The door opened and I sleepily opened my eyes up at the blinding light in the hallway. Pauline was standing there shaking her head saying, “Look at you. Did you poop in your dydee again? I’m ashamed of you. Look at the mess you’ve made on the floor! Did you know you’re sitting a big puddle of pee? You’re nothing but a baby! Get out of there, baby!”
I pulled my thumb out of my mouth and struggled to get up. The sodden, overfilled diaper hung heavily on my hips and drooped dangerously. I looked down and saw she was right, I had made a big mess! I stepped out of the closet and she said, “Get down on your hands and knees baby. You can crawl to your bedroom for your diaper change. I don’t want to see you walking until I tell you it’s okay to act like a toddler again. You’re not going to be mommy’s baby toddler anymore, from mow on you’re going to be mommy’s LITTLE baby. Little babies don’t walk or talk and I don’t want to see you do either until I tell you its alright. Do you understand?”
I hung my head and softly said, “Yes, mommy.”
“What did you say? I thought I just told you I didn’t want to hear you talking. Now get down on your hands and knees and talk to me like a baby. Say ‘gaaa’!”
I got down of the floor at her feet and said quietly, “Gaaa?!”
“Louder!”, she commanded.
“Gaaaaa!!!”, I almost shouted.
“Again!”, she demanded.
“Gaaa!”, I replied.
“More! I want to hear you talk the way you did when you were only a year old.”, she ordered.
“Aga..bmmm goooo gahmoga!”, I returned. I began to pee again and panic overtook me. I started to cry like a real baby! She made me crawl down the hall and into my bedroom as I wept and cried to be changed. She helped me on the bed and unfastened my diaper, saying, “Ohhh, mommy’s baby is sure ‘tinky this afternoon.
Pauline changed my diaper and made me spend the rest of the afternoon playing on a blanket in front of the TV. When it was time for dinner, she made me crawl on the floor to the kitchen where she bibbed me and fed me baby food she had purchased earlier that day at the grocery store. She wiped my face with a baby’s feeding bib and gave me a bottle of formula to drink when I had finished eating. Then she held my hand to ‘help’ me toddle to the living room. Shortly after dinner I pooped in my diaper again and she changed me on the blanket in front of the TV. We watched the tube until eight thirty when she told me it was time for bed. I whimpered in frustration at being forced to go to bed so early in the evening, but she told me that little babies had to get their sleep. Not being allowed to talk kept me from arguing with her, so I reluctantly went to bed as I was told.