Regressive Ad Campaign: Part 2



By Sage Ann

This story is set in the incredible world created by AlteredStates14. Her universe is brought to life not through traditional written narratives, but through a powerful collection of images—advertisements, media articles, and other visual artifacts—that vividly capture everyday life in her setting.
All images associated with this story are her original work. Please consider supporting her so we can continue to explore and enjoy more of this fascinating world.
You can find her work here:
 https://www.deviantart.com/alteredstates14
Another author has also written a story based in this universe from a different perspective. You can find it here:
 https://www.deviantart.com/fatherfish/art/Pampers-and-Propaganda-1028729633



A week later, Kalie sat in AP Literature, half-listening to Ms. Parson's breathless interpretation of Sylvia Plath while Jen Whitman fidgeted in the seat beside her. Jen—whose debate team victories had once earned her the nickname "Ruthless Whitman"—had been quiet lately, her hand no longer shooting up to answer every question. Now she squirmed, crossed and uncrossed her legs, her face tightening with an expression Kalie hadn't seen on another seventeen-year-old since kindergarten. Then came the sound—subtle but unmistakable—and the growing darkness on Jen's light blue jeans.
The classroom atmosphere shifted. A ripple of whispers. A few snickers quickly hushed. Jen's face collapsed into mortification so acute it was painful to witness. Ms. Parson stopped mid-sentence about bell jars and female oppression, assessed the situation with a quick glance, and said with practiced calm, "Jen, why don't you go to the nurse's office? Take your things."
Jen gathered her books with trembling hands. As she stood, Kalie caught a glimpse of the full extent of the accident—the denim soaked from center to thigh. Tears balanced precariously on Jen's lower lashes as she hurried from the room, leaving a silence that felt thick enough to touch.
Ms. Parson cleared her throat. "As we were discussing, Plath's imagery of rebirth..." 
But Kalie couldn't focus. Jen Whitman had wet herself. Jen, who corrected teachers on historical dates. Jen, who'd organized a petition last year to extend library hours during finals week. Jen, who had never—not once in all the years Kalie had known her—shown a single crack in her meticulously maintained facade of perfection.
After class, Kalie tried texting Jen, but received no response. She spotted two more girls from her grade being escorted to the nurse's office before lunch. The rumor mill churned with uncomfortably specific details about who had wet themselves and who had done worse.
At lunch, Kalie found her best friend, Tara, sitting alone at their usual table, picking at a salad with the enthusiasm of someone fulfilling a court-mandated activity.
"Have you heard about Jen?" Kalie asked, sliding onto the bench.
Tara nodded, not looking up. "And Melissa. And Brianna from Calc."
"What is happening? This is like... like some weird outbreak of incontinence." Kalie unwrapped her sandwich but found her appetite had abandoned her. "Is it something in the water? A viral thing?"
Tara's fork stopped mid-stab. She glanced around, then leaned forward. "Can you keep a secret?"
Something in her tone made Kalie's skin prickle. "Of course."
"I've been wearing pull-ups to bed for the past two weeks." The words tumbled out in a hushed confession.
Kalie blinked, certain she'd misheard. "You've been what?"
"Having accidents. At night." Tara's cheeks flamed, but she continued. "It started about three weeks ago. I woke up wet. I thought it was just a one-time thing, but then it happened again, and again. My mom took me to the doctor, but they couldn't find anything wrong. So now..." She trailed off, eyes fixed on her salad.
"So now you wear pull-ups," Kalie finished, the reality of the situation clicking into place with disturbing clarity. "Like the ones in those ads."
Tara nodded. "My mom bought them. BabyAgain brand. They're not—" she lowered her voice even further, "—they're not terrible. They've got these patterns on them, and they don't show under clothes."
Kalie felt as though she'd stepped into an alternate reality. "But Tara, you're seventeen. Doesn't it feel... weird?"
"At first." Tara pushed a cherry tomato around her plate. "But my mom says it's happening to a lot of girls our age. Some kind of delayed development thing. She reads all these articles about it. There's even a support group she goes to now."
"A support group," Kalie repeated. "For mothers of teenagers in diapers."
Tara shrugged, a gesture that failed to convey the casualness she was clearly aiming for. "It's not just the bed-wetting. It's like... my mom says I've been pushing myself too hard, growing up too fast. That maybe this is my body's way of saying I need more nurturing."
Kalie's mouth felt dry. The conversation had veered so far from normal teenage lunch talk that she couldn't find her bearings. "And you believe that?"
"I don't know what I believe. I just know I keep wetting the bed, and the pull-ups help, and my mom is being really nice about it all." Tara finally looked up, her expression a complicated mix of embarrassment and something else—relief, maybe. "She says maybe I'll need them during the day soon too, like Jen. A lot of girls are starting to."
After lunch, dazed, Kalie wandered into the school library and found herself drawn to the magazine section again. There were more of them now—those parenting magazines focused on "regression care." She picked one up, flipping to an article titled "Voices of the ReParented: Teens Speak Out."
The spread featured interviews with girls aged fourteen to eighteen, all photographed in childish clothing, some visibly diapered. They spoke about their experiences in terms that made Kalie's stomach twist—gratitude for mothers who "recognized what they really needed," relief at "not having to pretend to be grown up anymore," joy in "returning to a simpler time."
One quote stood out, from a girl named Amber, sixteen: "At first I was embarrassed when I started having accidents at school. But now I know it was just my body's way of telling me and my mom that I wasn't ready for all the responsibilities of being a teenager. Now I wear my special pants all the time, and Mom helps me change, and I don't have to worry about anything except being her good little girl."
Kalie closed the magazine, her hands unsteady. The girls seemed happy, or at least claimed to be. But there was something deeply unsettling about the whole thing—the way the mothers were making these decisions, the way the girls spoke as if reciting lines from a script, the way none of them questioned why they'd suddenly lost control of their bladders at seventeen.
By the end of the day, Kalie had witnessed two more accidents in the halls. The school had apparently designated a special area in the nurse's office for "changing needs," according to an announcement made over the PA system during sixth period. No one seemed particularly shocked anymore. Girls who'd been fine last week were now being led away by teaching assistants after accidents, returning in different clothes, sometimes with visible bulges beneath their pants or skirts.
On the bus ride home, Kalie's phone pinged with a text from Tara: "Mom taking me shopping for daytime protection stuff tomorrow. Nervous but also kind of relieved? Doc says a lot of girls having probs during day now too."
Kalie stared at the message, trying to formulate a response that walked the line between supportive and what-the-actual-hell. Before she could decide, another text arrived: "Don't worry about your mom doing this to you. Your mom's not like the moms who are into this whole thing."
The message hit a nerve Kalie hadn't realized was exposed. She hadn't even considered that possibility—that her mother might suddenly decide she needed diapers too. But Tara was right. Her mother was perpetually locked in her home office on conference calls or rushing between meetings. She barely had time to grocery shop, let alone engage in whatever intensive "reparenting" these other mothers were doing. The most nurturing thing her mother had done in the past year was order soup when Kalie had a cold.
Still, as the bus pulled up to her stop, Kalie felt an uncomfortable heat in her chest, a sensation she recognized as relief mingled with guilt—relief that her mother was too busy for such nonsense, guilt that she was somehow safe while her friends weren't. She stepped off the bus into the afternoon sun, bag heavy with homework she'd barely be able to focus on, wondering how many more classmates would show up tomorrow in "special pants," and why no one seemed to be questioning any of it.