Did you get your son circumcised?

[Anonymous]

17:11, good for you for getting your son to an actual physician who could provide the care he needs. I do not believe you need to answer to the nutjob PPs who have never met your son and think they know better.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:17:11, good for you for getting your son to an actual physician who could provide the care he needs. I do not believe you need to answer to the nutjob PPs who have never met your son and think they know better.

But, THE PHYSICIANS WERE WRONG about this case. This is exactly the issue we are all banging our heads against the wall with this. We have a few generations of MISINFORMED medical professionals, due to a vast cultural bias which demonizes and incorrectly treats the foreskin.

A diagnosis of adhesions CANNOT BE MADE for a three year old intact boy. It is medically impossible due to the fact that at that age, the foreskin is SUPPOSED to still be adhered to the glans - as it is at birth. Very gradually, the foreskin naturally loosens -- this can happen before age three, but it might also not be until age 13 or even beyond. Many doctors have false information about the foreskin, and start instructing parents to retract; or they themselves try to retract while examining the penis, ultimately causing the exact problems they think they are trying to prevent. Knowing what I know about the foreskin and the intact penis does not make me a "nutjob" - it makes me well-informed about an issue that people (including many doctors) know far too little about.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:
Sarcasm aside, suitable as it may be for this argument, do you have any actual data or reason (based on evidence) to believe that families who circumcise are less likely to breastfeed? Care to share sources? Preferably the ones that have nothing to do with your opinion.

I'm not the pp you quoted but I don't think she stated that families who circ are less likely to breastfeed -- just that many don't. Many who don't circ also don't breastfeed, I'm sure.

Her point was that if one was examining the studies that suggest the potential for a lower likelihood of UTI in the first year of life (perhaps, the study is flawed, as a pp mentioned), and choose to remove a functional part of their son's body to decrease this risk, perhaps they should consider breastfeeding, which doesn't cost anyone a body part.

Thank you, PP. That is exactly what I meant.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:17:11, good for you for getting your son to an actual physician who could provide the care he needs. I do not believe you need to answer to the nutjob PPs who have never met your son and think they know better.

But, THE PHYSICIANS WERE WRONG about this case. This is exactly the issue we are all banging our heads against the wall with this. We have a few generations of MISINFORMED medical professionals, due to a vast cultural bias which demonizes and incorrectly treats the foreskin.

A diagnosis of adhesions CANNOT BE MADE for a three year old intact boy. It is medically impossible due to the fact that at that age, the foreskin is SUPPOSED to still be adhered to the glans - as it is at birth. Very gradually, the foreskin naturally loosens -- this can happen before age three, but it might also not be until age 13 or even beyond. Many doctors have false information about the foreskin, and start instructing parents to retract; or they themselves try to retract while examining the penis, ultimately causing the exact problems they think they are trying to prevent. Knowing what I know about the foreskin and the intact penis does not make me a "nutjob" - it makes me well-informed about an issue that people (including many doctors) know far too little about.

What makes you a nutjob is your apparent belief that PP should put her child's health care in the hands of an anonymous DCUM poster with an agenda instead of a presumably licensed and certified physician, who has completed years of training and continuing ed in this field.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:17:11, good for you for getting your son to an actual physician who could provide the care he needs. I do not believe you need to answer to the nutjob PPs who have never met your son and think they know better.

But, THE PHYSICIANS WERE WRONG about this case. This is exactly the issue we are all banging our heads against the wall with this. We have a few generations of MISINFORMED medical professionals, due to a vast cultural bias which demonizes and incorrectly treats the foreskin.

A diagnosis of adhesions CANNOT BE MADE for a three year old intact boy. It is medically impossible due to the fact that at that age, the foreskin is SUPPOSED to still be adhered to the glans - as it is at birth. Very gradually, the foreskin naturally loosens -- this can happen before age three, but it might also not be until age 13 or even beyond. Many doctors have false information about the foreskin, and start instructing parents to retract; or they themselves try to retract while examining the penis, ultimately causing the exact problems they think they are trying to prevent. Knowing what I know about the foreskin and the intact penis does not make me a "nutjob" - it makes me well-informed about an issue that people (including many doctors) know far too little about.

You are a certifiable nut job that needs to stop posting. As pp said I dont care how much "research" you have done inside your own pea sized brain... Unless you are a doctor shut up and leave ppl interested in making their own choices alone! Or in the case of your dumb posts the pp who already made her decision that you do rudely are insulting.

you don't sound too smart yourself...

[Anonymous]

Haha pp nice attempt at s "comeback"... Nut job

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:17:11, I'm sorry, but that makes no sense. An intact boy doesn't "develop adhesions" at the age of 3, he retains adhesions, as it were. They're normal at birth and yes, still at 3, and resolve at some point before puberty. Spraying means the separation process had begun and he was on his way toward retraction.

I have come across the same PP on other circumcision threads. She admitted on a previous thread that the doctor retracted her son's foreskin which we all know can cause adhesions. I don't understand why she doesn't point this fact out on any of these threads. She acts like her son had problems because he wasn't circumcised when really an ignorant doctor caused the problems. Intact penises do not just grow abnormal adhesions for no reason.

[Anonymous]

My son's doctor told us that we absolutely had to get him surgery because his foreskin did not retract before age six. We got a second opinion and found out that the average age when the foreskin retracts is 10 years. Many doctors are seriously misinformed about uncircumcised boys. Now that he is 7, his foreskin retracts on his own. No unnecessary surgery.

[Anonymous]

More than being glad about not circumcising my son, this thread is really making me glad to have a good pediatrician who knows how to care for an intact boy.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:
The same applies to HIV studies. Yes, the earlier studies were flawed and thus not valid. But again, not necessarily wrong--new studies are needed. Some are apparently underway with promising results; I haven't researched this extensively, but a quick search led me to this article:
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article.cfm?id=circumcision-penis-microbiome-hiv-infection&page=2
(And OF COURSE I will teach my son to wear a condom, but any extra prevention is good in my book. I also plan to teach any daughters to insist on condoms, but I will still give them the HPV vaccine.)

I do agree that more education is vital regarding care of the uncirced penis, and that parents of intact children remain vigilant against early retraction to prevent problems.

My son did not have any problems with his penis, intact or not. His problems were all internal; reducing his chance of future UTIs was critical, and so based on the new research I linked above, it was recommended that we have him circed, so we did. But he did not have any problems with his foreskin, from poor care or anything else.

I breastfed exclusively for 6 months, and continued for over a year, and am offended at your insinuation. I highly doubt you can show ANY correlation between breastfeeding rates and circumcision rates, so you need to stop making that claim.

Lastly, I never, ever said we should circ all babies. I don't even think it is always better. I think it is a very close call, and given that I still haven't seen any evidence of widespread harm from the procedure (and you'd think we'd have enough data at this point to determine that), I only wish the option to be available to all parents to make the choice that is right for them without being demonized.

I have no problem with people who choose not to circumcise their sons, for whatever reason.

I have a problem with people who throw around outright insults or use false logic to make spurious and insulting claims and insinuations about my opinions, intelligence, education, love for my child, breastfeeding status, etc. It doesn't help your case.

But, I strongly suspect that I will never change your mind, whatever evidence or arguments I present. To you, I am barbaric, and that's the bottom line. I'm sorry.

The HIV studies you are referencing are among the several different studies I was referring to. There are simply no current conclusions that go beyond the conclusion that circumcision does anything but reduce female to male transmission of HIV in a very specific environment. Even that conclusion is premature since there was no accounting for the period of abstinence. Newer studies have not been completed. The older studies were never completed, either.

The studies on UTI have been refuted as well, however, I don't think they need to be refuted so much as put into context. You say the risks of circ are rare. The risk that your child will be hospitalized with a very severe UTI that damages the kidneys to the degree your child was damaged is also EXTREMELY rare. So you can lop off part of the penis as prevention, but I'm among those who say it's the same as saying you can cut off both breasts to reduce your chance of breast cancer. This may make sense if you're certain (or likely) to get breast cancer, or if there was NO use for the breasts or if the procedure carried no risks. But with circumcision, none of that is true. The risk of death is low, but the risk of side-effect is high. Higher, by the way, than the chances of reducing UTI (even if we accept the studies you submit without objection). So, you should be well equated with false logic and spurious claims, given all that.

As far as my flinging insults around, you misunderstood (deliberately, I suspect) my statement about breastfeeding. I specifically said I was not talking about you. Nor did I at any point say there was a correlation between lack of breastfeeding and circumcision. There might be, but that's not my point nor is it something I pretend to know. My point, as PP already explained, is that there is already one proven way to greatly reduce UTI's, and as PP said, it does not cost a body part.

I have actually tried to be fairly nuanced in my discussion, haven't flung insults. I believe with all of my heart that the ritual is barbaric. I didn't say you were barbaric. You tell yourself that it' doesn't hurt, that baby can't remember it, it's for his own good. I think in order to circ, people have to either convince themselves that somehow their 2 day old baby cannot actually feel part of its penis being ripped off with only superficial pain blockers, or tell themselves the benefits are greatly exaggerated from the real benefits. Otherwise, how could you do it?

[Anonymous]

Are most competent peds really that ignorant about how to treat an uncircd boy? Best reason on this thread for circing.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:My son's doctor told us that we absolutely had to get him surgery because his foreskin did not retract before age six. We got a second opinion and found out that the average age when the foreskin retracts is 10 years. Many doctors are seriously misinformed about uncircumcised boys. Now that he is 7, his foreskin retracts on his own. No unnecessary surgery.

A woman on another listserv told a scary warning story to a bunch of moms about how her son's foreskin wouldn't retract when he was 7, so he had to be circumcised then. It made me so angry on her behalf, but also on her child's behalf. Who doesn't do further research? She must not have even thought about a second opinion. Poor kid - it is completely normal for a foreskin to still not fully retract by that time. But on the other side, it's totally unbelievable that moms have to second guess doctors because they don't know what to do with an intact penis. Just terrible all around.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are most competent peds really that ignorant about how to treat an uncircd boy? Best reason on this thread for circing.

Yes, they are.

Most peds are also very ignorant about BFing. So does this mean we should all FF?

[Anonymous]

My ped didn't have much to say about bf, other than he preferred it. For help with bf, I would talk to a consultant or gyn. Why would you need bfing advice from your ped?

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:Are most competent peds really that ignorant about how to treat an uncircd boy? Best reason on this thread for circing.

Yes, they are.

Most peds are also very ignorant about BFing. So does this mean we should all FF?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:Are most competent peds really that ignorant about how to treat an uncircd boy? Best reason on this thread for circing.

Really? If your physician didn't know how to care for a part of your body, would you alter it accordingly? How silly.