To Circ or not to Circ... that seems to be the question these days.

I live in a house with 3 boys and for 2 of them I had to decide what to do with their penis when they were born. If you have girls, be thankful. Deciding whether to circumcise your son or not is no easy task. Why am I writing about this though? Well, I guess the main reason is because I have a unique set of experiences and can offer a different way of looking at this topic.

Here is why I know a lot about circumcision. My older son IS circ'd and my youngest son is NOT circ'd and likely won't be (this is completely dependent on Slobber Rocket). Now... why on earth would I circumcise one of my children and not the other? I will get to that, I promise.

But first, lets discuss the pros and cons of this decision.

Pros to Circumcision
1) Uniformity within the family (some dads feel like their sons should look like them)
2) Religious reasons (Judaism and Islam are 2 religions where it would be culturally unacceptable to be 'in tact')
3) Some studies (though the validity of the studies are often called into question) suggest that the transmission of STDs, particularly HIV, is lower in circumcised men than in non- circ'd men.
4) Many people think that circumcision makes it easier to clean a penis (no foreskin to be moved in order to wash)
5) Decreased Risks of UTIs

Cons of Circumcision
1) The pain of the "procedure" (there are videos out there of circs being done on newborns... if you aren't horribly squeemish, it may be worth looking into but I have heard they are hard to stomach so I haven't personally watched)
2) Potential for infection of circ'd penis
3) Too much or too little skin removed (which can lead to such things as a curved penis when erect)
4) Hospital preference for the method can prevent urologists, peds, OBs, family doctors from doing circumcisions with the method they are most comfortable with. Most places around here like the plastibells (as in, they use that method on all infants and if you want their foreskin cut and sutured, you have to wait until they are at least a year old and can be put under anesthesia) and our urologist does not at all like that method of circumcision.

Pros of being Intact
1) The AAP states that there is no medical reason to circumcise a healthy male...
Here is an excerpt from the Circumcision Policy Statement that can be found on the AAPs website. "Existing scientific evidence demonstrates potential medical benefits of newborn male circumcision; however, these data are not sufficient to recommend routine neonatal circumcision." It does go on to say basically that this is their position but it is a decision each parent must make in a way they feel is in the best interest of the child.
2) Foreskin protects an infant against diaper rash and penis irritation during the diapering years.
3) The foreskin protects the penis in general beyond the diapering days. It produces oils to moisturize the penis (the glans doesn't produce these oils without a foreskin). The foreskin also helps keep things the right temperature and helps maintain the appropriate pH balance.
4) It is a pretty common belief that has both been studied and has anecdotal evidence that intact men have more sensitivity in the penis and therefore enjoy sex more (this does not mean that circ'd men don't enjoy sex though... the research is based upon the nerves that are removed when the foreskin is removed)
5) It allows the person on whom the procedure is to be done to make the choice.
6) Penis care for an uncircumcised child is no different than penis care for a circ'd child. Trust me, I know... A baby's foreskin does not retract (nor should a parent try to retract it). You simply wash a baby's penis with soap and water at bath time.

Cons of being Intact
1) Increased risk of UTI, though UTIs in children are fairly uncommon
2) Possible increased risk of STDs, though this is definitely more a product of sexual behavior and practices. I, for one, hope my sons are responsible in making those decisions. Also can be prevented with the proper use of condoms.

There are even more pros and cons found by people more militant on one position or the other than I am. But that's the basic rundown.
Where I get a lot of my info...
1) My/Slobber Rockets Urologist
2) The Case Against Circumcision
3) AAP Policy Statement on Circumcision
4) To Circ or not to circ (one of the better articles I found that outlined both options)

I have read a lot about this subject in the past too but A LOT of the information came from Slobber Rockets Urologist.


So, why did we do it the way we did it? Because... lets be honest, its kind of odd.

Here is the deal. When I was pregnant with Super Muscles, I let Mr. Wonderful make the decision. I had no strong opinion one way or the other. I don't have a penis so I really had no tangible way of knowing what my son would prefer but I figured Daddy did. So, he made the decision to make Super Muscles look like him in that area. In Indiana, where his circ was done, it was absolutely no big deal. He was cut, no apparatus was attached to him when we took him home. He healed. All is well with his little penis to this day.

So why the change? Well, we moved to Illinois and had decided to have slobber rocket cut in the hospital. But when his pedi came in and told us he wouldn't do it (because SR had too little foreskin), we were sent to a Urologist for a consult. Come to find out, our pedi (who we completely trust and love and whose opinion we value greatly) does not do circs on any of his patients at all. What?! So, this led to us asking lots and lots and lots of questions. Because if Dr. Y wouldn't do it, there had to be a good reason. Apparently Dr. Y doesn't think any child's foreskin should be cut. He is Chinese so he is probably uncirc'd himself but I didn't ask that... Anyway so we talked to the Urologist who explained to us the methods used in the hospital and the problems with them. The plastibell is most commonly used. The incidence of problems is much higher with the plastibell than with free hand cut. Too much skin taken off, not enough (which leads to what he referred to as a 'hybrid' penis... not quite circ'd not quite not). They also sometimes use the gomco clamp which our Urologist also doesn't like. He says it is too hard to get it perfect and if he is going to do it, he wants it perfect. The Urologists preference for many reasons was to wait until our son was 1 yrs old and take him into the OR and do it free hand. He assured us that allowing him to get bigger would yield a better result if that is what we wanted to do going forward. Also, foreskin would protect his penis from irritation caused by diapers. And the kid already has seriously sensitive skin as it is. We decided that, after getting all this info and our pediatricians views, we would not have Slobber Rocket circ'd. My husband concluded our conversation with "I don't know any grown man who wishes they had it the other way, I just don't think its that big of a deal".

SR can get one up until age 3-4 without remembering and with better pain control and a free hand, cut circumcision (far fewer complications) IF, and only if, he shows signs of being uncomfortable with his body looking different than his brothers/dads. I don't anticipate this happening as we are a very very open family and we will explain it to them just like we do everything else.

Before we get to my opinion on the matter, I want to include that I do NOT think that Christians have a religious reason to circumcise children. In the Old Testament God makes a covenant of circumcision with the His chosen people, the Jews. Check out Genesis 17 for information on this covenant. The Gentiles (all non-Jews) were never given this covenant and furthermore Paul argues that Jesus blood covers ALL including those who are circumcised and those who are not 1 Corinthians 7: 18-19. You can do an in depth search about Paul's teachings on circumcision if you are really interested though.

So what is my opinion? It is complicated. I basically think ALL parents do what they feel is best just as we did, in each case, what we felt was best for our children. I don't think that anyone who circs or doesn't is a bad parent. I just think there is a lot of misinformation and I KNOW that before Super Muscles was circ'd I was not given enough information and medical advice from the medical personnel around us at the time. I did my own research but meeting with a Urologist was infinitely better for our family than anything I had read. So, if *I* had it to do over again with SM, he would NOT have been circ'd. That is just me being honest about it. Do I feel bad? No. At the time, it is what we felt was right. Now, I have changed my mind. It happens. Super Muscles penis is fine, his circumcision went perfectly.

So, there you have it. The pros, the cons, my decisions, my opinions... hope you enjoyed a probably new perspective on the subject. And I hope this gives someone the tools to make a more informed decision, no matter what their decision ends up being.