Intact, yet ignorant.

[guest9921]

I recently asked an intact friend overseas what age he retracted, while asking a specific question relating to my son.

He was very adament that men are retractable from birth, and clearly I would retract him and clean under there everyday for his bath. :

Also, if a man was not able to retract from birth, he had an abnormality - and should be circed.

I sent him links, and articles - he told me I was 'reading too much' and to 'take it from a man who has a foreskin, its never adhered to the glands." :



To top it off, his father is the head of a large hospital in Australia, and he has grown up around the medical establishment his entire life.

What awful misinformation. Wow.
I was flabbergasted that a woman was arguing with an intact man about the functions of the foreskin.

[Papai]

How the heck would he know when he was first able to retract or if he was retractable at birth? LOL! What nonsense.:

[guest9921]

Originally Posted by Papai

How the heck would he know when he was first able to retract or if he was retractable at birth? LOL! What nonsense.:

From my understanding - the age ranges from infancy (rare) to elementary aged (more common) to teen and high school aged, (sometimes.)

I was wondering if he could specifically remember it, if it were painful (seperation trauma), etc (dh is circed, have no other first hand knowledge.)

Anyways - I was quite surprised.

But then again, I know a lot of men/women who believe penises come circumcised.

[klg47]

I knew a family from Italy a couple years ago. They thought that circumcision was silly and unnecessary. However, their typical practice was to try to retract the baby at each diaper change. Not forcefully retract all the way, but work the foreskin around a little to loosen it gradually. I was under the impression that this is how all Italians took care of uncircumcised penii.

[Yulia_R]

Originally Posted by klg47

I knew a family from Italy a couple years ago. They thought that circumcision was silly and unnecessary. However, their typical practice was to try to retract the baby at each diaper change. Not forcefully retract all the way, but work the foreskin around a little to loosen it gradually. I was under the impression that this is how all Italians took care of uncircumcised penii.

Well, I'd email him the circ video and ask that if foreskin isn't attached to the glans why the heck they have to rip it off : ...

[mntnmom]

My intact DH was under the same impression. He doesn't remember becoming retractable, but was very glad for the newer info.
I do generally slide the boys' foreskin back 'til it tightens to get the tip clean though.

[Yulia_R]

Originally Posted by mntnmom

I do generally slide the boys' foreskin back 'til it tightens to get the tip clean though.

It can create micro tears allowing infection in. No one (and that include parents) should mess with foreskin except for the oner of the penis.

[TigerTail]

Originally Posted by mntnmom

I do generally slide the boys' foreskin back 'til it tightens to get the tip clean though.

Would you stretch your dd's clitoral hood up to 'get the tip clean'?
There is nothing cleaner than my kids' intact genitals, & I haven't touched them since diaper changes. Their fingernails are a thousand times dirtier (those require scrubbing daily).

[klg47]

Originally Posted by TigerTail

Would you stretch your dd's clitoral hood up to 'get the tip clean'?

Maybe I should start a thread somewhere else, but how exactly do you care for a baby girl? : I've only changed boys! Do you have to try to get into the folds of the labia and stuff when you change them, or only if poop gets up in there? What about bathing?

[MonicaS]

Originally Posted by klg47

Maybe I should start a thread somewhere else, but how exactly do you care for a baby girl? : I've only changed boys! Do you have to try to get into the folds of the labia and stuff when you change them, or only if poop gets up in there? What about bathing?

I have 3 DDs. I always wiped the outside then spread the labia majora to do a quick check and swipe in case anything got in there. There was poop in there at every BM. Rarely, an explosive poop would send something superficially into/onto(?) their vaginal openings, so I would wipe that to get it out/off. It didn't seem comfortable to not do it. I know it would drive me crazy to have something sitting in there.

Judging by some of the pretty good poops I've seen, I could see how I would want to gently wipe away any poop that may collect in the very superficial bit of bunched foreskin. I wouldn't retract to get it, though. I would just wipe at it gently until the poop was gone. I have changed a few of my friend's intact boys.

[klg47]

So I guess the answer is basically to use common sense and clean off anything you can get to I'm sure my boys must've had explosive poops get all over their foreskins, but we would just do what you described.

[TigerTail]

Swish & swipe . If I felt I needed to dig, I'd do a bath.

[buckeyedoc]

I've seen the recommendation on otherwise sensible medical sites to do a semi-retraction like what mntnmom said and then dab the baby smegma off the tip. I was very surprised to see it, but there it was.

[Yulia_R]

Originally Posted by klg47

So I guess the answer is basically to use common sense and clean off anything you can get to I'm sure my boys must've had explosive poops get all over their foreskins, but we would just do what you described.

My dd is almost 6 m.o. She hasn't been pooping in her diapers since about 2 months at all (she's been doing it in her potty; we're ec-ing) and before that she would just start pooping in her diaper and I'd hold her over the sink and wash with warm water after that, so she never had any poop geting even close to her vagina .

I also have intact son who is 22m.o. now and we were doing the same thing with him when he was a baby, so he had never had any poop even near his penis.
EC rocks!
yulia.

[MCatLvrMom2A&X]

Originally Posted by mntnmom

I do generally slide the boys' foreskin back 'til it tightens to get the tip clean though.

By doing that you are in fact retracting. If you read the sticky at the top of the main CAC page "The Definition of Retraction and Why it is BAD" you can see this does indeed fall under the heading of retraction and should never be done. Why because there is no way to know how much is to much.


The foreskin is a self cleaning organ if anything is in there that needs to come out the urine will wash it out. Or a simple swish in the tub will get it out. Please stop doing this to your son. It is so not needed and can cause major issues for him down the road. In the form of scar tissue on the sphincter that the tip of the foreskin is made up of. Making it to were it isnt stretchy any more.

I know you dont mean to do anything that would hurt him and didnt think it would but it can and isnt worth the risk.

[AntoninBeGonin]

:

One of my friends is from South America and her intact husband is from Europe. Their son is intact. She was retracting him in the same way the previous poster mentioned and he ended up having an infection. She cured it with some type of sitz bath (circ' wasn't even mentioned) and then talked to me about it. I explained proper care and the little guy hasn't had any problems since.

[mntnmom]

Originally Posted by TigerTail

Would you stretch your dd's clitoral hood up to 'get the tip clean'?
There is nothing cleaner than my kids' intact genitals, & I haven't touched them since diaper changes. Their fingernails are a thousand times dirtier (those require scrubbing daily).

Not the tip of the glans!! I'm sorry if that's what it sounded like. The "tip" where the foreskin folds over. i don't know if we just aren't understanding each other.
And yes, when my daughter was covered in fecal matter I gently moved what I could without being invasive. If that wasn't enough, I put her in the bath...just like my sons.

[TigerTail]

no, i got what you meant, i just don't poke around. well, on kids' genitals.

[buckeyedoc]

mntnmom - I think I know what you mean. My older DS has a long foreskin that far overhangs the tip of his penis and kind of folds in on itself so that the actual tip opening is adherent to his penis but the rest of it hangs freely past the penis. I could manipulate the part that hangs freely to clean it off (if needed) without retracting anything still attached to his penis or stressing the opening, KWIM? It's like an empty sock with the toe telescoped back inside. My younger DS, on the other hand, has no overhang and completely adherent foreskin so that I would not be able to manipulate it at all.

[mntnmom]

Originally Posted by buckeyedoc

mntnmom - I think I know what you mean. My older DS has a long foreskin that far overhangs the tip of his penis and kind of folds in on itself so that the actual tip opening is adherent to his penis but the rest of it hangs freely past the penis. I could manipulate the part that hangs freely to clean it off (if needed) without retracting anything still attached to his penis or stressing the opening, KWIM? It's like an empty sock with the toe telescoped back inside. My younger DS, on the other hand, has no overhang and completely adherent foreskin so that I would not be able to manipulate it at all.

Yes, that's exactly what I mean.