My Funny Farm - Chapter 16 – Who Wants To Be a Baby?

 

My Funny Farm

By Karen Singer

 

Chapter 16 – Who Wants To Be a Baby?

 

Position:  Baby. 

Job qualifications:  Must be willing to put up with the most embarrassing situations on the planet. 

Pay: Diapers changed multiple times per day.  Baby bottles of drinks shoved in your hand.  Fine dining of different baby foods provided for all meals. 

Job Perks: The opportunity to play with lots of useless toys while trapped inside a fenced-in area.  TV watching of the dumbest and worst cartoons ever made.  Enforced early bedtimes plus two naps every day.  Constantly changing embarrassing uniforms provided at no cost.

Applicants interested please apply as soon as possible.  The current baby in our situation is sick of his treatment and wants out.  Unfortunately for him, out is a direction that babies don’t understand.

Yeah, the battle was on, even though they didn’t realize that yet.  As I laid there in my crib drinking my first bottle of baby formula of the day, all I could think about was fighting back.  Holding back.  Not becoming the complete imbecile I knew they all wanted me to be.  Because hanging over my head was the knowledge that their real goal was to get me committed permanently to that behavioral center again…or maybe someplace worse.  In fact, someplace worse was the more likely possibility.  I hadn’t thought about that fact before.  So as far as I could see, I had more reason than ever to fight back and hold on to my sanity…even though that sanity included wanting more than ever to end my own life.

Emily hurried into my nursery while I was drinking my bottle and gave me a quick hug and a kiss.  “Love you baby,” she said happily.  “Have fun today.  Wish I could be here with you.”  And then she was gone.  Hurrying off to work.  You want the truth?  I liked it when she and Caitlin came in and showed me brief little bits of affection.  Who wouldn’t?  Those bits of love were precious to me.  I immediately went back to finishing my bottle and thinking about holding back as much as possible every time I needed to go.  Suck…out…suck…out.  I was so focused on my predicament that I never realized that the rhythm of my drinking was exactly the way both Emily and Caitlin wanted it.

Caitlin finally breezed back in just as I had finished drinking.  I briefly wondered how she had known so quickly that my bottle had run dry.

“Hi again baby,” she greeted me as she leaned over my crib and took the bottle from me with one hand, while her other hand stuck my pacifier back between my lips.  My mouth didn’t seem to ever be empty anymore.  Suck…out…suck…out….  She didn’t even have to say anything.  I just automatically did it.  She grabbed my hand and pulled me to a sitting position while still in my crib.  “It’s a special day for you today,” she practically sang to me.  And then she laughed.

A special day?  What the hell did that mean?  And why the hell was she so happy about everything?  Right now, all I was interested in was getting up on that changing table and getting that plug pulled out of my ass.  But of course, I suspected that breakfast had to come first.  Still, why the hell was she keeping me in my crib?

She disappeared into my closet for a moment then came back with a box.  What the hell was in it?  I had no idea.

“Something special for you today,” she told me as she set the box on the floor.  She bent down and pulled something out of it.  Something very padded and covered in childish cartoon characters.  I was about to ask what the hell it was, when she grabbed my right hand and then started pulling that thing onto my hand like a big fat glove.  I tried to pull my hand back, but she held it firmly.  “Hold still!” she ordered sternly.  “It’s going on you whether you like it or not.”

I held still and let her keep shoving that thing over my hand, I was too afraid of being put back into that behavioral center again to not do what she wanted.  The damn mitten had some kind of stiff thing in it and was narrow enough that it forced my fingers to stay straight out, while at the same time kept them stuck somewhat together.  She fastened the mitt firmly around my wrist and went to work on my left hand.  While she was busy there, I did everything possible to try and move my fingers inside that thing, but I couldn’t.  I couldn’t do anything with that hand at all.  It was actually worse than those bondage mittens that Jared and Emily had once used on me.  Not only did it keep my hand completely useless, but since it was so padded all over and my hand was stretched out straight inside, it was much bigger than those other things had been.  Caitlin finished fastening the second one and both my hands were reduced to complete uselessness.  I wanted to ask why, but that big pacifier in my mouth sort of kept me from asking anything.

But it seemed that Caitlin wasn’t done with me yet.  Not at all.  While I sat there trying to fathom those two big things covering my hands, she went back to her box and pulled something else out.  She grabbed one of my feet and began pulling some kind of padded bootie onto it.  Very quickly, my foot went in, and I was shocked to feel something inside on the sole of the thing.  In fact, there was a bunch of somethings all over the sole of the thing.  And whatever they were, they were hard and uncomfortable.  She fastened that bootie firmly to my foot, then put another bootie on my other foot.

“Okay baby,” she declared a bit too happily.  “Let’s get you down now.  She grabbed my hand and helped me slide off my crib, but the moment one of my feet hit the floor, those things inside that bootie felt like they were going to go right through my foot!  “Ow!” I yelled suddenly and sank down to my knees since I couldn’t stand on that foot.  It had hurt…and Caitlin was laughing.  I remembered then that Caitlin too had been interested in that BDSM stuff.  Was this part of that?

I experimented a bit with trying to get to my feet, but I quickly discovered that any attempt to do that at all only brought me intense pain.  I looked up at Caitlin, she was still laughing delightedly.  “We wanted to give you a chance to experience being more a real baby than usual.  Which means more helpless.  Since babies can’t walk and they don’t have much finger dexterity, neither do you now.  Now you can spend the day crawling everywhere just like a real baby, and you can enjoy having me help you with everything else.  Won’t that be fun?”

She had said it like she really expected me to enjoy it.  I already knew I was in for a nightmare of a day.

“Come on baby,” she said.  “Breakfast time.  Crawl out to the kitchen.”

Yeah.  Crawl out.  I had no choice but to crawl out.  I had no choice but to crawl everywhere.

Surprise!  I got baby cereal for breakfast again.  Actually, no surprise at all.  I got baby cereal for breakfast more often than not.  Caitlin grabbed me under my shoulders and lifted me up so I could sit in my chair at the table.  Then she literally sat there and spoon fed me my entire breakfast, including encouraging me to keep eating by making airplane sounds and train noises.  I could have done without both.  I could have done without the baby food.  I could have done without the damn things she had put on me, making my hands and feet useless.  And I could especially do without my entire life!  Why the hell couldn’t they just let me die?

After breakfast, Caitlin decided I was too heavy for her to lift up onto my changing table, so she changed me right on the floor of my nursery.  The best part, and the most painful part, was when she finally pulled that plug out of my ass.  Once I was diapered again, I was sent out to the living room to watch TV.  My normal schedule for the day had started.  I was just going to have to go through it all with no hands and no way to walk anywhere.  And then of course, only moments after I started watching that cartoon, and as always seemed to happen after having that plug removed from my ass, my bowels erupted, and I helplessly filled the back of my diaper…and it wasn’t even wet yet!  But yeah, I did wet it only moments later, and even though I had been planning on holding back all day, that wetting had been a bit more effortless than usual.  Now not only was I stuck crawling around all day, since they didn’t change those thick diapers of mine as often, I was going to be stuck in a stinky, messy diaper until after lunch.  Hours away!  Ugh!  I hated those plugs in my ass.

“Somebody made a stinkyyyy.”

I couldn’t believe that Caitlin would actually sing that little bit of news to me.  And why did she have to sound so happy about it?  I certainly wasn’t.  She delivered a bottle of that delicious vanilla flavored stuff to me, that I now knew from finding cases of it in the pantry was some kind of vitamin supplement drink.  Something that was actually very good for me to be drinking since it would help to keep me healthy…well, my body.  My mind of course was another matter.

When playtime came, I crawled my stinky butt into my play area where Caitlin once again joined me and actually played with me…and my toys.  Was she trying to teach me how to play with those dumb things?  Trust me, it wasn’t working.  Still at least one of us seemed to be enjoying it.  Hint…it wasn’t me.

As I figured, I didn’t stop stinking up the house until after lunch, and by that time Caitlin had a huge mess to clean up from my bottom.  All I could think about it was that it served her right to have to deal with it since she had caused it in the first place.  From there, it was more crawling around for everything I did.

With no usable hands, Caitlin didn’t even try to sit me down in front of the computer.  We spent more time playing together with the toys instead.  Or rather, she did most of the playing, although I was “made” to try and play with them too.  Even if I was interested in doing anything with those stupid toys, what could I do with no hands?  It boggled my…baby…mind.

When naptime came, she struggled like crazy to get me back in my crib, and believe it or not, managed it.  I was actually glad.  I’d rather sleep there than on the hard floor.  I’d already had too much of that hard floor from crawling around on it all day.

Eventually, Emily came home, and she breezed in like she couldn’t wait to get there.  Why?  “How’s the baby doing today?” she asked the moment she got into my nursery where Caitlin was lying on the floor in front of me playing with my toys.

“We’re having a good time.  Aren’t we?” she replied as she looked in my direction.

If she enjoyed playing with my toys so much, why was she insisting they were for me?  Okay.  Five minutes later, things got far more weird than they already had been all day.  Both Caitlin and Emily were lying on the floor of my play area, playing with my toys…together!  All I could do was sit there and watch those two acting like total…uh…babies together.  Besides, what else could I do with no hands.  They, for some reason, never seemed to notice that little fact.  So far, it looked to me like their little baby therapy was working on the wrong people.  Not that I minded that at all.  I had to wonder though if they both would prefer to be in my diapers instead of me.  Now that I would have loved to see!

It wasn’t too much longer before Bill came home and both women must have figured out that it wouldn’t look good to him to see what they were doing (instead of me).  They both got up and headed to the kitchen to make dinner.  I just looked at them both leaving my nursery behind, glad to see them go, even though I had been highly amused seeing how much they seemed to enjoy playing with all my toys.

At dinner time, I crawled my wet diapered butt into the kitchen where Emily had Bill help lift me up into my chair.  Hooray!  I got real food to eat instead of baby food.  The only problem was those huge mitts on my hands.  Caitlin once again fed me my dinner while she was eating hers…until the front doorbell rang.  I panicked.  Who the hell would ring our doorbell?  Most of the family always just barged right into the house, coming in through the garage.

Emily went to answer it, and she came back a minute later with Doctor Clive.  Caitlin got up from the table and the three of them wandered out of the kitchen in the direction of my nursery.  Five minutes later, Doctor Clive was gone and Emily and Caitlin returned to the table.

“She loved the new nursery,” Caitlin gushed happily.

“Yeah,” Emily agreed.  “She said it was like a dream room, and she thinks we’re doing a great job with…you know who over here.”

I was guessing she was talking about me.  And then I remembered who it was that seemed to enjoy playing with all those toys so much.

“Here comes the choo-choo train,” Caitlin said as she held up my spoon loaded with food and started bringing it towards my mouth.  “Choo-choo-choo….  Open up the tunnel.”

Yeah, I was starting to get convinced that all their baby treatment was working on them instead of me.  A few more days and maybe they really would be wearing my diapers instead of me.  I could only hope.

 

My Funny Farm - Chapter 15 – The Fantasy of Reality – Part 2 of 2

 

My Funny Farm

By Karen Singer

 

Chapter 15 – The Fantasy of Reality – Part 2 of 2

 

Caitlin finally came back into the room to get me.  She paused partway across the room though and reached down to pick my pacifier up from the floor.  She opened the gate and came into my play area and stuffed the pacifier back in my mouth.  “Suck…out…suck…out…suck.”  She was absolutely relentless when it came to making me suck that thing the way she wanted.  She finally stopped her coaching and grabbed my hand, pulling me out of that play area and out of the room.

“I suggest you start learning to accept how you’re going to be dressed and treated in public from now on,” she told me as she dragged me out toward the garage, “because this is what we’ve all planned for you, whether you like it or not, and we already know you’d rather not.”  She stopped walking and turned to me with a sly smile on her face.  “Of course, we also know that deep down inside, you’re probably loving it.”  She stuck her finger into my chest.  “So get used to it.  It’s happening.  Right now in fact!  Now go.  Get in the car.  And remember, the backseat from now on.  I’ll buckle your seatbelt for you.”

I went, but trust me, it was reluctantly.

True to her word, and like she had done last time, I sat in the backseat, and she buckled my seatbelt for me.  Then she looked me in the face.  “Suck…out…suck…out.”  She watched me for a moment to make sure the motion of my pacifier was up to what she expected of me.  While she got the car started and pulled out of the driveway, I sat there in the super cushioning of my diaper and stared down at my bare legs.  Bare legs!  With an emphasis on bare!  I knew I had to look ridiculous.  And she wanted to take me out in public this way?  How was I supposed to handle that?

My hair had once again fallen down in front of my shoulders framing my view of my legs and blocking part of the view out the window.  It was all so surreal that I didn’t know what to do.  All I knew was that the panic was building up inside me.  And then I realized I was peeing…without knowing I had to go.  It wasn’t a lot that came out, but it was enough to make me notice.  And then I realized that I was still sucking my pacifier with that same rhythm that Caitlin and Emily always demanded.  I quickly stopped that and just kept it there in my mouth, as if it was a way to protest and fight back against the way they were forcing me to act.

I stared down at my bare legs in that too short dress until I realized she had pulled into the parking lot and was parking the car.  The strangest thing though was that I was suddenly wishing I could to pee again, just for some little way to give me a bit of relief.  But I felt no need to pee at all anymore.  I had already done that…without trying.

Caitlin came around, opened my car door and unbuckled my seatbelt.  She literally grabbed my hand and pulled me out of the car.  I went, but not willingly.  She stopped me right there.  “Suck…out…suck…out…”  She watched me for a while, getting the rhythm going again.  “Now keep doing that!  I shouldn’t have to remind you at all about that anymore.”  With that, she took my hand and dragged me from the car into the doctor’s office.

The receptionist certainly got a kick out of the way I looked.  There was absolutely no doubt about that.  She didn’t say anything, but I could see she was doing all she could to not laugh out loud.  Caitlin and I took some seats in the waiting room…and waited.  Finally, my name was called and I left Caitlin behind and headed into the doctor’s office for…a chat.  I pulled the plug from my mouth before I opened her door and went in.

“Hello Mr. Bryson,” she said with a very amused look on her face.  “Or should I call you little Miss Bryson today?”

“How about we don’t call me anything and just let me go home and kill myself instead.”

She chuckled.  I guess she thought it was funny.  It should have been perfectly obvious to her that I was serious.

I sat down and immediately asked the one biggest question on my mind.  “Would you really send me back to that behavioral center if I refused to do whatever they want?”

She considered that for only a short moment.  “I’m afraid so.  Everyone knows that’s where you belong.  I’m only allowing this as long as the family continues to provide all the extra therapy for you.”

“How is wearing a dress out in public any kind of therapy?  It’s ludicrous!”

“Ludicrous?  Perhaps,” she admitted.  “But maybe you should consider letting go completely of your old life and ideas and try to embrace some new ones instead.  And, from what I’ve been told, they’re ideas you have an interest in anyway.  Craig, as much as I hate to say this, you need to let go of the old you and become someone new for a while.”

“Why?  There’s nothing wrong with the old me.”

“If you’ll remember, the old you wants to commit suicide.  Which means that you don’t seem to like the old you very much.  You hate your life enough that you’re determined to end it.  Now you get a chance to be someone new.  Someone different.”

“But look at me!  Yeah, I’m different all right.  Ridiculously different!  But how is this supposed to help me?”

“Craig, think for a minute.  If you’re outside of yourself, then maybe you can see your old self better.  Sometimes it takes a completely different point of view in order for us to be able to examine our inner selves completely.  Your family is providing you with that new outer self.  Someone totally different than you used to be.  Now you’ve got the opportunity to look back at your old self and see that self in a completely different light.  Craig, you’ve got an opportunity here to learn a lot about yourself.”

“By dressing and acting like an idiot?”

“If that’s the way you want to think of it.  But think of it as an opportunity instead.  Take the time and immerse yourself in this new person so you can look back on your old life more objectively.”

“Look back on my old life?  All this new life is giving me so far is more stress and worries than I’ve ever had!  And I mean real stress!”

She nodded.  “Yes.  I can see that.  It’s going to take some time and effort though to get past all the embarrassments, so they no longer are any stress for you at all.  New things always take time to get used to.”

I shook my head.  “All I can see now is that I’ve got more reason than ever to want to kill myself.  But the truth is that’s not what I was talking about at all.”

“It wasn’t?”

“No.  But yes, you are right.  I was talking about the way they’re making me…live too.  In fact, that’s a lot of it.  But there’s something else going on that I found out about that has me stressed to high heaven now.”

“Oh?  What?”

“They’re plotting against me.  They’re all against me.  Their real goal is to get me so crazy that they can have me committed permanently somewhere for being completely incompetent.”

“Mr. Bryson, that’s ridiculous!  Of course they’re not.”

“Yes they are!  I know.  One of them told me.  She spilled the beans.  Maybe she thought my baby brain…that I don’t have…wouldn’t be able to understand what she was saying.  But trust me, I understood her perfectly.”

The doctor shook her head.  “And what did she tell you?”

“That they’re planning on making me into so much of an imbecile that they can have me committed permanently for being incompetent.”

“But why would they ever want to do such a thing?”

“Because she said it would give them opportunities.”

“Opportunities?  For what?

“That’s just it.  I don’t know.”

“And what do your son and daughter think about this?”

“I haven’t had a chance to tell them yet.  But I’m planning on it.”

“Mr. Bryson,” she said.  “I think this sudden persecution complex that you’re experiencing is nothing more than a reaction stemming from your reluctance to accept your therapy and the way they want you to live.”

“It is not!”

“I think it is.  Maybe you should consider that fact a bit more than you have.  And speaking of considering things, did you think about any of the things I asked you to think about last week?”

I was angry with her for not believing me.  I stared at her for a moment before I answered.  “Sort of,” I told her.

“Sort of?”

“I figured out why they get me up so early every day.  The answer was so simple I should have realized it before.”

“And what’s that?” she asked.

“It’s simply practical.  Caitlin and Emily have to go to work.  They need time to get me up, changed, fed, and ready before the babysitter comes.”

She nodded.  “That wasn’t so difficult to figure out at all then, was it.”

“No.  Not really.  Now if I could just figure out the rest of it.”

“As much as you might not think so, it’s important that your schedule is as consistent as possible every day.  Right now, you need as much consistency in your life as they can give you.  Which brings us to the next thing I asked you to think about last week, why there’s more playtime in your schedule than anything else.  Did you figure that one out yet?”

I shook my head.  “Not a clue!  It’s stupid.  Just like the dumb toys they give me.  I don’t know what to do with them.”

“And that,” she said, “may be your first clue  Think about it some more this week.  All that playtime you have is one of the most important things in your schedule.”

“Not as far as I’m concerned.  And you should see what they did to my room.  They created an entire nursery out of it, and the biggest center of attraction is a fenced-in play area for me.  A big useless area where I don’t play with all the even more useless toys they gave me.”

“Mm!” she grunted.  “They said they were going redo your room as soon as possible.  I really need to stop by there one day and take a look.  I’m way overdue for a visit to check up on your home life anyway.”

“Home life?  You mean my ridiculous life!  They’re making me do the most outrageous things possible, trying to turn me into a complete imbecile of a baby…strike that…a baby girl now!  And all of it is stupid!”

“Then Craig, I think you need to spend a bit more time thinking about all that.  All of it is important to your therapy to help you get well.  For instance, tell me, have you figured out yet why they want you to watch your porn just before you take a nap every afternoon?”

“Yeah, to make me realize what a pervert I am.  But if they’d just let me kill myself, nobody would have to worry about it.”

“Craig, I’m afraid that’s another thing you need to think about a bit harder.  There’s literally a reason for all of it.”

When I walked out of the doctor’s office, I wasn’t exactly a happy camper.  Caitlin wasn’t happy with me either when she saw my pacifier in my hand instead of in my mouth.  “Suck…out…suck…”  Yeah, my entire life sucked!

It sucked even harder when I realized a little while later that Caitlin was pulling into the parking lot of the grocery store.

“Don’t even try arguing with me, it won’t work!” Caitlin told me before she had even parked the car.  “We need groceries and we’re taking care of it now.”

Hearing that didn’t help matters, even though I already knew she was going to find some way to force me to go inside dressed the way I was.  Sure enough, two minutes later, she had unfastened my seatbelt and pulled me out of the car.  And yes, she held my hand all the way into the store, where she had me take a shopping cart and told me to make sure both my hands never left the handle.  Then she spent a minute staring me in the face just to make sure my pacifier motion was up to specs.  When she looked away though, it was only to pull my dress up and rub her hand all over my diaper to see how wet I was.

“You better not be holding back,” she told me.  “You know what awaits you at home if you are.”

I knew alright.  That damn plug in my ass.  That didn’t mean I was going to simply let go though.  She could stick that plug in me all she wanted.  Something told me it was coming anyway.  My intentions just then were to hold back as much and as long as I could.  Besides, I had another reason for it now.  I had to fight their desire to turn me into a complete imbecile.  There was no way I was going to get committed back to that behavioral center again, and this time for being incompetent.

As much of a fantasy life as all this was, I didn’t want anything at all to do with the reality of it.  Still, like it or not, I was now living the reality of that dream.  A life I knew now that I had to fight against and somehow win…without getting myself recommitted for being crazy.

Once again we wandered slowly around that store.  To say I felt totally embarrassed over the way I looked would be a huge understatement.  Somehow all that long hair partially blocking my view did little to hide the looks I saw from everyone around me.  And all the while, Caitlin had the gall to act like everything was normal.  How could she?  I simply wanted to die!  More than ever.

We were wandering down the third aisle of the store when one of the nearby shoppers looked to Caitlin.  “Excuse me,” she said politely.

“Yes?” Caitlin asked.

She pointed at me.  “Is there a reason he’s dressed like that?”

Caitlin looked at me for a moment before she reached out and pulled the pacifier from my mouth.  “Tell the nice lady why you’re dressed the way you are.  Tell her properly!”

I looked at her, bewildered for a moment, before it finally dawned on me how she expected me to answer.

“Baby, tell her, or you can expect to get punished as soon as we get home.”

I continued to look at Caitlin for a moment more.  I didn’t need any more punishments in my life, even though I knew they were coming.  I looked over at the woman.  Oh how I hated saying, “Because I’m nothing but a baby, and I need to behave like a baby.”

The woman seemed very surprised.

“He wasn’t exactly happy with being the oldest member of our family,” Caitlin explained.  “So we all decided he’d be better off being the baby of the family instead.”

“Baby?” she asked.

To which Caitlin grabbed me and pulled the skirt of my dress way up, fully exposing the diaper I was wearing underneath.  “Baby!” she confirmed.  She groped all around my diaper, doing an overly thorough diaper check, before letting go of my dress and sticking the pacifier back in my mouth.  She watched me intently for a moment until I resumed the rhythmic sucking she expected.

She turned to the woman.  “You’ll have to excuse him.  He’s still learning.  But I know he’ll be getting better in his new role very soon.”  She looked at me.  “Won’t you!” she said sternly.

I looked at her but didn’t say anything.  Did she realize we had opposite opinions on that?

We continued our shopping.  As much as I mentally wanted to pee, just for the strange relief it might bring me, I held on and fought the urge.  I had more reason to fight this life than ever.  During one of Caitlin’s many diaper checks, she angrily accused me of holding back.  I of course said nothing to that.  I was holding back, and for once I didn’t care if she knew it.  The diaper checks kept coming all through the store though.  That damn dress made doing them a bit too easy for her, but what could I do about it?  Nothing!

Eventually, we went through the checkout and Caitlin and I together loaded all that stuff into the car.

Guess what happened the moment we got home.  Right!  I got put up on the changing table, my diaper was pulled down, I got rolled over and firmly strapped down, and Caitlin stuck that darn big plug into my rear end, trying to break my asshole in the process because of the size of the thing.  It was such a relief when the widest part of it finally went in, and the entire thing got a lot more comfortable…which is what it wasn’t.  When she was done with me, she put me on the floor to play again while she went back to remove the groceries from the car and put them away.  But she was back soon after she left me with another baby bottle of juice for me to drink.

“We need to start giving you more of these,” she told me as she handed the thing to me.  “You’re not wetting enough.”

I didn’t tell her, but drinking more bottles was only going to give me more practice at holding back.

“And we need to give you more practice out in public!” she added before she walked off.

More practice in public?  That part didn’t sound good to me at all.  They might make me do all the dumb things they wanted, but I had a reason now to fight back.  I was not going to be committed again, this time for being an imbecile and unable to think for myself.

The battle was on!  They just didn’t know it yet.

My Funny Farm - Chapter 15 – The Fantasy of Reality – Part 1 of 2

 

My Funny Farm

By Karen Singer

 

Chapter 15 – The Fantasy of Reality – Part 1 of 2

 

Having a diaper pail right next to your changing table is a handy thing.  The girls could just take my soggy and messy diapers off me, step on the floor pedal to open the lid, drop my diapers in, and forget about them.  Especially since one of my chores every other day was to take the plastic bags containing those diapers out to the trash for them.  But what wasn’t good about it was that they didn’t have to move away from me at all during the entire cleaning and changing process.  They were right there next to me all the time.  Monday morning brought that fact abundantly home so that it was very clear to me.

“Now what are you, and how are you supposed to behave?” Emily asked me as soon as she had me lying on my new changing table and buckled in so I wouldn’t fall.

Ugh!  “I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby,” I replied, noticing that she hadn’t even started to check my diaper yet.

She looked me in the eyes and said, “Don’t stop now.  In fact, don’t stop until I say you can.”  She stood there looking at me intently…waiting.

I literally sighed.  “I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby,” I said.  Then I said it again, and again, and again.  She didn’t let me stop saying it until she had removed my night diaper, cleaned me up, layered me in baby lotion and baby powder, stuck a new diaper on me, released the strap holding me in place, and finally dressed me in another short skirt and blouse outfit with a pair of pastel blue socks on my feet.  No shoes again.  I was still saying it as I stepped down onto the little stool to get myself off the table, and I was still saying it until she sat me down in front of the TV for my morning cartoons.

“Good!” she finally declared.  “Now tell me, is holding back and not peeing and pooping with no control acting like a baby?”

“No,” I was forced to admit.

“Then what are you going to do?” she asked.

“Not hold back?” I asked, fairly certain I knew the answer she wanted.

“You better!” she replied.  “And I’m going to ask Mrs. Lowrey to check you more often to make sure.”  She shoved that pacifier back in my mouth.  “Suck…out…suck…out…”  She kept that up for a while too before she finally walked away.  I had a feeling that it was going to be one of those days.  But come to think of it, every day for me was one of those days, and there was no end in sight.

Mrs. Lowrey seemed to get a big kick out of the way I was dressed.  She also absolutely loved my new nursery.  And true to what Emily had said, she did keep checking my diaper all day.  Did I hold back though?  Hell yes!  I didn’t care what Emily and Caitlin wanted as far as that went.  I was going to do things my way.  I was already enough of a baby, even for my warped tastes.  I didn’t need to add that little embarrassment to my list.

All Mrs. Lowrey could do about it though was to keep complaining that I wasn’t wet enough, and to threaten to tell Emily and Caitlin about it as soon as they got home.  I already knew she’d tell them.  She had proven in the past that she would do just that.  The problem was, what were Emily and Caitlin going to do about it?  That damn butt plug came to mind.  Despite worrying about it, somehow I managed to get through the day.

We were all sitting down at the table to dinner that night, when our home was invaded by a couple of visitors.  Mike and Nichole walked in.

“Nichole!” Emily exclaimed happily.  “We didn’t know you were coming.  Want something to eat?”

“No thanks,” Mike told her.  “We’re going out.  We just wanted to stop in with something Nichole wanted to discuss.”

“Oh?  What’s that?” Emily asked.

“Something Jennifer told me today, that Ashley told her,” Nichole replied.

I remembered that Nichole worked with Jennifer in the office for Chris’s construction company.  Between the two of them they did a lot of the scheduling as well as the paperwork for just about everything to do with the company.  I always had the impression that it was a pretty big job.

“What’s that?” Emily asked.

“Jennifer told me that you’re trying something new with his diapers.  Limiting them to just a few every day, and only changing him at certain times.”

“Yeah,” Caitlin confirmed.  “With these new diapers, they last a lot longer, and there’s no need to waste them.  Two regular diapers during the day, and then one of those really big ones at night is all he seems to need.”

“Don’t!” Nichole told her.

“What do you mean?  Why not?  It’ll save a lot of money, and Mrs. Lowrey will only have to change him once when she’s here.”

“Don’t!” Nichole said again.  “Listen,” she said.  “As I understand it, you want him to not hold back when he has to go, right?”

“Yes,” Emily replied.  “Caitlin and I both feel it’s important to help him feel more like a baby if he can’t control himself.”

“Well, that won’t work very well with the way you’re diapering him now.”

“What else should we do?” Caitlin asked.

“Only use the really cheap thin diapers on him instead.  The cheaper and thinner the better.”

“We can probably save more money by using the thicker ones and changing him less,” Emily pointed out.

“Maybe, but that’s not the point,” Nichole told her.  “With the thinner diapers, if he holds back, then he’s going to flood them when he goes, and as I read on the internet, they’re more likely to leak.”

“Yeah, we know,” Emily replied.

“But if he leaks, that means he’s holding back, especially if his diapers are always a little wet to begin with.  The only way he can prevent them from leaking is to not hold back at all.  He’ll have to pee a lot more often, just a tiny bit at a time so those cheap diapers can handle it.  Otherwise, you know he’s holding back, and he won’t be able to hide it.”

Emily looked to Caitlin.  “It does kind of make sense,” she admitted.

“Yeah,” Caitlin agreed.  “But I like the new diapers.  Besides, they’re super cute on him.”

“But cute isn’t their purpose,” Nichole countered.

“They’re one of them,” Caitlin told her.

“But not the main one,” Nichole replied.  “And right now, you need to get him used to not holding back at all so that it becomes a habit for him.  Once he’s to the point where he literally can’t hold back anymore, then you can switch over and use the more expensive ones.”

Emily looked to Caitlin.  “What do you think?”

Caitlin seemed to consider it.  “Maybe,” she agreed.  “But if you don’t mind, I think we should discuss it with Ashley and my dad first.  We did talk to them about our plan to use just three diapers a day.  That’s what they’re expecting us to do.”

“Yeah.  We’ll call them right after dinner,” Emily agreed.

“And while you’re at it,” Nichole said.  “I’ve got another suggestion.”

“What’s that?” Emily asked.

“I talked with Jennifer about it, and she said that now that the weather’s turning cooler and things are slowing down a bit, she can manage without me a few days a week for a while…except when payroll comes around.  On those three days when Mrs. Lowrey has to be here, what if I came to watch him instead?  And then if I need to be in the office, I can always take him with me.  It won’t hurt him to play with his toys on the floor there while I’m working.”

I saw Emily and Caitlin look at each other again.  “It sounds okay to me,” Emily agreed.  “Everyone who’s watching him would be in the family.”

Caitlin nodded.  “Yeah.  Maybe we should let Ashley and my dad know about that too.  Thanks Nichole.  That might be great.”

They might have thought it was great, but I didn’t.  And after listening to Nichole’s plan, my thoughts immediately turned to the subject of incompetence.  Nichole had already told me she wanted to take very good care of me, just to make sure I was behaving like everyone wanted – like an incompetent imbecile!  Something made me regret deciding to not tell Ashley about it when we had talked the day before.  And James wasn’t due to be here again until Friday.

As a baby, in theory, I wasn’t supposed to have to worry about anything, but the reality of it was, I was now more worried about things than anything else in years!

 

--- §§§§§§§§§§ ---

 

I know both Emily and Caitlin talked on the phone with James and Ashley, although I don’t know why they bothered.  I had no doubt that both of them would agree with Nichole’s suggestions.  Still, I was surprised when Tuesday morning came around and Caitlin dressed me in one of the new thick diapers instead of digging out one of the older cheap thin ones they had first used on me.  I wasn’t sure, but I thought it was possible that they had simply run out of the cheap ones.  I didn’t dare ask though.  I was just thankful for small favors.  I didn’t need more intense training in not holding back.  The training both Caitlin and Emily were giving me was intense enough.

“Keep saying it like you mean it!” Caitlin ordered as she had me on the changing table after removing my nightgown.

Why did Caitlin and Emily have to work at all this stuff so much the same?  I had no doubt they were conspiring together all the time to make sure they both kept after me.  “I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby,” I babbled on and on and on while she cleaned and changed me.

She stopped me sooner than Emily had done the day before though and left me firmly buckled in place on the table for a few moments before she came back again.  She wasn’t carrying any clothes for me to wear though.  Instead, she was holding my razor.  Once again, she shaved my face for me, after she and Emily had shaved my face and the rest of my body last night.  The last time Caitlin had done that was when….  Yeah, last Tuesday when I had to go to see Doctor Clive.  And it was Tuesday again.

Once she finished shaving me though, it was right back to saying, “I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby.”  Strangely, instead of giving me girly clothes to wear, she put my nightgown back on me that I had worn for the last few nights.  Yes, it too was girly…or womanly.  Still, I liked it.  I had been looking forward though to seeing what other new girly clothes they might have bought me.  Maybe none.  Maybe I had seen them all now.

Caitlin took me out to the living room like I expected and plopped me down in front of the TV for my cartoons.  But she didn’t turn the TV on.  Instead, she sat down in front of me and said, “Since you’re saying you should behave like a baby, then tell me, is holding back and not peeing and pooping right away acting like a baby?”

I remembered going through this yesterday with Emily.  Yeah, those two were definitely conspiring together.  “No,” I told her.

“So what are you going to do from now on?” she asked.

I sighed.  “Pee and poop as soon as I have to,”

“Good.  Now say it and keep saying it.  And make me believe it.  What are you going to do from now on?”

Oh boy!  Now she was making things worse!  I preferred even those lousy cartoons to this.  “From now on, I’m going to pee and poop as soon as I have to,” I said.

“Don’t stop,” she prompted when I didn’t keep going.  “I want to hear you keep saying it.”

Ugh!  “From now on, I’m going to pee and poop as soon as I have to.  From now on…”  I hated my new life!

She kept me at it for about five minutes before she stuck my pacifier back between my lips.  “Suck…out…suck…out….”  The repetition of everything was getting to be too much.  They were doing their best to make sure I remembered everything a bit too well.  She finally moved away, and I did my best to focus and pay attention to the colorful shapes moving around on the TV screen.  They were far more preferable for me to pay attention to than all the repetitious sayings she had put me through.

There was no doubt that Caitlin was keeping me strictly to my schedule all day.  There was also no doubt that she was hounding me and checking on me more often than usual to make sure I wasn’t holding back…which I was.  I just told her I wasn’t.  Hey, in those thick diapers I was sure she couldn’t really tell the difference anyway.

During my playtimes, it felt strange to be confined to a larger area than I had before, and I was confined by an actual fence they had set up for me.  I now had a few more toys than I had last week as well, but they interested me even less than the first toys they had given me.  I had a spiral shaped ramp to roll some balls down that had pictures of faces on them (oh joy…and useless).  I also had this electronic thing that when I pressed different buttons or pictures on it made animal sounds.  Mostly all I did was stare at the thing and wonder what I should do with it.  More uselessness.  Of course, there were also the three new small stuffed animals that had invaded my fenced-in prison to go with that small stuffed doll they had given me in the beginning.  Now that doll had plenty of company: a white rabbit, a pink pig, and a pink and white unicorn.  Somebody please explain to me how you’re supposed to play with things like that.  I had no earthly idea at all, so I simply left them scattered around like the rest of my toys in that playpen.

And then there was the fleece blanket they had put in there.  That, and that alone was the only thing they had put in my play area that I liked.  It was…yes, girly, but it was also very soft.  Soft enough that my hands simply liked touching it.  I spent some time just holding onto the thing while I watched the rest of my toys doing nothing on the floor around me.  What fun!  Maybe somebody should invent toys that play with themselves.  I certainly didn’t know what to do with them.

All my wonderful, joyful playing and not holding back got interrupted shortly after lunch when Caitlin decided it was time for her to get me ready to go out to see Doctor Clive.  I thought that would be fine, but I soon decided otherwise.  On no!  Oh no!  OH NO!  And yes, I’m afraid I was pretty vocal in my vehement protesting about it.  I had fully expected Caitlin to pull out some of my old clothes for me to wear like she had done last week.  Nope!  And before you start thinking that maybe she dressed me in another short skirt and blouse outfit instead, don’t worry, it didn’t happen.  It wasn’t a skirt and blouse outfit she had for me, it was a dress!  And yes, it was short!

I literally spit that big plug from my mouth.  “No!  I can’t go out wearing that!” I protested the moment I saw it.

“You can, and you will!” she told me in no uncertain terms.  “You agreed to all of this, remember?”

“Yeah but…”

“No buts!  You agreed to it, and I know Aunt Ashley and my dad told you this was going to be part of it.”

Yes, they had told me, but still.  “Yeah but…”

“What’s it going to be?” she asked.  “Do what I say, or do we call Doctor Clive and have them take you back to the city behavioral center like she wants?”

“That’s not fair!” I protested.

“Yes it is!  This is what you agreed to.  Now either put up with it, or get yourself recommitted and save everyone a lot of trouble.”

Oh God.  What had I gotten myself into?

Not getting an answer from me, she pulled the dress over my head and fed my arms through the armholes.  Before zipping up the back of the thing, she kept me sitting up on the changing table and put a pair of white ankle length socks on me and then those black flat shoes, buckling the thin straps on them tightly around my ankles.  Once I was standing on the floor, she turned me around and zipped up the dress.

“Getting there,” she said as she surveyed her work.  “Just one more little thing I think.”

I couldn’t imagine what that would be.  The only other thing I wanted just then was a gun to shoot myself with.  If I did ever make it to Doctor Clive’s office though, I was determined to find out if she really would recommit me if I didn’t do what they wanted.  Somehow, I didn’t think Caitlin had a valid threat to try and use on me.  I was going to make sure she never tried it again.

Caitlin disappeared into my closet and came back a few moments later with….  Huh?  A wig!  A wig of long brown hair.  I stared at the thing in disbelief as she turned it around in her hands, preparing to put the thing on my head.  She suddenly reached out towards me with it, and I automatically stepped back and raised my hand to block her.

“Hold still!” she ordered sternly.  “You’re going to wear it, like it or not.”

Ugh!  I forced myself to stand still and let her settle the thing on my head, pulling and tugging it around until she was satisfied.

“Hang on a minute,” she told me.

I stood there while she disappeared again, this time out of the room.  I moved my head around.  The hair of the wig was perfectly straight and hung down below my shoulders to about my armpits.  I could feel the fringe of bangs all across my forehead.  I could feel the bottom of the hair brushing all around my head and shoulders.  I had a mirror in my room, but I had no intention of looking at myself.  Something told me I wouldn’t like what I would see.

Caitlin hurried back into the room, this time holding a comb.  She ran that comb over and over again all around my hair…I mean my wig.  “There,” she said as she stood back and surveyed her work.  “I think that should do very nicely.  It’s actually quite lovely!”

Lovely?  She had to be kidding!  I never imagined feeling so ridiculous in my life.  I took two steps in that dress and started wondering if the diaper I was wearing under it would be obvious to anyone who looked at me…as if just the fact that I was obviously a man wearing  a dress wasn’t enough.  Oh…a man wearing a dress and a wig…uh…and a big fat diaper!  I tried to turn around and look at my backside, but all I saw was hair in my way.  Did that diaper make my butt look big?  I had no doubt at all.

Caitlin sent me to my playpen…I mean my fenced in play area to play, while she got herself ready to go.  I stood in my play area and looked around at the toys with no intention at all of doing anything with them.  Not that I knew what to do with them anyway.  My mind certainly wasn’t on toys.  It was on the way I was dressed and the fact that I had no doubt that Caitlin was about to try and drag me out into public that way.

Just looking down at the toys sent strands of hair from both sides of my head  to block part of my view.  It was another one of those weird experiences of my life.  I reached up with both hands and brushed the hair back over my shoulders.  Much better.  Now I could see clearly all around me.  I turned my head a bit and some of the hair fell back across my shoulder, blocking part of my view again.  Something told me all that hair was going to be another pain in the neck.

 

My Funny Farm - Chapter 14 – One More Time, With Feeling

 

My Funny Farm

By Karen Singer

 

Chapter 14 – One More Time, With Feeling

 

Waking up in a baby crib, with bars on either side of you is not anything like waking up in a regular bed.  The minute you open your eyes, you know you’re trapped there and there’s no way out.  With my old bed I could get out of it any time I wanted.  Not anymore.

For once I was awake before one of the girls could come and get me.  Not that I wanted to be awake, but I think just sleeping in the strange bed…I mean crib…was so different that sleeping was more difficult for me than ever.  Consequently, I really wanted to go back to sleep.  I closed my eyes, and tried, but that darn fate had other ideas.

The light suddenly switched on.  “Hi baabyyy,” Emily sang cheerily.  “How was your new crib?”

“Disturbing,” I tried to say around that huge plug in my mouth.  I’m not sure if she understood me or not, but she didn’t seem to react to my assessment of the situation.  Since the word didn’t come out even close to clearly, I was guessing she wasn’t really worried about what I had said…or what I thought.

It took her a moment of struggle with the unfamiliar mechanism to lower the entire side of my crib.  Those bars suddenly gone were like a huge relief.  After an entire week of the same schedule, I pretty much knew she wasn’t going to allow me out of bed…I mean out of my crib yet.

She ignored my blankets, also ignoring the bloated mess of diapers I was wearing.  Instead, she stuck her face close to mine and pulled the plug from my mouth.  “What are you?” she asked in a soft but demanding voice.

Oh, how I suddenly hated her again.  Oh, how I wanted to lash out with my fist.  But I didn’t.  The damn police might come and put me back in that other funny farm place again – with the high school age doctors!  “I’m nothing but a baby,” I told her, remembering the way they had forced me to say it countless times.

“Right!” she said determinedly.  “And since you’re nothing but a baby, then how should you behave?”

Huh?  Now what?  “How should I behave?”

“Since you’re nothing but a baby, then how should you behave?” she asked again.

“I don’t know.  Like a jerk?”

“Wrong answer!” she said angrily.  “If you’re nothing but a baby, then how should you behave?”

Okay, I was getting the picture.  “Like a baby?” I guessed.

“Right!  Now tell me from the beginning.  I want you to tell me that since you’re a baby, then you should behave like a baby.”

“I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby?” I asked.

“Right!” she replied.  “Again.  Just like that.”

Oh-oh.  I had a bad feeling about what was coming.  “I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby,” I replied.

“Good!” she said.  “When Caitlin brings your bottle in a few minutes, you don’t get it until I hear you keep saying that for a while, and I expect you to say it like you mean it.  Like it’s something important.  Got it?  No bottle until I’m satisfied.  Now tell me and keep telling me, what are you and how should you behave?”

Did she really think that that bottle of baby formula was going to be some kind of reward?  It was just the opposite!  But the determined look on her face let me know I wasn’t going to get out of this.  “I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby,” I replied.  “I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby.  I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby.”

“Say it like you mean it!” she prompted.

I put a bit more effort into it.  “I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby.”  Over and over.

Catilin walked in and watched us for a while, handing the bottle off to Emily.  “I’ll get ready for work,” she whispered to Emily before she walked out.

“I’m a baby, so I should behave like a baby.”  I hated saying it once.   I hated saying it over and over even more.  I hated having to sound like I meant it.  And I especially hated that they were starting to make me feel like nothing but a baby in more ways than one.  What had Nichole said about having me declared incompetent?  I worried that I was well on my way.

After breakfast, as usual, Emily cleaned me up and changed my diaper.  Then to add to my humiliation, she pulled a short skirt and a frilly blouse out of my closet.  I stared at both those garments with nothing but disbelief.  But a few minutes later, I was put down on the floor wearing them, along with a pair of white socks on my feet.  No shoes.  That’s how she dragged me out to the living room for my usual lousy TV time.

Emily hit me a number of times during the day with having to repeat my new phrase over and over.  Could that be what I had read somewhere that they called an affirmation?  I wasn’t sure, but I was guessing that’s what it was supposed to be.  I just wish she hadn’t made me sound like I meant it every time.

Despite being saddled with an entirely new environment to live in, and despite Emily making me say that new affirmation a million times, much of my mind was stuck worrying about something completely different.  For some reason, I couldn’t stop thinking about what Nichole had told me the day before.  They wanted to get me to the point where they could have me declared incompetent.  And once they did, then they would have some…opportunities.  Whatever that meant.

But being declared incompetent had more of a bad connotation to me than spending the rest of my life in that professional nuthouse downtown.  And something told  me it would be for the rest of my life, which they would make damn sure I kept living.  Or maybe they would let me die.  Maybe they would even help me die.  Wouldn’t that gain them whatever it was they were after even sooner?  I had to think about that.  But as much as I wanted to die, I was more worried about being declared incompetent.  That part I knew I didn’t want.  What opportunities?  That puzzled me like nothing else.

Later in the afternoon, Ashley walked in while I was…playing…in my new fenced in play area.  I remembered it was Sunday.  Her day to “talk” to me.  But last week, nothing we had talked about had been about me wanting to kill myself.  We had talked instead about my favorite thing in the world, my wife, Ashley’s mother.  We both had very fond memories of her.  I wondered what she would want to talk about today.

While Ashley spent a few minutes talking with Emily on the other side of the room where I couldn’t hear them, I sat there and once again remembered that one big thing I had been so worried about all day.  Incompetency!  Should I tell Ashley what Nichole had told me the day before?  Should I tell her how worried I was about it?  Would she care?  Yeah, I was sure she would care, but then I thought about something else.  Maybe she wasn’t the best person to tell.  Maybe the best person was James, my son.  He was the one who was handling all my business affairs, and the concept of opportunities sounded to me like it fell under that category.

And then there was the possibility that all my worrying about it was for nothing.  Maybe I was misreading the entire situation.  That was entirely possible.  I didn’t know all their plans.  I only knew the few brief snatches of things that I overheard now and then.  Strangely, I was the baby of the family now, and nobody consulted me about anything.  So yeah, maybe I really was misreading and misunderstanding the entire thing.  I suddenly felt a bit better.

The two girls finished their conversation and Emily left, closing the bedroom door behind her.  Ashley came over and opened the gate in my pen.  “Hi baby,” she said.  “How’s your new room?”  She looked around and shook her head.  “I can’t believe how nice it came out.  I think it’s just perfect!”

Did she really want to know my opinion about it?  The truth was, just looking around my room frightened me to death…while at the same time, it excited me to death.  I was stuck in a dream world that played to all my weirdest fantasies.  The problem with being frightened to death and excited to death, was that neither of those prospects would actually kill me.  Pity.

Ashly reached her hand down toward me.  “Come on,” she said.  “Let’s sit together on the couch.”

Oh goody!  I was going to be allowed to actually sit on my own couch.  Or maybe it wasn’t my couch.  But it was in my room!

She slipped her shoes off and sat up on one side, pulling her feet up onto the couch to face me.  I sat on the other side and pulled the plug from my mouth.

“Put your feet up and face me,” she said.  “That way we can at least see each other.”

So I did like she did and turned to face her with my feet on the couch.  Now I just had to wait to see what subject she wanted to talk about this week.  I didn’t have to wait very long.

She smiled at me and said, “Em and I got to do some shopping yesterday, and it was great!”

“Great?” I asked.  “I’m guessing it’s always great for both of you.”

She chuckled.  “Yeah.  Pretty much.  It was nice to go yesterday though since we had such a big shopping list to take care of.”  She pointed playfully at me.  “And all of it for you!  How do you like that skirt outfit you’re wearing today?”

That threw me for a second.  “It’s…okay,” I told her.  There was no way I was ever going to admit how much it turned me on.

She laughed,  “I’m betting it’s a bit better than okay,” she replied.

I said nothing to that, which only made her laugh again.

“Anyway,” she said, “Em and I really loved that shopping trip.  But what struck me while we were out, was how much it was the same as all the shopping I did with Mom, except that now I’m the parent instead.  And I think what really made me think about that was trying to find baby clothes for someone your size.”  She dropped her voice to a whisper.  “They don’t exist!  We had to do the best we could.”

“I have no doubt,” I told her.  “And, I have no doubt you and Emily had a great time…again.”

“Yeah, we did,” she admitted.  “We’ve already talked about how much I always loved shopping with Mom, but the trips that I think were really the best were when Em, me, and Mom could all go together.  They were the best times imaginable.”

“I’m sure they were,” I replied.  “And the three of you spent enough to support an entire country.  I happen to know that for a fact!”

Ashley laughed again.  “Yeah, we probably did.”  She became more serious.  “Emmy and I spent a lot of money this weekend too.  So much that I called James and suggested that maybe I should pay more than just my third of it all.  In fact, I offered to pay for most of it.  But James said no.  We would stick to our agreement, and it was all stuff we would have been buying for you anyway, so he was good with it.”

“Stuff for me?  Like what?”

“Some of it you already know of course, in fact you’re wearing some of it and remember you’ve got a few new toys to play with now and some real pretty bedding for your crib.  But there’s other stuff that I guess you’ll find out about in time.”  She laughed.  “I also know there’s a few things that came in the mail for you this week that Emmy and Caitlin are dying to try out with you.  I think they’re planning it for later this week.”

“What’s that?” I asked, afraid to find out.

She shrugged.  “I’ll let it be a surprise.  I know it should be interesting.”

“What?”

She shrugged again.  “Wait and see.  Did you enjoy sleeping last night in the pajamas Emily found for you?”

“Pajamas?  Is that what you call it?  I thought it was a nightgown.  A long one.”

She seemed surprised.  “They put the nightgown on you?  I’m so glad.  I insisted on buying you that, but Emmy was sold on a pair of pajamas for you instead, especially since the weather is turning cooler.”

“I guess I have that to look…forward to yet.”

“Yeah, you do,” she told me.  “I remember one time when me, and Em, and Mom were out, and…”

We talked for almost half an hour together about shopping once again.  Actually though, she did most of the talking, spending a lot of time comparing shopping trips between her and her mother, and her and Emily, since she was the mother now.  Once, she even briefly mentioned looking forward to Emily having a baby and their shopping trips could become a threesome again.  My daughter certainly loved her shopping.  I guess, so did Emily.  Just like Rachel had.  That gene certainly got passed down the line from mother to daughter…to daughter.

That nice talk with Ashley wasn’t the only time I got to be on that couch that day.  After my bath and being changed into another of the big fat diapers, along with that same long nightgown again, Emily brought my evening baby bottle of formula into the room and sat on one end of the couch.  I had already been through it last night so I knew what was happening.  I laid down on the couch and arranged myself so that my head was in her lap.  She stuck the bottle in my mouth, and I did my best to make sure I was sucking properly, keeping the required rhythm I knew she was expecting.  And trust me, here eyes never left my face.

“You know,” Emily said as she held my bottle to my lips.  “I really like sitting here holding you like this.  I know you’re a lot bigger than a real baby…that I’d love to have someday, but even as big as you are, I still love holding you and doing this with you.  It’s real nice.”

I would have commented, but she was keeping that bottle in my mouth, and I was also too preoccupied with keeping my required sucking rhythm going.

“I’m sure Caitlin likes it too,” Emily continued.  “Not to mention, it’s good practice for her.  She’s really getting into taking care of you and I think she’s enjoying it more than ever.  Which is good.  She needs to learn these things.  But for me, sitting here quietly, feeding you like a real baby is…nice.  It’s relaxing.  It’s…special.  And baby,”  Once again she bopped me on the nose.  “I love you so much!”