I had to go - really bad

It was last night, Saturday evening, that I unwittingly put my bladder to the ultimate test.

To my delight, I was given a Red Line to operate for eight hours. Part of the alignment was shut down between Gateway Transit Center and 102nd Avenue and Burnside, so all the Blue Lines that normally go all the way to Gresham, had to be turned around at Gateway. The shut down was due to the new Green Line getting connected to the existing tracks just south of Gateway Transit Center. So, lucky me on the Red Line, could scoot right through the Gateway TC like I normally do on all my Red Lines. I was happy.

In my bag were three bottles of water; I was almost done with my second one when I noticed I needed to "go" again just minutes after having had a "comfort break" at PDX. A"comfort break", light rail speak for "I really gotta go", sounds a lot more private on our open air radios, than "uncouth" words like "pee", "poop", "urinate" "defecate" or any other "p" or "s" word you might want to use for the "call of nature". We want to sound civil... ;-)

I like the Red Line because it is relatively short, only an hour from Portland Airport to Beaverton Transit Center. There are convenient bathrooms at each end; normally, I only use the bathrooms at PDX, since the break time is longer at the airport than in Beaverton.

Now back to my dilemma last night.

As I approached Gateway, less than 15 minutes after leaving the airport, my bladder sent me a gentle message: "Mommie (that's me), I need you to find a potty" which I immediately ignored: "Hey, you, we just went a few minutes ago. What's your problem???"

So my bladder calmed down - just long enough for me to leave both Gateway and a potential bathroom behind.

"Hey, YOU!" That was my bladder again, a bit more urgent this time. I shifted around on my seat and thought, "Oh, I can make it to Beaverton TC - it's only 47 minutes away."

47 minutes can be a very long time. Especially when my bladder has made up her mind (of course my bladder is a "she") to act up. Stupidly, I had another drink from my water bottle, thinking I might as well finish it.

As I started my 55 mph run along I-84 toward downtown, my bladder seemed to suddenly fill up like an inflating balloon. It felt like my belt was suddenly too tight, like the seat was getting harder to sit on, and like my insides were approaching the bursting point. However, I have been through this before, so I said to myself: "Hey, Eva, just suck it up, sit on it, and you will be fine. You'll make it to Beaverton TC."

At least that was the plan. Stopping at the Hollywood TC platform, I wished for a bathroom, almost any bathroom, even recalling in my mind some of the crazy stories I had heard about bus drivers 30 or 40 years ago when they would whip out "junior" almost anywhere in a dark corner - especially at night - and be on their merry way.

Well, I had no "junior" to whip out - I like being a girl. I had a really big problem that was becoming bigger by the minute. Down the long straightaway to Lloyd Center, I thought about calling Control and telling them I had a need for a "comfort break" at the Rose Quarter TC just a few platforms past Lloyd Center. It was really tempting, because by now I was squirming in my seat.

I kept talking to myself: "It's OK, you can make it to Beaverton. You don't need to go potty at Rose Quarter." I had a one car train and it was pretty full. I decided I did not want 547 pairs of eyes watching me go into the bathroom at the trolley barn. And before I could even leave the train, I would have had to make an announcement on the PA system: "Ladies and Gentlemen, I need to go pee. It will only be a few minutes. Please bear with me." Or something like that. Perhaps I would have used the more discrete sounding "comfort break."

Besides, shutting off the train and then afterwards turning it back on, takes a long time. And then I would have had to find the correct code for the automatic PA announcements from Rose Quarter to Beaverton TC, and there might have been another train behind me, and then I would have slowed down everybody else, and Control would have had to ask other trains to hold on the platforms behind me, and soon all of TriMet would have known I had to pee. I really did not want to bother Control and my co-workers with my bladder problems. Embarrassing.

Thus, I passed the Rose Quarter TC bathroom heaven, and immediately regretted it.

I had acted like the stubborn NorVegian light rail operator that I am, ignoring the dire needs of my poor bladder. Ugh.

Across the Steel Bridge and through the downtown area I went, my bladder screaming at me. "MOMMIE - HELP!" There was nothing I could do other than just stick it out. To Beaverton. Beaverton seemed a long way away...

By now it felt like my bladder was the size of my head. I shifted around, happy to remember the Kegel exercises: What are Kegel exercises? Kegel exercises help to strengthen the pelvic muscles. Kegel exercises may help to bring back or improve bladder control in people with urinary incontinence (in-KON-ti-nens) (urine leakage). Click here for more info.

I used these exercises during and after each of my three pregnancies hundreds of years ago when I was young and beautiful. Thank goodness I learned something from being pregnant that I can still use.

So there I was, operating a train through downtown Portland, doing my "Kegel's" and hoping I would last until I arrived at Beaverton TC. Just before going to work I had read the article in the NW Labor Press (see previous post) about TriMet having had to replace around 30 bus operator seats due to urine.

I did not want to add to that statistic.And what would I do about my pants? In my despair, I could see the ugly wet stain. Yuck. HOW EMBARRASSING! I can understand if an operator would not want to tell anybody. How on earth would I hide the stain??? And the odor? And what about the seat? A horrible thought made worse the more I thought about it... I tried to ignore these possibilities, and instead think positive.

Up through the tunnel, I sat first on my left thigh, then on the other; I leaned forward, I leaned backwards, and nothing helped. Minutes later, I was so desperate that I looked up on the structure above the Sunset TC platform, knowing there was a BATHROOM for bus drivers up there. The thought seemed heavenly...

Never before have I been so in need of a bathroom, and never before has the pain been so great. The last five minutes from Sunset to Beaverton were agony. I thought how good it would feel to just let it go. "NO NO NO - THINK POSITIVE. You can do this." I was fighting with my own bladder, trying to tell her it would all be OK.

The more upset and uptight I got, the stronger the urge to go became. So I tried to relax - without much success, but I had to try. When I came around the last turn before crossing 114th Avenue, and then 117th Avenue, I was on my feet, easily steering the train the last few feet of the trip to Beaverton TC while taking pressure off my poor bladder.

To my horror, a Blue Line came toward me, so I had to sit down - ouch - to dim the cyclops; I sprang to my feet again as soon as the front of the train passed me, and then slowly approached the Beaverton TC platform. Stopping the train, I opened the doors for my passengers, shut the train off, grabbed the portable radio, locked the cab door behind me and ran for my life, zigzagging in between people on the platform. I was on an important mission, and NOTHING could stop me.

I made it - just in time.
It was the closest I have ever come to soiling myself at work. Too close for comfort. Many bus and light rail operators know what I went through; some have not made it without soiling themselves. My heart goes out to them. For the rest of us: perhaps the Kegel has helped some of us, or perhaps just stubborn refusal to give up, or a bit of luck. It could be that we were saved just because we did not have to hold it for that one minute longer that would have been a minute too long...

Had I not stood up and relieved the pressure on my bladder the last two minutes of my run, I would not have made it. Thus my being a light rail operator gave me an advantage over a bus driver who cannot stand up and operate the bus. Each job has it's advantages and disadvantages in regard to bathroom breaks.

I still prefer to be a light rail operator when nature calls.