I am an American woman who had a son in 1984. When he was born, after we both endured 32 hours of natural childbirth, the first thing the doctor asked us was whether we were going to have him circumcised. Understand that the baby had just been born, he was still on my abdomen with his umbilical cord still attached, and this was the doctor's first question. I was taken aback, but I was exhausted from the long labor and also exhilirated because my baby was beautiful and healthy and we had both made it through a long natural labor and birth, and I wasn't thinking straight. When the doctor asked us, I said, "I don't know. I don't see the point" but my husband immediately said "Yes" and the doctor told us that he recommended it, so I went along with them, but with doubts.
Here in the US, most boys are still being circumcised, so I was thinking that it would be better for him to look like his friends and his dad, but I had no faith in the necessity of the procedure medically. As a scientist myself, my feeling is that if nature puts something someplace, we shouldn't remove it for no reason, and that includes a baby boy's foreskin.
I wish I hadn't let the procedure be done, and I am glad that the rate of circumcision is dropping, slowly but surely, in the States. Had we been in Canada, I wonder if they'd have pressured me as much about it. What's done is done, but I still have second thoughts about it. The only reason I went along with it was to save my son any teasing later if he was the only one of his friends who was intact, but I hope that changes in my country soon.
- Kathleen in New Jersey
November 26, 2011
I changed my mind
Dear siteowner,
your site helped me a lot. I changed my mind about circumcision. Now, I am totally against it.
thank you very much
- Gabriel from Brazil.
November 6, 2011
Now that it has gone, so has the pleasure.
I am a 50 year old male from Melbourne, Australia. I was not circumcised when I was born and remained that way until recently. I was born being blessed with a penis that brought great pleasure, (once I learned how to love), to my last two women and also to myself. I was never ashamed of my penis or my foreskin and if anything I felt a little sorry for other males that I observed in changing rooms, whom I felt had had their penises "mutilated".
...
Just about one year ago, what I had taken for granted all came to an end. Firstly, I began a new sexual relationship with a woman who had had a recent hysterectomy, and unfortunately the shortened vagina that results from this operation made sex uncomfortable. Eventually we managed to find positions that made it possible and we would have sex twice a night. Within a month of this however, I began to experience pain so severe that I had to pull out, even before orgasm. It was a small tear in the frenulum. We stopped the sex for a month to see if it would heal, and I made an appointment with a Melbourne urologist to enquire about a frenulectomy.
Before I got there however, I noticed that my foreskin had developed a pale ring around it and it had become painful to retract. The Urologist took one good look at it and diagnosed Balanitis xerotica obliterans (BXO). He said: "No one knows where it comes from. There's no cure and the only solution is circumcision." Since circumcision is elective surgery in Australia and the waiting list is at least 4 months, I booked in and went home to think about it.
After research on the internet and hearing of an acquaintance who had the same problem and been forced into the same solution, it was clear to me that the Urologist had spoken the truth. I dreaded the operation, and dearly would have preferred an alternative, but it was obvious that topical hormone creams weren't going to do the job. Meanwhile, as the months went by, my phimosis grew worse and worse. Sex was impossible except with a condom, as the foreskin retracted over an erect penis produced a burning pain that was not tolerable. Eventually it became completely impossible to retract over an erection and then over a flaccid penis. I rang the hospital in desperation and they booked me in.
Unfortunately public health care in Australia isn't always all that one would wish, as this operation confirmed. I had no proper opportunity to discuss the operation with the surgeon, whom I could not choose and never met prior to going under, merely a desperate plea for him not to stuff it up. I needn't have bothered, since stuff it up he promptly did.
When they brought me out of general anaesthetic I was drugged to the eyeballs and when I went to the toilet to make sure I could still piss, I saw that one side was greatly swollen and bruised black and blue. The surgeon assured me it would be fine and not to have sex for 4 weeks. I dreaded the pain when the local anaesthetic wore off but I needn't have worried since I felt nothing the next day, neither pleasure nor pain. I wondered whether this was a bad sign, but I kept faith and waited.
After 4 weeks the wounds had healed and the stitches had fallen out, but one side remained swollen and painful and the other side was also painful due to a displaced blood vessel. Sex was quite impossible due to the pain which became more severe if there was any touch on an erection. I went back to the surgeon who had a cursory look at his handiwork and pronounced me ok to go. I asked him why one side remained swollen and misshapen and he dismissed it, saying: "Just a little bruising. It will settle down.". He waved us out of the door, but I forced him to consider the matter of the displaced blood vessel. Against his will he took another look and pronounced it: "A little swelling on the suture line." and dismissed me.
Months later, the displaced blood vessel, which could not have been a loose suture since it was at least 1 cm below the suture line, has atrophied and causes less pain but it can still be felt. The other side which was swollen , has subsided just slightly but it remains unshapely and it clearly a 2nd rate job which I will have to wear for the rest of my life. I experience very little pleasure in my penis now and have pretty much lost all interest in sex. Sex with my woman has gone from twice a night to once a fortnight, despite our otherwise excellent relationship. Masturbation has also dropped to a similar level. Things that used to turn me on no longer do. Nor does anything else.
I can only assume that it was MY FORESKIN that brought me most of my sexual pleasure. Now that it has gone, so has the pleasure. I asked the Urologist in the beginning about loss of sensation after circumcision and he dismissed the idea, assuring me that it was "nothing significant", even though I knew there were many nerves ending in the foreskin. Other adult males who had been circumcised from birth assured me that I would only be happier. I was not so confident and sure enough: THEY WERE ALL WRONG! Nerve formation and growth must take place as you grow, so that males circumcised at birth can still experience proper sexual pleasure. That's not much consolation for me though, being removed from the sexual register at 50.
Not happy!
- Not Happy in Melbourne, Australia
October 19, 2011
They look like retarded anteaters
You have nothing better than to create a website about intact
penises?
Gross.....They look like retarded anteaters. Can't imagine what they smell like....yuk
I am a 21 year old male and my circumcision has left me impotent.
I was born a healthy baby boy the summer of 21 years ago, and my mother decided to have me circumcised. As a result of poor outpatient care on my parents' behalf, the prematurely exposed glans formed an adhesion with the freshly cut prepuce, resulting in a skin bridge.
The bridge goes from the shaft of my penis to the ridge of the corona. It pulls tight during erection, causing me a sensation very much like poison ivy's itch with sticking your finger in boiling hot water. I have never been able to experience an erection without this constant pain. I cry about it more than I really ought.
My father has known for a while that I have a skin bridge, but I never have had the courage to talk to him about the pain. The few times that I ever bring it up, he becomes dismissive of it, saying "it doesn't really matter. It's just an extra piece of skin."
I am sick of this. Not only for having genitals that have never worked, but never being able to do a damned thing about it happening to me, or to others for that matter. The effect of this grim realization has left me with a sense of indelible pointlessness hovering over my life.
Not anymore.
My predicament, or even this confession leaves a strange sensation in my chest, a weight or a pressure perhaps. I feel as if something that by all means should have been my birthright has been taken from me - the right to even have a say over what is and isn't done to my own body.
I am so sick of this. I want to change things about this very badly, and I know that there are others who are as damaged or even more so than I out there who have not had the tenacity to confess such things. I have observed quietly the things that appear in the media, the news, and I have noticed a major hole in the voices arguing for or against the practice of routine infant circumcision - voices like mine.
To this effect, I am willing to start the cascade.
I am willing to go public with this confession, in a form of media that never disappears and spreads very, very quickly. I am considering confessing such things on a popular video site, my face blurred out for the sake of anonymity. I feel that if someone like me would finally step forward, someone who has been so badly damaged both physically and emotionally by what supposedly is a preventative health measure, [then] so would others. I think that it could be the very thing necessary to start the cascade that could derail routine infant circumcision everywhere.
I thank you for having brought the cause of bodily integrity thus far, and I thank you in being a good resource for people just like me.
Sincerely,
- Xx September 23, 2011
Planning to start a genital integrity movement in Indonesia
Hello,
My, I can't seem to thank you enough. Your intactivist website is pretty much an eye-opener. I've been discussing about circumcision with some of my friends. I had confronted my parents about their circumcision decision. They said I had the balloon thing back then. Now, after some research, I know it's just normal to have balloon down there especially if you're still one y.o..
Right now I'm beginning my restoration. Being in Indonesia, it's hard not to be influenced to be circumcised even though you're not Muslim. My dad even went by himself to get one, although none of our family historically ever circumcise (we're part of the overseas Chinese community).
I've been planning to start a genital integrity movement in Indonesia. Can I use your resources, and can you recommend more materials, maybe?
Sincerely,
- Ray in Indonesia
September 9, 2011
They should be happy and proud to be intact
I was born in NY, and I'm a Greek-American. Today I divide my time between Greece, Serbia and America.
I never gave circumcision much thought while growing up; it's something Greeks don't do, but I never thought much about it. ... But my first lover was Irish, and intact of course, and you know how they say: you never forget your first time. After him, I've dated and slept with circumcised men. It wasn't bad, but it was clumsy and rough, and dry somehow.
Still, I was never particularly vocal on the intactivism, until I started dating my current boyfriend. He's American, but he's intact (he was born in Europe). Unfortunately, he's not happy about it. Privately, he is glad to be intact, but he's also kind of embarrassed about it. There were girls who refused to date him when they learned about him being intact, and they referred to his (amazingly beautiful and perfectly clean) penis as "gross". He even contemplated circumcision when he was 18. But he's still insecure about being intact, and I that's why I started researching for all the info on circumcision, to show him and prove to him how lucky he is and how proud he should be about his penis. That's why I'd love to send a message to all the intact guys (especially younger guys) out there, to tell them how sexy intact penis is, and how they should be happy and proud to be intact.
Also, one more thing: I've noticed absence of female-oriented intactivism sites... sites run by women, with tips on how to, um... approach an intact penis and all the pleasure an intact man can give you. I think women need more tips of those sorts, you know; there are women who'd like to be with an intact man, but are completely clueless about the foreskin. Most of them don't have a clue that foreskin should move, so they try to grab it and fixate it with their hand "so it won't get in the way". Yes, that's a real advice I've read, and I cringed. The sad thing is, the woman seemed genuinely sympathetic and interested in this, but she was just too clueless. That's why I think women should get a proper advice on this matter.
...
- MS in the USA, Greece or Serbia
August 21, 2011
disturbed by brutishness and senselessness
... thanks for the work you've put into [this website] over the years.
Right now I'm feeling a little disturbed by the brutishness and senselessness of my fellow Americans as it is revealed in the circumcision debate stirred up in San Francisco; reading your thoughtful site provides some sense of not-being-alone.
- Aaron, U.S.A. June 15, 2011
I wonder if they'd realize their stupidity
I can not believe the ignorance of some women. I being born in the Netherlands and having come to Canada in 1981 at the age of 17 am not circumcised. While being in Grade 12 high school, I and two other boys were uncircumcised. One Canadian born the other from the UK. The one from the UK had a habit of wearing gym shorts under his sweats. In home class he would stand up and pull his sweats off before the home room teacher arrived. This one day he had forgotten the fact that he had forgotten to put shorts on before leaving home.
After gym, coming into the home room he went through hs usual ritual and pulled his sweats down. He exposed himself in front of the whole class, male and female. While some called ant eater, some of the girls came up to him and actually inspected his penis witha lot of interest.
Later on after having gotten interested with a Canadian girl, I ended up marrying her six moths later. I told her up front prior to getting very serious that I was and am not circumcised. Having grown up with males in her family and relatives being all circumcised, she told me that she was OK with my uncut status. 21 years later, we are still married and have raised two boys who we have kept intact.
Some of the women here complain about a natural penis and want to circumcise all males if they could. I wonder if they'd realize their stupidity if most males would want them to have their vaginas altered. The clit also has a foreskin which can be removed, the labia can be reduced as well. As for the suposed smell of the uncircumcised penis, I have been in judo classes with some females who emitted very strong smells from their nether regions. As a matter of fact the vagina is much harder to keep clean than an uncircumcised penis.
I have experimented with other boys while I was younger, [and] I can assure [you] that the smell of some vaginas is far worse. [This included] oral sex. I can only recall one boy who practised poor hygiene, after retracting his foreskin there was a strong smell. The poor hygiene did not just involve his penis, but the rest of his body as well. During swimming or gym class later on, I noticed several times from seeing him in his underwear or in the process of putting his underwear back on, that he also did not wipe very well after a bowel movement. ... the supposed uncleanliness of the uncircumcised penis is total nonsense.
Most European males are uncircumcised, they still reproduce so an uncut penis cannot be that big of a deal. Hygiene whether male or female does.
- Mike in Alberta, Canada
May 19, 2011
There's never been any problems
After talking with friends who are going to have a baby boy, we told
them
about NOT circumcising him and why. I found your site, sent them to it.
But
I decided to send a note along after reading and viewing a couple of the
interesting vids.
Neither our two sons nor myself are circ'd - and very
glad
of it. I am the only man my wife has "known", though she'd seen teen boys
as
a girl, so she saw a "difference" with me. I had some explaining to do.
When the first boy came along, there was no question about leaving him
intact. As they grew, we taught them proper hygiene. There's never been
any
problems with infections of any kind - ever.
The boys ... now 13 & 15 years of age. ... have asked questions and we answer them honestly - age
appropriately. Though they get teased in the locker room at school, they
know they're the lucky ones.
...
Cordially,
-Alan in U.S.A.
May 2, 2011
I wish I had been given that option
At age 13 I had phimosis and so circumcision was prescribed to take care of it. Besides the
embarrassment of having my mother dress the wound and the pain when urine touched it, at
middle age I developed skin bridges although I didn't know that that was what they were. Since
they didn't cause any effect other than appearance I didn't do anything until I got a yeast infection
under one, because the opening was too small to cleanse and I had to go to an urologist to have
the bridge cauterized and cut (after two shots of deadening substance).
At that time, the urologist noted another [skin bridge] from just below the urethra to the shaft and suggested another procedure would be in order. I eventually pierced it myself and took pleasure in "decorating" it with metal objects until it tore off and so today I have a penis "tassle" or skin flap and no frenlum. I have a friend who was given some salve to cure his phimosis and I wish I had been given that option.
I live in NW AR and wouldn't mind comparing experiences with someone who had similar ones.
Please communicate only by my gmail, and only on this subject. Thank you. This site is tremendous and very educational.
I love your uncut website. ... I'm Jewish and
recently had a baby. ... I did not have my son ...
circumcised. I couldn't be paid to have that barbarity done to my little son. Peace ... .
- Candy Goldberg in New York
April 2, 2011
I don't think they understand
My name is "Mark" I am a Caucasian from Australia and I am going to convert to Islam as of this Sunday. I found your page a relief and a blessing to hear that a muslim is speaking out about this topic. I get the impression from most muslims I have written to that they say I can convert however I feel they look down on the fact I don't wish to be circumcised, they say it is a condition and I should, but not straight away. I don't think they understand what it feels like to be faced with having a part of you cut off at the age of 28 that is perfectly clean and fine just because someone else feels it makes you unclean. I think I am more inclined to get the basic core beliefs and 5 pillars of Islam right before I even worry about cutting off my foreskin after all correct me if I am wrong but isn't Islam about submission to Allah? So while I endeavor to follow as much as what I am told is right by man, my main focus will be on what Allah sees and commands first. Thanks for your site and keep up the good work.
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