Tight v. Loose circ

[KBecks]

I don't quite understand tight vs. loose circ and I don't know how tight or loose my boys are. Not that I can do anything about it, but I'm curious.

Any help?

[Quirky]

It's just a question of how much foreskin is taken off. As you know there's no magic dotted line to tell the doc "cut here," but doctors vary in how far down the penile shaft they go in removing the foreskin. Many adult men, like my dh , have very tight circs with no remaining skin mobility during erection, and it can result in the penis bowing to one side, or pubic hair being drawn up onto the erection, even skin splitting during erections because there's not enough skin to accommodate the erection.

So doctors these days appear to be doing looser circs and taking much less off, to prevent these problems. Which of course results in another set of problems -- adhesions from the remnant foreskin trying to heal itself by readhering to the glans, hygiene issues, parents getting their poor kids recirced "because they didn't take enough off," etc.

There's no right way to do a wrong thing, but at least the boys with loose circs will have more skin to work with later on, assuming they can avoid the recircing that seems to be fairly common these days.

[calngavinsmom]

Looser circ=more foreskin spared. Tighter circ=less or no foreskin spared. Basically, a "loose" circ will have some coverage or overhang of the foreskin over the glans of the penis. In a tight circ, there will be no overhang of the remnant foreskin over the glans.

Tight or loose are terms refering to the appearance of the penis, as in the skin looks tight or smooth in a tight circ, whereas it has a loose or bunched up look in a loose circ.

Hopefully, your boys have the loose variation, as it will make it easier for them to restore when they are older.

Take care,
Tara

[mamazee]

It's always been my opinion that circumcision status doesn't effect sexual ability much if any, but now I wonder if that's because the circumcised men I've slept with have for the most part had "loose circs". The only man I ever had trouble with didn't have enough skin left and skin was pulled up from his scrotum area when he had an erection. Maybe that's just a "tight circ"?

Except for that one man, the other circumcised men I've slept with have still had a bit of skin that was up around the head of their penises when they were flaccid. Not as much as a man who isn't circumcised though - the men I've been with who weren't circumcised had enough skin that you couldn't see any of the head of the penis when flaccid.

I haven't slept with enough men to have any kind of scientific study, and I'm still learning.

[KBecks]

I can't tell if my boys are tight or loose. Both have skin that bunches around their glans a bit but I can't tell if it's shaft skin or foreskin, I don't know much about foreskin.

I'd say what looks like their shaft skin widens out like a bell.

I'm hoping they are loose but I have no idea really. If I stretch them out to have a look, I can see the bottom of the glans so I guess that might mean they are tight.

I was looking at my husband's circ'd penis last night! and I always thought the scar was right under the head of the glans, as it appears to be on my boys, but it looks like his scar is further down on the shaft.

OK, now I feel weird for taking about penises so much!

[guestmama9908]

I read somewhere that the closer the scar is to the glans the more foreskin was removed? Does anybody know if that is true?

[mean_jeannie]

Said Quirky:

parents getting their poor kids recirced "because they didn't take enough off"

Egads! RE-CIRC?! This world is quite crueler than I thought. Yes, the loose circ causes my son's penis to look extremely wrinkly, like there's a little sharpei down there. It's my only consolation. I hope your boys are loose, too.

[KBecks]

Side note on too tight circs -- I have seen men whose penises bowed or hooked during erection, a problem caused by circ, and unfortunately that does make intercourse more difficult.

[Past_VNE]

Originally Posted by CalenandEllasmomma

I read somewhere that the closer the scar is to the glans the more foreskin was removed? Does anybody know if that is true?

Yes, the closer to the glans that the scar is located, the lesser inner foreskin the boy/man has remaining. As far as what that means for him, the less inner foreskin remaining, the less sensitivity he will have compared to what he would have had. The inner foreskin is a very sensitive area, and often is the circumcised male's most pleasurable area. If the scar is high up, closer to the body, the man has more inner foreskin and less/no outer foreskin/shaft skin.

Did that make any sense? I can see it in my head, but don't know if I'm describing it clearly or not.

Here's a page that can help make sense of it. The more the foreskin is drawn back, the more inner foreskin you see. Penis photos: http://www.foreskin.org/3zones-c.htm

[Bm31]

Originally Posted by mamazee

The only man I ever had trouble with didn't have enough skin left and skin was pulled up from his scrotum area when he had an erection. Maybe that's just a "tight circ"?

If you had trouble with it, try to imagine what it's like for the penis owner.

[mamazee]

Oh I know. He was miserable and very embarrassed.

[Yulia_R]

Originally Posted by KBecks

Side note on too tight circs -- I have seen men whose penises bowed or hooked during erection, a problem caused by circ, and unfortunately that does make intercourse less fun, IMO.

Unfortunately, sex is less fun even with perfectly preformed circ. Started as a cure for masturbation it didn't stop it, but definitely made it less pleasurable as it did sex .

1. Ridged band and Frenulum are THE MOST sensitive parts of the penis are removed by circ http://www.icgi.org/touch-test/touch-test-article.pdf
http://www.icgi.org/touch-test/ .

2. Skin of the glans becomes thick, rough (the prosess of keratinization that makes the glans to loose quite of sensitivity) due to being rubbed against underwear (the same way it does on your feet); dry (so a man can't really have sex or masturbate without artificial lubricant). On the other hand intact men do not need it at all. Foreskin slides up and down the shaft of the penis providing an easy and smooth penetration, lubrication and additional pleasure for both partners.

3. Permanent emotional scar. While full permanent psychological impact of circumcision is still mostly unknown, it’s logical to assume that just like any extremely painful http://www.cnn.com/HEALTH/9712/23/ci...on.anesthetic/ and traumatic event—even if forgotten—it can lead to a permanent emotional/psychological scar/damage.
There has been also a study that proved that intact boys and girls have higher thresholds of pain than circumcised boys. It was published in the Lancet (British medical journal) in 1997.

4.Even a perfectly performed circumcision does not guarantee that a person will not have more serious (beyond the mentioned above) problems in his future sexual life. Such problems as, for example, too tight (sometimes even painful) erections can be due to removal of too much foreskin and whatever left over just not enough to accommodate a normal erection are much more common than many people think since it’s nearly impossible to know for sure how much is “too much” until the penis reaches its full-grown size. Removal of too much foreskin can also lead to a shaft of the penis being hairy (it pulls skin from above to more or less accommodate an erection).

5. Worth while mentioning most recent scientists discovery that Langerhans cells that are present in the foreskin are behave as ‘natural barrier’ to HIV. Bellow are the links.

http://body.aol.com/news/articles/_a...28234109990019
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn...030500357.html
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/entrez/q..._uids=17334373
http://www.womenshealth.gov/news/english/602421.htm

yulia.

[Tinker]

My dh is circed but, has enough skin that it can be pulled up to cover about half the glans when erect. I have know idea where his circ scar is. What does this mean for him? Did I explain that right, does it make sense?

[mamazee]

2. Skin of the glans becomes thick, rough (the prosess of keratinization that makes the glans to loose quite of sensitivity) due to being rubbed against underwear (the same way it does on your feet); dry (so a man can't really have sex or masturbate without artificial lubricant). On the other hand intact men do not need it at all. Foreskin slides up and down the shaft of the penis providing an easy and smooth penetration, lubrication and additional pleasure for both partners.

I have no doubt this is true in some cases, and I have seen this in a couple of cases, but it isn't true for every man who is circumcised. I've never needed to use artificial lubricant with my husband, and he doesn't need it to masturbate or if I manually stimulate him. But he does have enough skin left that there's lots of sliding of skin along his shaft. Also, the skin of his glans isn't thick or rough. And I have had sex with uncirc'd men, including a relationship that lasted two years, so I have some basis for comparison. I wouldn't say anything about my disagreement except your preface seems to indicate that what follows is true for all circumcised men regardless of how "well" it was done. Of course, there's no way for someone to know at the time of circumcision how badly the child will be effected when he reaches sexual maturity. So even if it were less than half of circumcised men, who would want to take that chance? And why on earth would anyone make a gamble like that?

I can't disagree with the rest though. Especially that part about not knowing until sexual maturity how much skin will be needed to accommodate an erection at all. This is what boggles my mind about routine circumcision most. How can anyone possibly think they will know how large a boy's erections will be at the age of two days? It's ridiculous.

And my husband definitely has a low tolerance for pain. It never occurred to me that there could be some relationship.

I read in a book about Australia that in Australia circumcision became popular in WWII because Australian men sent to Europe sometimes contracted STDs, and the British doctors would circumcise them, largely to punish them, and then they'd go back home and their wives would wonder why they'd been circumcised, so they'd tell their wives that it was impossible to keep clean enough in wartime conditions so they'd had to be circumcised for their health. Then, when they had kids, the wives wanted their boys to be circumcised because they were afraid of that happening to them at some point.

[mean_jeannie]

Originally Posted by Yulia_R

4.Even a perfectly performed circumcision does not guarantee that a person will not have more serious (beyond the mentioned above) problems in his future sexual life. Such problems as, for example, too tight (sometimes even painful) erections can be due to removal of too much foreskin and whatever left over just not enough to accommodate a normal erection are much more common than many people think since it’s nearly impossible to know for sure how much is “too much” until the penis reaches its full-grown size. Removal of too much foreskin can also lead to a shaft of the penis being hairy (it pulls skin from above to more or less accommodate an erection).

so much for my previous post.

[phatchristy]

Originally Posted by mean_jeannie

Said Quirky:

Egads! RE-CIRC?! This world is quite crueler than I thought. Yes, the loose circ causes my son's penis to look extremely wrinkly, like there's a little sharpei down there. It's my only consolation. I hope your boys are loose, too.

This is the thing...whether they have a "loose" circ is something that you can't really guage either until they are erect and see how much mobile skin is left.

You see, my DH (using the sharpei analogy) would look like that. He has a tremendous amount of wrinkled skin down there, so you'd think he was loosely circ'd, right? Well, some men are "growers" and when erect they grow way over 50%. So, the plethora of loose skin that he had when flaccid COMPLETELY disappeared when erect and sadly his skin was tight as a drum when erect. In general, the more mobile skin during an erection the better (and the looser).

He did start restoration last year, and thankfully all of this has improved .

[mean_jeannie]

Originally Posted by phatchristy

This is the thing...whether they have a "loose" circ is something that you can't really guage either until they are erect and see how much mobile skin is left.

You see, my DH (using the sharpei analogy) would look like that. He has a tremendous amount of wrinkled skin down there, so you'd think he was loosely circ'd, right? Well, some men are "growers" and when erect they grow way over 50%. So, the plethora of loose skin that he had when flaccid COMPLETELY disappeared when erect and sadly his skin was tight as a drum when erect. In general, the more mobile skin during an erection the better (and the looser).

He did start restoration last year, and thankfully all of this has improved .

Yes, I was just trying to think about that after reading Yulia's post. Not that I want to be thinking about ds's erections but somehow . . . oh well, I'm sure y'all understand!

As for dh, must get together some restoration literature!