WE ARE ALL
BEDWETTERS
Emeka Mgbenu
From time immemorial, bed wetting has been an integral part of our existence, a necessary rite, a
rite of passage if you may…
A child is born, a child cries, a child eats, a child sleeps, a child bedwets. It is an integral part of our
living, an infinite cycle, a phenomenon which surprisingly has escaped global cultural status. We
forget our moist beginnings at the sight of tiny moulds on our chests and fickle strands on our
chins. Puberty: The first stone in the long dry road to adulthood. Unfortunately, our soggy past is
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not something to be ashamed of, try as we may, we are reminded of it every single day, doing the
exact same thing (this time, in all the right places!). The Irony! The problem is we purposefully turn a
blind eye, perhaps the amnesia is intentional, selective or true? We don’t know, it gets really murky
at times.
Are we as mankind making it a habit of forgetting too soon?
My job here is to act as a medium, not a fixed portal, but one in a constant state of flux, discovery
and transition between the past, present and future. To jolt you out of your reverie. Permit me to
go back to our single digit years, when whatever strategies parents applied were finally beginning
to take effect. Like a shot of heroin up our throbbing veins, there was this light headed feeling. Like
an illusion of self control…but we dare not say it for fear of jinxing it. Or so we thought.
Fast forward a few months later, in the early hours of the morning, we wake up to afamiliar dampening