the session with making him heavily soil himself. As a casualty of her sharpened claws, Tucker would find himself fear-pooping in his pants a lot in the coming weeks, but to the doctor, his oncoming plight was just the result of some warming up. If his mother made any complaints, then the doctor would just blame it as a possible side-effect of his prescription, or that he needed more sessions to improve. A quick spritz of the air freshener later and she was ready for the main attraction. The woman kept a warm demeanor of professionalism as she watched Matty slink into the room, and she noted how unconfident he'd become since this had all started. He didn't have to say a word, his body language spoke volumes. "Good to see you again, Matty. I hope things have been well?" The lad crinkled over to the couch and gently sat down on it, his hands in front of him and his eye contact with the floor. "Uh...Yeah, I guess..." "Your mother tells me that your accidents haven't seen any improvement. Have you had any today?" It was a genuine question. The boy's mother had talked to the doctor earlier in the week to confirm their appointment, and with minimal prodding had mentioned that Matty had been having more and more accidents in his diapers. It'd become an everyday problem, so the doctor was curious if it'd already been something that had happened today. "Yeah, umm, when we went to get ice cream. It just kind of happened." The woman shook her head slowly, "Matty...Things don't just 'happen'. As chaotic as the world is, every event is preceded by an event before it. Every action causes a reaction. What you're doing is making it seem that this was an event with no explanation, so you can push yourself away from feeling any culpability. Ask yourself, what might have made this happen?" Matthew fidgeted uncomfortably where he sat. "I-I didn't do anything...I was just waiting in line with my little brother, and it...happened. I didn't even know it happened until my brother said something about it..." She put her hands together, "I want you to close your eyes and take me through what happened, piece by piece. Okay?" It'd been like he'd said, but the furthering details had given her a greater insight on what had triggered it. Matty was at the ice cream shop with his younger brother; the occasion was that said younger brother had brought home an excellent grade on a math test. While waiting in line, the two had went on to bicker and it'd progressed to a point where Matty had gotten pretty nasty, and then gotten 'nasty' in a less verbal way. Her patient had hardly seemed aware of what he'd done, only that he'd gotten worked up and the result had been a messy mud-bomb in his bulky babypants. His younger brother had noticed it before he did, and when making his order, the suggestion of 'hot fudge on the bottom' kept being teasingly put out there. Matty explained how it made him feel, once he realized there was something sticky, hot and gooey oozing against his buttcheeks. The shame that'd filled his heart when he realized that he'd filled his diaper yet again and in public. "And why does that embarrass you so much?" She prodded, though the answer was hardly a difficult one to ascertain. "...It makes me feel like a big baby. It makes me feel like people are looking at me like I'm 'special' or something..." His cheeks burned. "Is that how you felt when you had these problems in the past? Did anyone ever make you feel this way specifically?" The woman had made sure to keep Matty from reenacting the scene from the ice cream shop; she was looking for something a little more intense and didn't want to waste her torment on something as simplistic as that. "Umm...Well... I guess..." He looked a little overwhelmed by the question, and the doctor decided to dial things back from being so broad. "Let's circle back to that. Now, the accidents that you had as a child, why don't we talk more about that? In our first session, you told me that you had last wet your pants when you were ten and your bed when you were eleven. I believe you said you'd last messed your pants at ten as well...Do you have a timeline of these accidents?" "A timeline? I said those were the last ones I had, at least until this year..." Since starting therapy to be more exact. "Yes, but how was the frequency before that? I assume it wasn't that you just stopped all at once; there must be some point when they were more of a problem for you, right? What age were you pottytrained?" Matty looked thoughtful about the question as he sifted through his own memories. To say he'd been pottytrained in a normal way would be dishonest, at least when one accounted for how accident-prone he'd been for years after. "Umm, well, I guess I was pottytrained in preschool...But I still had to wear Pull-Ups during the day until second grade, because I had accidents most days...By third grade, I only had to wear them on long trips or when I wouldn't be able to reach a bathroom easily. I switched from diapers at night to Goodnites around the same time..." It really was a treasure trove of embarrassing factoids for the doctor to sift through. She hadn't gotten into such specifics before, because she'd thought she'd known enough to work with, but her patient's past was more densely layered than she'd given credit for. It made more sense as to why the boy had rarely come over, since he probably wanted the home-field advantage for playdates. To think that he'd been so inadequate in his pottytraining that he'd remained padded up until he was eight years old, and that Bryce had charitably stuck by him anyways... "That's much longer than most people would stay in Pull-Ups or diapers. From what I can tell, you had no medical condition that accounted for this, right? Do you know why you had these accidents for such a long time?" Matty looked uncomfortable from the embarrassment of such questioning, especially in how they were framed. "I-I dunno...I remember seeing doctors a few times, and being tested for different stuff. I think that the school wanted to move me to the slow classes after second grade, but then the accidents got better..." "The slow classes? You mean like a 'special education' class? That would make a lot of sense, since that'd likely be the only place to find a kid that old in training pants. Was it purely because of your accidents, Matty? Or did you struggle in your schoolwork too?" Matty had never been a great student, but that was much more a behavioral problem than an intellectual one. He'd been aloof and often rambunctious, resulting in being a 'C' and 'D' student for most of his academic career. That'd actually worsened in middle school, due to the bad crowd that he'd fallen in with. Now that he actively rebelled against anything that was expected of him, those grades had slipped more often into the 'F' range from a failure to engage with the content. "Umm, I don't know the reasons. I mostly remember being scared of getting put in a different class, so I think that helped me get over my accidents...Mostly. I didn't want people to think I was a retard or whatever." Matty shrugged, seeming even less comfortable with talking about that. "I see... Is it possible that it might have been a more conducive environment for you? Toileting and academic issues aside, you have a clear lack of emotional regulation and impulse control. Both of those things might have been earlier worked on in a classroom where you'd have more individual support." Matthew bit his tongue and gave a rather disgusting look toward the woman. For someone whose confidence was so heavily tied to image, it was unthinkable to see his reputation go through such a lense, even if retroactively. "My problems weren't really like *those* kids." "From what I can gather, I'd argue quite the contrary. Why don't we try some roleplay? I want you to think about the way you felt back then, when the direction of your life at school might have been altered, and how things might have ended up differently." The woman reached into her desk for her pendant and began to swing it back and forth. "Relax and watch it go...Think back to your past..." Matty's eyes tracked the amulet, just like he'd done in every other session so far. In a matter of moments, his eyelids drooped and the doctor could see that he was deep under her trance. "Very good, Matty. I want you to listen carefully, okay?" "Okay..." She smiled, "Now, back in second grade, back when you were being talked to about going into a special classroom for kids like you, can you remember that for me?" "Yes..." He murmured, completely zonked. "I want you to try pretending like you *did* get put in one of those classes, and that you were a student in them up until now. What would that look like, hm?" The boy's jaw slackened and he allowed a sliver of slobber to escape his gaping maw. He took a finger and planted it firmly into his nostril, while the doctor watched on in bemused silence. "Me eat boogie!" He added, dislodging some green gold from the nose mine to put between his drooly lips. It was enough to get a small chuckle out of the doctor. The way she had posed her command was in a way that it relied purely on the subject's subjective thoughts. She had only told him to act as if he was a student in a 'special class', and his mind had filled in the blanks by being a complete cliche. She'd be lying if she said that this wasn't the result she had been hoping for. "Do 'special' children use the toilet, Matty? Or do they wear diapers?" "Diapee! Wear diapee!" He babbled before starting to suck on his thumb, while his other hand was hooked onto the waistband of his pants. "That's right! Just like you do." She nodded, leaning back in her chair to better enjoy the scene; she was so furious with Matthew, that she still wasn't sure what she should do to him to punish him for making Bryce so unhappy. While mindlessly sucking on his thumb, the boy fidgeted for a moment and then ripped a juicy fart into his concealed diaper. He softly giggled at his own gassy outburst, but otherwise appeared unconcerned with the rude noise. "Uh-oh! What was that? What was that sound?" "Matty farded!" The mushbrained delinquent excitedly announced, before leaning to one side to let another one sputter out. This one didn't come to an abrupt end though and instead shifted into something that sounded more substantial than mere gas; it was the unmistakable sound of a turd crackling into a pair of Pampers. "I think you're doing more than that, mister! Sounds like you might be making something in your diaper, huh?" She teased. "Nnghhh...P-pooo..." The dummy grunted, suddenly getting a more distant look as the words sluggishly passed his glistening lips. The boy got off of the couch slowly, passing more gas with each shifting movement that he made. Then, once his feet were planted firmly on the carpet, he squatted down and held onto the couch to balance himself. He looked like a big toddler who had little shame about what he was doing, but had enough knowledge to know it needed to happen. The crackling sound got louder in direct proportion to his face becoming more red; he wasn't blushing, he was straining, which was why he was grunting so loudly and having to shake his padded rump while in the middle of pooping himself. "Mmphhh! Go poopie in diapee!" The clarification wasn't necessary for the doctor to follow what was happening. Besides hearing it, she could visibly see the back of his pants growing in size from the diaper being loaded, and it wouldn't take long for her to smell it either. "That's right! Baby Matty is making poopie in his diapee, because he's so *special*." Perhaps things would have been different if he had been moved to that class in second grade; his education might have suffered in some regards, as well as his social life, but could it have been worse than where he'd ended up? He was a bully and a delinquent, and his grades were pitiful, so what could have been a worse outcome? Doctor Farren considered her options. At a minimum, she thought she needed to increase the parameters of what would trigger punishment, and perhaps it was worthwhile to see if some shifts to his intellectual abilities were warranted. For now, she had to mull it over. She snapped her fingers to end the trance, but Matty was still drooling and pooping on himself. A few more snaps, growing more frantic, didn't seem to do anything either. "Matty, I want you to return to normal, okay?" She said with an increasing sense of panic. "Matty spe-shul! Matty did poopies!" The mudbutt happily grinned back at her, one hand reaching into the back of his pants to cup his warm lump. Had she just somehow fried his brain? Doctor Farren needed to figure something out and *quick*. She couldn't very well send him back out like *this*! He was drooling and picking his nose, he sounded like a total moron and-- **BBLLAAAARTT!** --And he wouldn't stop doing *that*.