Over Active Bladders

Over active bladder, is there anything I won’t write about? I guess not. Today, I’m crossing over that line, exploring a topic that demure little blog writers should probably ignore. Maybe it’s all those commercials they play on TV for over-the-counter drugs to cure a problem I really didn’t think was a problem that had a cure until they planted that seed in my head. Maybe it’s the fact that every time I go out to a movie with friends I insist on getting an aisle seat in case I need a potty break in the middle of the film that has me wondering. Or maybe it’s the fact that I get up three to four times during the night to pee that has me starting a “liquids in, liquids out” chart to take to my bi-annual checkup coming up in a few weeks (assuming the Pandemic doesn't put the appointment on the back burner. Again). I even used my husband’s old blood sugar monitor a few times to rule out diabetes. Why do I even need a doctor? Give me a computer and a symptom and I can diagnosis myself. But the 64-million dollar question is this: Do I have an over active bladder or an under-sized bladder and do they need to do an autopsy to know which one? Either way, I’ve had it all my life and I can give you a review of every bathroom in the city plus the locations of every unlocked church---they have the cleanest restrooms---and other places like office buildings where I don’t feel compelled to buy peanuts, juice or a pop on my way out. I do, by the way, always buy something if I use a restroom at a gas station in exchange for using their water and toilet paper. It's only fair.

So do you think the doctor will believe me when I tell him my parents were still carrying a coffee can aka emergency toilet in the car when I was ten because I couldn’t even make a 50 minute trip to our cottage without having to go? Do you think he’ll believe me when I tell him a doctor had the eight year old little girl inside of me doing “exercises” to expand my bladder? If my current doctor suggests those same kind of hold-your-urine-until-you-cry-from-the-pain “exercises” I’ll call it elder abuse and dial my local 211 system to report him. All I want to know from him is this: Is there a downside/danger in using the patches that keeps the bladder muscles from contracting as the bladder is filling? And if you're wearing a patch do you have to looking in the mirror to see if the whites in your eyes turn yellow to know when you actually do need to pee again? Those are the kinds of questions the buy-my-product websites don’t answer. If the doctor will answer those questions to my satisfaction, I’ll be out the door and down to the pharmacy in a flash. (I really need a good night's sleep!) And doctor, don’t give me the speech about leakage is common with 'women your age' (which I decidedly don't have). That’s just going to make me feel as old as Moses. Don’t pat my head and say I’m exaggerating or ask if I have a daughter who can come with me the next time. Not that he’s ever treated me that way but I’m ever so diligent in looking for that first time when he'll patronize me with his humor-the-old-woman "charm." 

Note to anyone who might be visiting my house in the next few weeks: Don’t use the toothpicks in the bathroom. They are yucky, full of germs! They are my keeping-track tools and are moved from one pile to another after I pee. It’s a cheaters’ counting trick I learned by watching programs on the Food Network like Mystery Diners, Restaurant Impossible and Restaurant Stakeout. We all probably do quirky things like that that others coming into our homes wouldn’t figure out in a hundred years but as I age I’m finding myself wanting to leave notes explaining myself to that anonymous social worker I fear so much. You know who she is, she’s the newly minted professional who might one day be coming to visit us all at a certain age to take our mental competency temperatures and could find us “off” enough to be incarcerated in a place where we'd have no access to toothpicks and other quirky things that she doesn’t understand. Young people, what are we going to do with them except wait until they get old and have one giant 'Aha! Moment' of understanding of what it’s like to be old and know stuff young people don’t.

Oh, in case you don’t watch the Food Network and have never heard about the counting toothpicks trick, this is how it works: Dishonest bartenders use this trick to count how many times they overcharge customers so they’ll know how many dollars they can sneak out of the till at the end of their shift and still balance. So the moral of this blog post is this: Never-ever use tooth picks in my bathroom or grab one from behind a bar while sitting there watching a stud muffin pulling draft beers from the tap. And let's all hope the bars and restaurants are able to fully open back up again by mid-2021. While I haven't sat at a bar in over a half a century, stud muffin surveillance time sounds pretty darn nostalgic and I might take it up again when we all get out from under house arrest.  ©