Rethinking Circumcision for my son...

[Anonymous]

Another husband here.

I second 19:28 mostly (there are some studies showing reduced HIV for circumcised males, but that case is not closed yet).

But seriously, don't worry, because your child is growing up in a different generation. In our generation (depending on your age) 80 to 85% of males were circumcised. So yes, in your college days, some guys may have been teased on occasion. But now about half of American male babies are uncircumcised. That means that whichever way you choose, your boy will look like about half of the other boys and no one is going to care.

Here is some modestly reliable data:

http://www.cirp.org/library/statistics/USA/

[Anonymous]

Go dads. It's great to have their perspective on this.

[Anonymous]

Another dad chiming in:

I'm intact (not circumcised) and I was born and raised in the USA. I never had any problems, no teasing, and I dated and am now married.

OP, you seem to have your own issues going on. Don't project them onto your child. He is perfectly fine the way he is, there's no reason to regret a thing.

Seriously, the idea that we have in American society that men are not desirable or worthy unless they've had a knife taken to their penises is sick.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:its not healthy or cleaner to be circed .... the medical assiation has even withdrew then recommendation to circ

Well if your son turns out to have a kidney condition like mine then it is considered to be cleanier and healthier to be circed. It helps prevent UTIs.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:its not healthy or cleaner to be circed .... the medical assiation has even withdrew then recommendation to circ

Well if your son turns out to have a kidney condition like mine then it is considered to be cleanier and healthier to be circed. It helps prevent UTIs.

No one is criticizing your choices for your unique situation.

[Anonymous]

Well if your son turns out to have a kidney condition like mine then it is considered to be cleanier and healthier to be circed. It helps prevent UTIs.

Funny how no doctor ever recommends circumcising baby girls to help treat their kidney problems. Funny how other developed countries in the world don't recommend circumcising baby girls OR baby boys to treat infections, kidney problems, redness or swollen genitals. The truth is that in most cases there are ways of treating such things that do not involve removal of part of the genitals -- it's only the United States that can't seem to figure out the way to handle and treat boys with foreskins. Similarly, it's only the United States that (mistakenly) believes, as a society, that the foreskin is extraneous, useless and potentially dangerous skin. Doesn't this strike anyone else as problematic?

OP -- leave your son alone. It's his body and he has the right to decide if he wants to remove his foreskin or not. There's really no need to project your sexual preferences onto him. Help him feel great about his body, and he will ultimately make the choice that is best for him.

[Anonymous]

No one is criticizing your choices for your unique situation.

I'm the PP, and even though I (obviously) don't support circumcision in most instances, I just wanted to say that I agree with this. I would never criticize a parent for making a decision about circumcision when there are other medical issues present -- even though I do think that there are usually other ways to treat the problems.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Well if your son turns out to have a kidney condition like mine then it is considered to be cleanier and healthier to be circed. It helps prevent UTIs.

Funny how no doctor ever recommends circumcising baby girls to help treat their kidney problems. Funny how other developed countries in the world don't recommend circumcising baby girls OR baby boys to treat infections, kidney problems, redness or swollen genitals. The truth is that in most cases there are ways of treating such things that do not involve removal of part of the genitals -- it's only the United States that can't seem to figure out the way to handle and treat boys with foreskins. Similarly, it's only the United States that (mistakenly) believes, as a society, that the foreskin is extraneous, useless and potentially dangerous skin. Doesn't this strike anyone else as problematic?

OP -- leave your son alone. It's his body and he has the right to decide if he wants to remove his foreskin or not. There's really no need to project your sexual preferences onto him. Help him feel great about his body, and he will ultimately make the choice that is best for him.

Ok, the Dr didn't recommend that this be done to treat his condition, he just said that it was better for his condition that he was cicumcised. What is problematic is your jumping to conclusions about this....I was just trying to provide knowledge from an actual Dr about cases where this is considered cleaner and healthier.

[Anonymous]

Ok, the Dr didn't recommend that this be done to treat his condition, he just said that it was better for his condition that he was cicumcised. What is problematic is your jumping to conclusions about this....I was just trying to provide knowledge from an actual Dr about cases where this is considered cleaner and healthier.

I'm not sure that there is a huge difference between "recommending" and "thinking it would be better" but alas, no need to split hairs here. Aside from that, what did you think of the larger point that I was making? The fact remains that in no other country on the planet would a doctor think that circumcision makes a child cleaner or healthier, regardless of any other health factors that do or do not exist. It baffles me that my fellow intelligent Americans do not see the extreme cultural bias regarding this issue. It has nothing to do with health, cleanliness, disease, etc. It's just a cultural preference, which our doctors invent medical "proof" for.

[Anonymous]

OP here, thanks to everyone who responded, kindly or not. I knew I would get the militant anti-circ responses of course. In my defense, I feel like perhaps I dwelled too much on the sexual stuff in my original post and not the other concerns I have (kidney infections, STDs etc) because the statistics can be interpreted very differently -- well, this study was done in sub-Saharan Africa and this study well, let's discount that because blahblah.

But I also feel compelled to add that I am not "projecting" my own sexual issues onto my son.

As any mother does, I want him to grow up happy and secure with his own body. That's all I want for my kid. After all, I only have my own sexual experiences from which to draw. Doesn't every mother question her decisions? Conversely, can't a parent who opted for circumcision think about whether she is somehow impairing or mitigating his sexual pleasure. In honesty, I don't think I could put my son through the trauma and pain of the procedure. But my original post was about wondering if there were other mothers who felt the same way -- felt they made a bad choice, which didn't seem to be the case.
Thanks again. This was helpful.

[Anonymous]

I've only skimmed through the responses, but we decided to circumcise our DB and I sometimes wonder if it was the right decision also.

DB is one month old, and we struggled with the decision before he was born for my whole pregnancy. DH is circumcised, but we watched the videos online of infant circumcision and read all the anti-circ info. Even up to the last minute in the hospital, we were both considering not doing it.

Our reasons for doing it were -

1) DH is circ'ed and he never missed his foreskin. He never even realized that he was circ'ed until he was older.

2) My dad isn't and as he's gotten older, he's had some issues. His doctor said that if anything happens again (e.g. infection), it might be in his best interest to get circumcised. Not something he's looking forward to at his age.

3. I had a cousin who needed to be circ'ed at the age of 4. Like a pp said, I definitely think that's worse than as a baby.

I say all that to say that I remind myself of those reasons whenever I doubt our decision. So, whatever your reasons were for circumcising, maybe just remind yourself of those.

I agree that every mother questions her decisions. I sure do every day, even about the smallest things! I hope you're able to feel better about your decision. I'm sure that you did what you thought was in DB's best interest, and that's very important.

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Ok, the Dr didn't recommend that this be done to treat his condition, he just said that it was better for his condition that he was cicumcised. What is problematic is your jumping to conclusions about this....I was just trying to provide knowledge from an actual Dr about cases where this is considered cleaner and healthier.

I'm not sure that there is a huge difference between "recommending" and "thinking it would be better" but alas, no need to split hairs here. Aside from that, what did you think of the larger point that I was making? The fact remains that in no other country on the planet would a doctor think that circumcision makes a child cleaner or healthier, regardless of any other health factors that do or do not exist. It baffles me that my fellow intelligent Americans do not see the extreme cultural bias regarding this issue. It has nothing to do with health, cleanliness, disease, etc. It's just a cultural preference, which our doctors invent medical "proof" for.

It is reasonable to circumcise or not to circumcise, and I'm not trying to push an agenda. But the above statement is not true The best research is showing that circumcision reduces the risk of contracting and passing on STD's, particularly HIV. Lots of studies exist on this, but the best are a pair of controlled studies in Africa, where one group of subjects were circumcised and one group not. In those studies, circumcised males contracted HIV at half the rate of the uncircumcised males This corroborated other observations within populations of circumcised and uncircumcised men in Africa. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16184582/

These results were a bombshell to the researchers. They had to halt the study because the results were so compelling that they believed it was unethical to continue the study because the uncircumcised group was at such clear risk.

Now WHO and UNAIDS are recommending circumcision campaigns. http://aids.immunodefence.com/2007/03/who_support_male_circumcision.html Also, Rwanda has launched a circumcision campaign.

Here is what CDC has to say: http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/factsheets/circumcision.htm Note that this also mentions a lower rate of transmission of other STDs, including HPV.

Now I'm not trying to get everyone wrapped around the axle over HIV or STD's. Circumcise or don't. But seriously, it's not right to throw around claims like this when the epidemiologists are going nuts over the circumcision study data and the press is so full of articles saying that international bodies are pushing circumcision.

[Anonymous]

My husband was circumcised at age 9. He remembers not wanting his underwear to touch his penis-but it healed quickly. We had our son circumcised when he was 3 days, and he was given a numbing ointment. He didn't cry. I didn't want to be in the room, but my husband was there.

We basically did it because we didn't want him to be ridiculed in school. Kids can be cruel! I didn't realize that so many babies weren't getting circumcised these days-but I don't regret our decision. We never vasilated over whether or not to circumcise while I was pregnant-I guess that's why I didn't realize that the trend was to not circumcise!

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:

Anonymous wrote:

Ok, the Dr didn't recommend that this be done to treat his condition, he just said that it was better for his condition that he was cicumcised. What is problematic is your jumping to conclusions about this....I was just trying to provide knowledge from an actual Dr about cases where this is considered cleaner and healthier.

I'm not sure that there is a huge difference between "recommending" and "thinking it would be better" but alas, no need to split hairs here. Aside from that, what did you think of the larger point that I was making? The fact remains that in no other country on the planet would a doctor think that circumcision makes a child cleaner or healthier, regardless of any other health factors that do or do not exist. It baffles me that my fellow intelligent Americans do not see the extreme cultural bias regarding this issue. It has nothing to do with health, cleanliness, disease, etc. It's just a cultural preference, which our doctors invent medical "proof" for.

It is reasonable to circumcise or not to circumcise, and I'm not trying to push an agenda. But the above statement is not true The best research is showing that circumcision reduces the risk of contracting and passing on STD's, particularly HIV. Lots of studies exist on this, but the best are a pair of controlled studies in Africa, where one group of subjects were circumcised and one group not. In those studies, circumcised males contracted HIV at half the rate of the uncircumcised males This corroborated other observations within populations of circumcised and uncircumcised men in Africa. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/16184582/

These results were a bombshell to the researchers. They had to halt the study because the results were so compelling that they believed it was unethical to continue the study because the uncircumcised group was at such clear risk.

Now WHO and UNAIDS are recommending circumcision campaigns. http://aids.immunodefence.com/2007/03/who_support_male_circumcision.html Also, Rwanda has launched a circumcision campaign.

Here is what CDC has to say: http://www.cdc.gov/hiv/resources/factsheets/circumcision.htm Note that this also mentions a lower rate of transmission of other STDs, including HPV.

Now I'm not trying to get everyone wrapped around the axle over HIV or STD's. Circumcise or don't. But seriously, it's not right to throw around claims like this when the epidemiologists are going nuts over the circumcision study data and the press is so full of articles saying that international bodies are pushing circumcision.

There are studies that both support and negate the idea that circumcision prevents or reduces HIV and STDs. And the HIV studies in Africa are highly controversial and hardly accepted globally:

A critique from a group of researchers: http://www.futuremedicine.com/doi/full/10.2217/17469600.2.3.193

The Royal

They tried this is South Africa. Guess what? They found that there little to no difference in HIV infection rates between the tribes that practice circumcision and the ones that didn't.

As for STDs:

A recent study found that circumcised men were 53 percent more likely to contract genital warts than uncircumcised men
http://weswell.blogs.wesleyan.edu/2008/04/04/thwart-genital-warts/

A recent study in March found no protection from STDs via circumcision:

http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/18280846?dopt=Abstract

"early childhood circumcision does not markedly reduce the risk of the common STIs"

There's even a study that shows that women with circumcised partners are more likely to contract STDs than women with uncircumcised partners

http://www.aidsmap.com/en/news/863ED8A3-78C8-4C9C-BF22-FA0685E5D140.asp

"women partnered with circumcised partners had higher levels of sexual risk during follow-up, being more likely than women with uncircumcised partners to self-report a sexually transmitted infection (6% versus 4%, p < 0.001), have symptoms of a sexually transmitted infection (26% versus 20%, p < 0.001), and to have a risky sexual partner (a man with symptoms of a sexually transmitted infection, or who was HIV-positive; 23% versus 14%, p < 0.001). Women with circumcised partners also had a lower mean number of protected sex acts (8.6 versus 8.3 per month, p < 0.001)."

Stating that there are health benefits as a FACT is wrong. There is a wide body of opinions and studies to support or dismiss that theory.

[Anonymous]

23:52 Here. Regarding 00:27 comments.

First, I did not say FACT. I was responding to someone who claimed that it is a FACT that no other country's doctors would advocate circumcision. This is not true.

I stated that the "best" studies show benefit. By that I mean that these are the best constructed studies out there (RCT), and they are showing a real benefit. Other studies had been done with mixed results, but these are observational studies and not controlled trials. In other words, these are the first studies to actually take a population and randomly assign half the group to be circumcised and half not, and then see what happens.

It is not fair to say the results are highly controversial. There are critics (there always are), but the weight of the community including the largest world body, WHO, is behind these studies and it's because they are really compelling.

And finally if you take apart the criticism, the most persuasive parts address not the HIV findings, but that there are tradeoffs (complications, personal beliefs, alternative methods of HIV prevention, future methods of HIV prevention). And the tradeoffs might look much different for the US compared to sub-Saharan Africa.

I am not trying to be pro-circ or anti-circ. And I never use the word FACT. But it is not a stretch to say that these studies are the best ones to date.