single_dad
New Member
Hello -- I am a 39 year old single father of a 13 year old difficult child, adopted from Russia with ODD, ADHD, manic episodes and bowel disorders that mean that he has occasional outbursts of sudden, explosive diarrhea. Many of these issues come from neglect in Russian orphanages during his early years and substance abuse by his birth mother.
He insists on wearing diapers 24.7.365 ; which I can see is understandable given that he has had a few rather messy unexpected accidents in his diapers both at school and at home. He needs to wear 'youth diapers' -- Abena Abri-Form S4 diapers (he's big for his age), because pull-up style diapers are not nearly thick enough to stand up to his episodes of explosive diarrhea. He also still wets the bed very heavily, needing these thicker diapers -- at night I need to duck tape his diapers tightly shut because there have been isolated incidents of fecal smearing and he has recently started to shove his hand down his diaper to play with himself at night, often destroying the diaper and leading to leaks.
The thing is that besides bedwetting and occasional episodes of colitis, he has normal control over his bowels and bladder. Even when he does have episodes of colitis, rarely are they so urgent that he couldn't make it to the bathroom in time. He absolutely refuses to use the toilet and I know he is using the diapers as a crutch, both for fear of using the toilet, esp in public places and because he is terrified of having a messy accident in his pants or inadequate pullup diapers.
He is mentally operating at around an 8 year old's level and the thing that riles me up the most is that 98% of the time (excluding bedwetting), he knowingly chooses to use his diapers; I can't help but think that he does this out of defiance. While he openly uses his diapers at home / around family, at school he avoids using his diapers at all costs. His Special Education teachers know about the problem and have someone capable of changing his diaper when his colitis is acting up -- believe me you do not want to spend more than 10 minutes in a room with a 13 year old boy in an explosively messy diaper. Otherwise he either completely holds going to the bathroom at all or will go #1 once during the day, hence avoiding the need for a diaper change at school (I change his diaper right before and right after school).
My question is whether any one else has gone through a similar issue with their difficult child. It gets tedious changing 1 -2 messy diapers a day and the same amount of wet diapers a day -- especially on a 13 year old boy that is larger than average. The cleanup and smell of the messy diapers is extremely taxing and time consuming -- not to mention that these premium diapers are not cheap.
On one hand he really does need the backup security of a diaper due to his episodes of colitis, and pullup style diapers just don't do the trick in that case. Which basically leaves me with the option of keeping him in tab-style diapers that I have to change about four times a day or trying to make him go without diapers, which also would be disastrous both mentally and in the case of accidents, especially at school.
Any other diaper suggestions / ways to deal with this? Being a single dad I just don't have the time to spend a ton of time thinking about this, though I did see a product called the Abena Abri San for bowel incontinence that doesn't fasten on like a tape style diaper, it is held in place by mesh undergarments -- I really don't want to still be changing his messy diapers when he goes to high school next year!
Any helpful suggestions/ experience welcome !
He insists on wearing diapers 24.7.365 ; which I can see is understandable given that he has had a few rather messy unexpected accidents in his diapers both at school and at home. He needs to wear 'youth diapers' -- Abena Abri-Form S4 diapers (he's big for his age), because pull-up style diapers are not nearly thick enough to stand up to his episodes of explosive diarrhea. He also still wets the bed very heavily, needing these thicker diapers -- at night I need to duck tape his diapers tightly shut because there have been isolated incidents of fecal smearing and he has recently started to shove his hand down his diaper to play with himself at night, often destroying the diaper and leading to leaks.
The thing is that besides bedwetting and occasional episodes of colitis, he has normal control over his bowels and bladder. Even when he does have episodes of colitis, rarely are they so urgent that he couldn't make it to the bathroom in time. He absolutely refuses to use the toilet and I know he is using the diapers as a crutch, both for fear of using the toilet, esp in public places and because he is terrified of having a messy accident in his pants or inadequate pullup diapers.
He is mentally operating at around an 8 year old's level and the thing that riles me up the most is that 98% of the time (excluding bedwetting), he knowingly chooses to use his diapers; I can't help but think that he does this out of defiance. While he openly uses his diapers at home / around family, at school he avoids using his diapers at all costs. His Special Education teachers know about the problem and have someone capable of changing his diaper when his colitis is acting up -- believe me you do not want to spend more than 10 minutes in a room with a 13 year old boy in an explosively messy diaper. Otherwise he either completely holds going to the bathroom at all or will go #1 once during the day, hence avoiding the need for a diaper change at school (I change his diaper right before and right after school).
My question is whether any one else has gone through a similar issue with their difficult child. It gets tedious changing 1 -2 messy diapers a day and the same amount of wet diapers a day -- especially on a 13 year old boy that is larger than average. The cleanup and smell of the messy diapers is extremely taxing and time consuming -- not to mention that these premium diapers are not cheap.
On one hand he really does need the backup security of a diaper due to his episodes of colitis, and pullup style diapers just don't do the trick in that case. Which basically leaves me with the option of keeping him in tab-style diapers that I have to change about four times a day or trying to make him go without diapers, which also would be disastrous both mentally and in the case of accidents, especially at school.
Any other diaper suggestions / ways to deal with this? Being a single dad I just don't have the time to spend a ton of time thinking about this, though I did see a product called the Abena Abri San for bowel incontinence that doesn't fasten on like a tape style diaper, it is held in place by mesh undergarments -- I really don't want to still be changing his messy diapers when he goes to high school next year!
Any helpful suggestions/ experience welcome !
