For those of you considering circumcision...

[PAXIMPERIA]

Consider getting these three e-mails from your son 21 years later... P.S. I personally wrote these e-mails to my mother. I love her more than anything in this world, which is why I cannot imagine why she did this to me. If you want to know what I really felt after I realized what had been done to me, read the e-mails below. Eventually, every intact boy will accept the beautiful body that god gave him. Just keep in your mind that if you do circumcise your son, he may feel like I have felt (an incomplete, mutilation of his man-hood, and the denial of erotic sensation, with can cause eternal dispair). If you ask a circumcised man if he has pleasure during sex, the answer will be yes. It will be an 8 out of 10. It's always an 8 out of 10. I have attempted reconstruction of my penis and let me assure you that the circumcised penis with an inner foreskin and a moist sensitive glans is at least 5 times better than a penis without. I suspect, although cannot confirm that an uncircumcised penis is 5 times more sensitive than mine (as a conservatively mutilated individual). You never know what you've lost unless you had it to begin with. Read the e-mails.

---

I've been furious over this for the last few years and I need to tell someone. It's abhorrent and disgusting, and usually performed without any anesthesia. The medical reasons are all bullsh*t if you read more than one sentence on anything. It is nothing short of mutilation of the most precious and natural part of being a human being, and I will never get to really experience it. I feel betrayed and violated by both of my parents, and for my own sake, I need you to know that this will bother me until I die. Every day I take a shower it is all I think about. This was stolen from me, and all for absolutely bogus retarded arguments that any sane first year med student would dismiss. I can't wear clothes without constantly feeling uncomfortable. I thought this was normal and apparently it's not. For someone who finished medical school and law school, your ignorance is staggering... Apparently the word "liberty" is not in the constitution, and the hippocratic oath doesn't really exist. You say you believe in protecting helpless children. Well I don't understand how any caring human being could possibly allow this to happen. You have no
idea.

Read this... All of it.
http://norm.org/lost.html

Your son.

---------------------------

answer my g*d damn e-mail...

---------------------------

You don't know the unbeleivable inexcusable damage that you have caused me as a person and as a physical being of this world. If you refuse to acknowledge even the slightest responsibility for my mutilation, than we will not be talking again. I love you, but what you did was inexcusable. You have made a horrible mistake. The most sensual and erotic part of my body has been carelessly and painfully excised from my body and tossed into the trash as a worthless piece of sh*t. My sexuality is gone forever, and I have been denied my birth-right to not be scraped cut and abused with pain that you cannot possibly imagine during your existence in this world. It was my d*mn body and you made my entire life a black-and-white film of what could have been a beautiful colorful and sensual experience. You can believe what you want, but what you did was wrong, unforgivable, disgusting, a violation of every basic tenant of human rights, and a disgrace to the human race. I would rather be dead than accept what you forced upon me as an acceptable part of this existence. You betrayed me in the worst imaginable way. I hate what you did to me. You said you will never get over Paul, well I pray to god that you will never get over this.
...

Goodbye Mom

[~Kira~]

:

[wytchywoman]

:
I made the very poor choice of circing my older son. I am so afraid that this is how he feels too. I have apologized to him through the wazoo and told him it was the biggest %&$# up I have ever made as his mother, without a doubt. I just don't know what else to do.

[njeb]

Have your parents replied to you?

[PAXIMPERIA]

I just wish I knew why this happened to me... I've never been a bad person! I just want to understand why-- I love her so much but I can never forgive her. I want to so bad but I've had a glimpse of what she took away from me. I love her so much... I love her so much I just want to know why-- why this had to happen

I love her! I don't know, my dad doesn't know, no one knows what they've lost, but it's so much-- no one wants to admit what happened to them, and no one wants to admit that there is anything wrong with themselves, its an endless cycle of abuse. it's normal so the boy is abused, he's abused and thinks it's normal. god, i just wish it had happened by accident, or by my own intent.

the most sensitive part of my penis is the inner foreskin. i was lucky and it was left almost entirely intact. in a bris most men are completely stripped of this. i could never imagine what this was like, and i can't help but beleive that i will never know what is like to be intact, just like the man with absolutely no foreskin, will never know what it is like to have an inner foreskin.. i feel cheated and robbed--- just know it is not your fault, but let people know-- foreskin is not skin, it is the male sex organ which is ripped (litterally) away from the penis in an excrutiantingly painful "procedure".

If I have a son I will never let him go what I have been through.

If you really want your son to be circumcised, perform the procedure yourself. I gaurentee that you will collapse in tears just watching him suffer.

[PAXIMPERIA]

No, my parent (I only sent it to my mom, since my dad is circumcised, and would feel inferioir had he known what he was missing... plus it was my mom's decision for "health reasons" and "so I would look like my dad") has not responded. If you are considering it for these reasons please stop! He can always get it done later if he wants

I only wish my parents could have felt the dispair the have caused me. "It's not fair" is a stupid arguement, but I cuold accept my genitals being cut off because of foreign nationals, I could accept my genitals being deformed because of disease... I cannot accept my genitals being deformed because my mom thought it was pretty.

[nini02]

Originally Posted by wytchywoman

:
I made the very poor choice of circing my older son. I am so afraid that this is how he feels too. I have apologized to him through the wazoo and told him it was the biggest %&$# up I have ever made as his mother, without a doubt. I just don't know what else to do.

I think acknowledging it and apologizing is huge, mama. Big hugs for you...

To the OP, I'm so so sorry :

[jserral]

I just wish I knew why this happened to me... I've never been a bad person! I just want to understand why--

Well, the simplest way to answer this is, she thought she was doing what was best for you... or at the very least, didn't think it would harm you. My mom for instance, didn't really like the idea of the procedure, but when she had my older brother (early 80s), it was just what you did, the doctors recommended it and people she knew did it. Yea, she knew it would hurt, but from her perspective, it would be worth it in the long run.

After going through the procedure with my older brother, she regretted it, but again, thought it was for the best. I think she was a bit more against it when I was born, but my dad wanted the procedure done, and since he had the penis (which is intact....), it was done and the same for both my younger brothers.

For you, (i am guessing from your bris comment), your parents also had the religious reasons. I dont agree with forcing religion, but they still thought they were doing what was best according to their faith.

Yea, if my dad thought circ was so great he should have gotten it done, or if they would have realized if I wanted it done I can always get it done later maybe things would be different, but that is what happened. For me, the most annoying part of all this, is what is going on NOW.... why isn't the procedure stopped, that is what needs changed. We know better now and people still do it.

[PAXIMPERIA]

No, my penis was deformed for "medical reasons". Third trimester abortion and neonatal male circumcision are the same to me. Both cause irreparable nerve damage, and excruciating pain. The only difference is one baby is freed into the void while the other is required to live his life, knowing every time he takes a shower that his parents have accidentally (hopefully) violated him in a fundamental and most idiotic way.

[MeepyCat]

I'm leaving circumcision alone in this. I'm going to talk to you about your mother.

What did you hope to get from your mother when you sent her these emails?

I ask because it's not clear to me, reading them, what response you want. You tell her that she hurt you incredibly and caused you unbearable pain, shame, discomfort, and loss of sensation. You say you'd rather be dead than the way you are now (a statement which would have me, as a mother, scrambling to get you into treatment for mental illness). And frankly, when people send me emails about how much I've hurt and betrayed them, complete with threats never to speak to me again, I don't feel that their claims to love me are terribly credible.

It was sweet of you to let your dad off the hook because you don't want to make him feel inferior about the sexual sensation he's missing, but it doesn't seem terribly fair to me. Should he not have protected you? It comes off looking as if you are just determined to beat up on your mother.

You're angry at your mom. That's understandable. You've issued her a bunch of ultimatums. Those never go well.

Your mother made a decision with the information she had at the time. As do we all. Your claim that "any sane first-year med student" would dismiss her reasons for circing is clearly false - all the non-circing mamas here can tell you, in detail, all about the apparently rational, fully qualified DOCTORS who think that circumcision is, at worst, harmless. There's a whole entire recent medical study about how circumcision prevents HIV, which is being used to pressure parents to circumcise. Every time a non-circed boy gets a UTI, his parents can be reasonably certain of hearing that they should get the kid circumcised to fix it. Sane, medically trained people make these recommendations.

Your mother's decision was not made in a vacuum, it was made in a culture imbued with all kinds of systemic violence. This violence is *still* presented, not just to parents, but to everybody, as unavoidable in its specifics. She was probably told (as many parents still are) that uncircumcised boys were doomed to shame and social isolation. She was probably told (as many parents still are) that if her sons were bullied, teased, tortured, that there would be nothing she could do to protect them without stunting their growth. She didn't have better informational resources 21 years ago than the vast majority of mothers (including mothers with medical degrees) have today.

She certainly does not have a perfect source of advice on how to deal with either your pain or your correspondence.

[RachelGS]

I understand the anger, but I don't see where attacking your mom is going to help you here. Chances are she bought the party line that circ was necessary or painless or both. My son is intact, but if I'd had him ten years earlier he wouldn't have been. I simply wouldn't have had the first idea that there was a reason to disbelieve the medical community about this. We all as parents learn as we go. Stories like yours help us learn. Trashing your mom probably doesn't accomplish much, though.

[RachelGS]

I also want to gently suggest that you work through some of your feelings about this before you enter into another sexual relationship. I can imagine that if I had been your partner as a young woman, I might have been very frightened by the vehemence with which you find sex unsatisfying.

I do have enormous sympathy. I wish no babies were EVER circ'd, and I did not and would not do it to my own. And I also want to encourage you to find ways to help your anger not get in the way of pleasure and love, which you deserve in your life.

[PAXIMPERIA]

I don't know... I just want my life back.. I want to know that she could never do such a thing to me. I want to know that society would not encourage her to do such a thing to me. I want to know that people have empathy and care about me. I want to know that soceity would have excruciating empathy with a helpless child that has such a traumatic event forced upon him. I want to know that in this day and age such barbaric practices don't excist, and that I can live my sexual life as a normal human being.

Of course none of these things are true. The world is not fair, babies do not have the same rights as anyone even a year older. I don't want my mom to suffer, I just need someone to know how much they hurt me. I've spent three years saying nothing. I've been in a periodic state of depression. My own selfish sense needs someone to know that they made a mistake.

Sure my dad made a mistake too-- but my dad doesn't really care about anyone. Ironically it is the person I care about most who is the only person who will listen to me, who will feel guilty, and eventually who will alleviate me of the pain I have been holding inside about what was inflicted upon me.

What did you hope to get from your mother when you sent her these emails?

I ask because it's not clear to me, reading them, what response you want. You tell her that she hurt you incredibly and caused you unbearable pain, shame, discomfort, and loss of sensation. You say you'd rather be dead than the way you are now (a statement which would have me, as a mother, scrambling to get you into treatment for mental illness). And frankly, when people send me emails about how much I've hurt and betrayed them, complete with threats never to speak to me again, I don't feel that their claims to love me are terribly credible.

It was sweet of you to let your dad off the hook because you don't want to make him feel inferior about the sexual sensation he's missing, but it doesn't seem terribly fair to me. Should he not have protected you? It comes off looking as if you are just determined to beat up on your mother.

You're angry at your mom. That's understandable. You've issued her a bunch of ultimatums. Those never go well.

Your mother made a decision with the information she had at the time. As do we all. Your claim that "any sane first-year med student" would dismiss her reasons for circing is clearly false - all the non-circing mamas here can tell you, in detail, all about the apparently rational, fully qualified DOCTORS who think that circumcision is, at worst, harmless. There's a whole entire recent medical study about how circumcision prevents HIV, which is being used to pressure parents to circumcise. Every time a non-circed boy gets a UTI, his parents can be reasonably certain of hearing that they should get the kid circumcised to fix it. Sane, medically trained people make these recommendations.

Your mother's decision was not made in a vacuum, it was made in a culture imbued with all kinds of systemic violence. This violence is *still* presented, not just to parents, but to everybody, as unavoidable in its specifics. She was probably told (as many parents still are) that uncircumcised boys were doomed to shame and social isolation. She was probably told (as many parents still are) that if her sons were bullied, teased, tortured, that there would be nothing she could do to protect them without stunting their growth. She didn't have better informational resources 21 years ago than the vast majority of mothers (including mothers with medical degrees) have today.

She certainly does not have a perfect source of advice on how to deal with either your pain or your correspondence.

Above all is the overwhelming sense of loss. This is something that no man who knows what happened to him can truely cure. If he is lucky enough to never realize or recognize what happened to him, then he is exceptionally lucky. However, I beleive that most of us are either in a sense of denial or deep sense of regret. It is the denial that perpetuates the procedure. Despite what some beleive, religion does not alleviate your responcibility to keep your children intact. Medically, the situation is the same. You would not cut off a woman's breast simply because it MAY develop cancer, in the same way that I would hope society and my mom in particular would not cut off part of my penis because it may (1 in 10,000) develop penal cancer. The whole thing is unbeleivably barbaric, and I have yet to meet anyone who has shown me different.

She may have been "dupped by the party line", but it is not her, but I that must live with the consequences of that decision. The sensation is paramount to being raped and for [at least] 50% of your gentials to be cut up and thrown in the trash. If considered, it is a deep and emotional betrayal of the person who is closest to you. I try to not blame anyone for anything, but it is so difficult in the case that the (albeit accidental) betrayer is the person closest to you in this world. It may be more difficult that you realize. Most men never deal with this because they vehemently avoid thinking about the true nature of their circumcision.

[Quirky]

I am so very sorry for your physical losses and your emotional pain.

I have to echo the previous posters, though. I know it hurts tremendously to believe that your mother deliberately hurt you, but I think you have to understand where she was at the time you were born, not where she might be now if she were to have another son. It really is only in the last couple of years with the widespread availability of information on the internet that the truth about circumcision is FINALLY getting out there. For years and years -- generations, really -- ALL the information about circ was positive. It was the rare parent, and the even rarer doctor, who decided against/advised against circumcision. The media, parenting books, medical journals -- all full of the party line about circumcision.

I don't think it's fair to blame your mother for making a bad decision based on bad information, when really -- where was she supposed to get better information?

I also don't think it's fair to let your dad off the hook. If he was fine with his circed status -- why was your mom supposed to figure out that circ was bad?

And in the final analysis, the ones who REALLY deserve the blame are the doctors and our circ-happy society that's been pushing circ for over a hundred years.

As Margaret Mead, the renowned anthropologist, once said -- if a fish were an anthropologist, the last thing it would discover would be water. In other words, if you grow up living and breathing something as truth -- how are you even to know that what you know is true down to your bones might be wrong?

I hope you can find it in your heart to have a real conversation with your mother. It may be incredibly hard for her to admit she and your dad made a terrible mistake, but try to understand -- I am 100% positive she did not deliberately harm you. I am 100% positive she did what she thought was in your best interest, and there was no one and nothing to tell her otherwise.

[MeepyCat]

Originally Posted by PAXIMPERIA

I don't know... I just want my life back.. I want to know that she could never do such a thing to me. I want to know that society would not encourage her to do such a thing to me. I want to know that people have empathy and care about me. I want to know that soceity would have excruciating empathy with a helpless child that has such a traumatic event forced upon him. I want to know that in this day and age such barbaric practices don't excist, and that I can live my sexual life as a normal human being.

Of course none of these things are true. The world is not fair, babies do not have the same rights as anyone even a year older. I don't want my mom to suffer, I just need someone to know how much they hurt me. I've spent three years saying nothing. I've been in a periodic state of depression. My own selfish sense needs someone to know that they made a mistake.

Sure my dad made a mistake too-- but my dad doesn't really care about anyone. Ironically it is the person I care about most who is the only person who will listen to me, who will feel guilty, and eventually who will alleviate me of the pain I have been holding inside about what was inflicted upon me.

You want your life back? Who has it now?

Your mother cannot alleviate your pain at this point. She can't give you your foreskin back. She can't reform your opinion about sex and pleasure and what was done to your body. That is not to say that nothing can be done - I would encourage you to find a therapist with some experience in these issues - but it is not work that your mother can undertake.

[PAXIMPERIA]

I hope you can find it in your heart to have a real conversation with your mother. It may be incredibly hard for her to admit she and your dad made a terrible mistake, but try to understand -- I am 100% positive she did not deliberately harm you. I am 100% positive she did what she thought was in your best interest, and there was no one and nothing to tell her otherwise

I know that she had nothing but good intentions when she ordered it. Still, I can't help but feel a sense of loss. I... part of it is jealousy that my step-brother wil never go through the same thing... try to understand that it is not that I want her to suffer, as much as I need someone to acknowledge my loss. and in case you're still not convinced their is a loss, there most certianly is a loss of way over half of the sexual tissue. I just feel like she should have known better. Had I been in the 1960's I still would never have consented to having anything cut off my newborn baby. Even if I had not had an instintual aversion to this, I would still spend days researching every intricate detail of the procedure. after all, it's going to affect him for the rest of his life?

perhaps (or rather most definately) my view is biased. there is no way I could truely predict what I would have done under the same circumstances. however... it's just not right. i'm frustrated that she just couldn't see that. i believe in evolution, which states that "if it aint broke, don't fix it". I wasn't broke, she "fixed" it anyway. shes got a law degree, and shes a cardiologist. if anyone could understand, she could, and yet she didn't. our society didn't. i have an inevitable anger and i don't know where to place it--

[Papai]

PAXIMPERIA,

I know first-hand about the passion surrounding the anti-circ movement, but wow, you are coming on incredibly strong.

I'm hearing a lot about how you "feel" like your sex life has been stripped of your, your life void of meaning etc. Have you suffered from any real, physical trauma from circ? Like tight erections, skin bridges, skin breaks etc?

Cause if not, I think for your sanity and health, you should recognize that was done to you was wrong, express that to your mother, but move forward with your life.

[thismama]

I think it's interesting, and disheartening, the viciousness that is unleashed upon mothers about this subject, while fathers get off basically scot free.

I would suggest to the OP that you think long and hard about this rage toward your mother, and the ignoring/justifying/minimizing of your father's responsibility in this.

I hear that you feel he would not care about it, and that you are concerned about highlighting his 'deficiency' as he too is circed. But, why use your mother's caring as a lure to unleash this torrent of venom upon her? And why spare your father's feelings, but not your mother's?

[PAXIMPERIA]

If you want to know the truth, I decided to start using moisturizer on the Glans of my penis. After several weeks I noticed that I could not wear underwear without intense discomfort with every step I took. In the shower, the newly sensitive glans hurt even when beads of water hit the tip. However, the orgasms were amazing, like nothing I had ever experienced. This is what made me realize, A. I could never continue what I was doing because it was incredibly painful on a day to day basis (having a sensitized glans exposed), B. that when the glans wasn't exposed, it is extraordinarily sensitive, and C. that the glans and inner foreskin, which are both incredibly sensitive, are not as sesitive as the primary sexual skin in the intact penis, the frenar band. The frenar band is almost always removed during circumcision. The moisturized glans made me realize that there was something intensely special that I was missing, and the lack of all of the other sensitive structures of the penis made me regret and despise my parents decision. Even today, I need to decide between comparatively boring ejaculations to extraordinary ones but constant pain from the abraision with the underwear, all because my mother made this stupid decision 20 years ago. This dilemma will effect me for the remainder of my life-- that is a really, really, really long time for someone who doesn't beleive in the after-life. It's perminant, intensely sexual (as i have found) and if it's intensely sexual it's also invariably intensely painful to walk every step of every day, because the foreskin is not protecting the glans. Keep in mind the glans is only sensitive if it is kept moist using vaseline or another method for several weeks, but it is amazing and intensely stimulating. This has made me wonder what else has been missing all my life due to this surgical "procedure". At least from what I've read, the frenar band is the most sensitive part of a mans penis. It is gone forever, stolen from me at birth, and a distinct pleasure of this life that I will never be able to experience. That is what really bothers me.

By the way, the frenar band is only one of many many nerve endings that all add together to create an enriching (but usually not pre-ejaculatory) sensory extraordinary experience. Most of the sensitive portions of the male penis are lost to circumcisions, there are numerous studies showing that.

[Fyrestorm]

Have you considered restoration? You will be able to maintain that sensitivity while gaining the protection against constant irritation when not in use. Of course it will never give you back all that you lost and will be a poor representation but it may help you in some ways both physically and psychologically.

You might even want to discuss the costs of surgical restoration with your mother AND father. They paid for the surgery to do this in the first place, perhaps you could convince them to contribute to the correction of their mistake.