Getting on a voiding schedule & workplace incontinence supply disposal.

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Some of these questions may be silly so I apologies in advance.

My first question was, is anyone else on a voiding schedule? At home I can just get changed, but at work when we get busy I tend to "forget" to go to the bathroom and have bigger leaks. Its kind of a no-win situation until I get help currently.

My second question is for those working with incontinence, how do you handle your trash at work? I simply pitched my pull up at work yesterday and hopefully that was fine, but I was curious if anyone had better solutions? I know some people get squeamish about stuff.

 

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I’ll speak to the voiding schedule as I don’t work. I find it hard to have a voiding schedule because I don’t drink the same amount every day. Maybe I should? A voiding schedule doesn’t really work for me also because I cannot force myself to pee. It just happens with no warning.

 

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To be fair that is a good point, if you are inconsistent its hard to know when you will need to go..which makes the voiding schedule irrelevent. I will just have to try to go off if I feel the urge and hope no leaks happen..and bring changes for sure.

 

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Hi @Koigal,
Since you carry your things in a backpack maybe you can add a packet of little disposal bags. They can be as simple as just going to your dollar store and paying $1 for a box of 26 small garbage bags (the easiest, quickest and least expensive option and one I like) or you can contact a place like North Shore and they will send you some that may (or may not) be "lightly scented" as they like to say. By using those little bags then no one, like whoever empties the trash, is any the wiser!!
As for voiding schedule, I think you have to work at your new job long enough to figure out when you have the best opportunities to "go." If they give you 15 minutes for a coffee break in the morning and then in the afternoon, and of course there's the lunch break. So those are kind of "built-in." As for other times, determine when the quieter and less busy times occur and maybe you can plan it around those times. I don't actually do it according to a schedule. I just go before I leave the house. Sometimes "going" just happens with no kind of warning.
But those are not silly questions at all!!! That is the benefit of a forum like this is to learn what others do in those situations.

 

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I think I may do an experiment because I partially wonder if the anxiety of not going on time isn't the issue. I know my capacity is lower than it used to be so I will have to deal with that however I can. I have discussed working closer to the bathrooms too so hopefully that will change, but the bag idea is perfect! The thing now is to figure out whats best for bathroom schedule, if anything. I've been trying to go every hour/hour and a half to avoid leaks, but likewise they will happen regardless. Its all a matter of experimentation. Thank you for your input

 

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Oh! I can pipe in about disposing of diapers. Go on either Amazon or eBay and search for “black t-shirt bags” you can get hundreds of them for like $10. I needed some quick as I was out and was going somewhere and I got them overnighted on Amazon for super cheap. They were the white ones but still work.

 

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@Koigal my bladder is in a mess right now. I can go from wanting to go every 20 mins to not wanting to go at all throughout a day. I was recommended to intermittently catheterisation every 2 hours but a lot of the time I have to go on the hour. Catheters and botox are my helpers through all of this.

Regards disposal, I would recommend large baby diaper scented disposal bags, these are cheap and don't job of hiding what's inside and help contain the odour. we have a store in the UK called Lidl and their baby nappy bags are large enough for an adult diaper and are scented to mask the smell and cheaper than adult disposal bags.

 

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@Koigal you always raise good questions, and handling trash at work is not easy.

Male bathrooms don't have bins in the cubicle and the bins out by the washbasins are way too public. So I bag up my soiled pads and carry them home with me at the bottom of my backpack.

I'm careful to tie the bags very firmly, but I am always aware they are there and it makes me feel self-concious and frankly quite gross.

I'm lucky in that two days out of three I work from home. I never look forward to my days in the office.

 

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That's the situation with male bathrooms here in the States as well. I have never seen any with a bin actually in the cubicle. They are all out by the sinks and there for anyone to see. There is not a problem putting a used item in a disposal bag that you brought along and just plonking it right into the bin. But the problem comes if there are other guys in that area and they see you, especially if you work with them. Then there IS a very potential problem!!! Otherwise if you don't know the guys, you will probably never see them again, and at that point, no problem!!!
But working at home does have its advantages!

 

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Same situation in British men's toilets. In Britain we have disabled toilets or accessible toilets which do have bins in them. These are the toilets i go to if I am out but totally agree with the boon of working from home.

 

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I am seeing a lot of concern on here about embarrassment related to conditions we can’t help. God has been good to me and I no longer have to deal with pads at work. However, when I did, I was cautious but at the same time it didn’t bother me that the trash bin wasn’t in the stall. I would wrap toilet tissue around it and carry it out to the bin. I’ll admit I was cautious if others were in the restroom at the same time. Most of the time I was able to avoid others. By the way I work in a public school and had to use a shared restroom albeit there aren’t a lot of men in working in the schools in which I work.

Another thing was that I was open with others (friends/colleagues) with which I worked closely that I had prostate cancer and had surgery. Most people understand. If they don’t, their turn dealing with incontinence may becoming.

 

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Very well said, @Alh63, It is good to be open about having had prostate cancer and surgery. It's a very common thing to have happen. And as for resulting incontinence then those you told about the surgery can then draw their own conclusions.
And it's completely true that there is an underlying embarrassment about conditions that we can't help. This is where the value of this forum comes in. We are human and we have these conditions and know that we aren't alone.
It's great that you no longer need pads and you had a good outcome and that is something to relish!
And working with well educated people as you do in a school, then people are more understanding.
And you're right... if people weren't understanding about incontinence, either implied or said out loud, then their turn to deal with incontinence is coming, sooner or later!!

 

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@Phil6003 I’m sorry they don’t have bins in the mens’ restrooms. Absurd.

 

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Hello Koigal,

here are 2'ct to your question: it's complicated.... such plans can work for e.g. elderly in a controlled environment - in normal life they usually don't.

Personally, I do it differently. To get a better idea of when things might get critical for me, I monitor fluid intake. This also has the effect that I notice when I drink too little. With an iPhone, it's really easy - you can use the health app along with a shortcut. With some experimentation, I've found something like a "maximum point" for water intake for me. If I go above that point things get pretty unmanageable, if I stay below that and go to the bathroom every hour things are usually fine. The amount of time that is "safe" for you has to be tested and you can increase it within limits by training.

For the whole thing to work it is important that you always drink the same thing - in my case that is just water. The food also plays a role - if you eat a lot of water, e.g. yogurt, melon or soup, then this will of course have a corresponding effect on your water intake.

Of course, there are many exceptions that make the whole thing a little uncertain, for example, when it is warm and you sweat, when doing sports, and so on. There you should of course also increase the liquid intake but all in all I was able to reduce the number of accidents considerably.

To find this point I did the following: I started with a relatively small amount of water (in my case 1500ml), which I drank evenly throughout the day. After two days I increased the amount by 100ml and saw what happened. For me, the micturition behavior changed massively from 2100ml per day. From this value I have to go to the toilet almost twice as much, often do not manage it anymore and had the feeling that my bladder fills up again enormously fast even after emptying.

So now I look that I always drink about 2L per day and that works quite well as long as I regularly go to the toilet.

 

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@MichaelDahlke Brilliant! I love science. I have not been nearly as precise as you but I agree whole-heartedly based on my experiences.

Another thing that will decrease urine output is elevation change. For each 1,000 feet gained, I will usually pee up to 30% less. I think it’s because the air is drier the higher one gets as is the atmospheric pressure less. My knees always feel a little better when I go from the 5,000 feet valley elevation here in SLC to the ski resorts at 8,000+. . . mwah ha ha, that’s assuming I don’t ski or snowboard, in which case they hurt way worse! But anyway, I bet there’s less pressure on the bladder also. I have not had this prove true on an airplane, however, likely because they’re somewhat over-pressurized.

 

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Of course when you're sitting in a window seat in the third of three seats together and the middle and aisle seat are taken up by people you don't know and would rather not bother if you can help it, then that's the time when you really feel the need to go, so I really don't know if there's less pressure on your bladder at 40,000 feet than at sea level!!! Maybe we can say there's more "social pressure?" (for lack of a better word!!)

 

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@billliveshere Quite right!

 

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lol - So as far as the airplanes are concerned - they tend to have a lower air pressure than normal when they are at cruising altitude. Of course not so much lower than when you are standing on a 3000 meter high mountain but enough to hit the person sitting next to you with the coffee cream if you are not careful while opening…

 

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I've heard that hitting the person sitting Next to you with the coffee cream can definitely happen in those tight quarters!!! I haven't been the "hittee" (at least not yet) or the "hitter" as I'd drink coffee or tea black, so no cream for me, thanks!!
That said, and all kidding aside, the new Boeing 787s are supposed to fly with an even lower air pressure when cruising at altitude. So I wonder if there's less pressure on your bladder flying on that plane than on other planes?

 

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I’m suddenly realizing I have never drank coffee on a plane - perhaps I drank a bunch in order to just get to the airport!