Cough Drops..Snicker Doodles...It's Not What You Think...

I think I just peed myself. Yes.. you read that correctly.  Cough drops are no longer simply lozenges meant to soothe a sore throat, they are the signs of what happens to a woman after she has given birth and sadly even to those who haven't but are simply aging. We tinkle at the slightest squeeze of abdominal muscles. Laughter and giggles, even a snicker can mean dribbles.

We tinkle like fine china but not in a good way. And the truth is, no matter how hard we try, there is no keggle exercise in the world that can fix the muscles needed to retain full control of our body. We sneeze, we drip. We cough, we drop. We giggle, laugh, snort, snicker, or otherwise engage in frivolity, that's right... you guessed it... we piddle, doodle, puddle.

Life without pantyliner's or some other greater capacity absorbency product is a thing of the past. Menopause might be starting and our periods might be fading away into memory, but the pads,  they are just now becoming a mainstay design in our everyday dress code.

I personally refuse to walk around in wet britches with a urine cloud surrounding and announcing my arrival. So I'll take the pantyliner or sanitary napkin any day.  However, I am not ready to give in to the full on undergarment, if you know what I mean.  They are just dribbles after all, not full on loss of control, so I've accepted this with minor caveats.

The hardest part of this dilemma of life is sharing a single bathroom home with a seventeen year old.   My son enjoys his long showers or hot soaks in the tub after long days at the track, they sooth his muscles. It's understandable, except when mom has to pee.  Which, lets be honest.... is frequently. The 'just hold it' mantra we teach our kids when they are little, no longer works for me as a middle aged woman. I WISH I could "just hold it". He doesn't understand the need to hurry along and/or to allow me to interrupt his otherwise soothing ritual, simply to pee. It can make things complicated. There is a shower curtain and he can always wear his earphones with his music. But when I have to go, I have to go. It's not like I would ever poop, that would just be rude and weird. Unlike a man, I can't just find a bush and pee standing up unbeknownst to passersby.

I'm 46, going on 47 and I've sprung a leak. It comes and it goes, but its persistently more prominent than I would hope for. Keggles don't repair it. It seems to be one of those things they don't tell you about when your twenty because they know if you knew, you'd never give in.