At the tender age of six, I learned what circumcision was, and that I had been subjected to it. This has been an issue in my life ever since. At first I was curious about why this had been done to me and I felt somewhat disappointed that I did not have a foreskin like many of my friends. Over time I became more angry and I felt that I had been cheated out of something rather special. I swore that if I ever had children, they would grow up as nature made them. Intact.

Many years later, in the early eighties, my wife and I were blessed with a handsome son. She had grown up with two older brothers who were intact, and had babysat her three younger half brothers who had been circumcised. Although, she worked as a nurse and admitted to almost passing out during the first circumcision that she witnessed being performed, (more…)

I am choosing today, Mother’s Day, to share it with my friends and family. Sharing this information with all of you is my Mother’s Day Gift to myself and all of you.

I guess my story really started when I was young. Somewhere in my childhood I must have learned about circumcision as something that “gets done” to baby boys, “extra skin” that gets cut off the penis because it is “better” for them. I never questioned it as a child or teenager, it was the “norm”. Everyone in my family was circumcised (until I later learned that my mother’s father wasn’t!) and it was the expected thing to do. I too held the false thinking that boys who weren’t circumcised were “dirty”. I’m still to this day amazed that even as a young child, this thinking was so ingrained within me, as I’m sure it still is in those mothers/parents who continue to circumcise.

When I was in nursing school, one of my classmates did a presentation on the pros and cons of circumcision. I can remember her clearly saying, “Dude, there are just no pros to circumcision.” Even so, I can still remember thinking there must be since “everybody does it.” I remember being excited to have my turn to see a circumcision during my postpartum nursing school rotation. Please hear me when I tell you, I was horrified by what I saw. My role as a nursing student was to just stand there and observe. Now I am not somebody who gets squeamish or grossed out or anything, and I wouldn’t describe the procedure as gross, I would describe it as torture. It was a life changing experience for me and I need to tell you what it meant to me. I couldn’t believe what I was bearing witness to. This perfect new baby, his legs strapped down to a white plastic board called a circumstraint, betadine splashed on his genitals as the doctor jabbed him with a couple shots of lidocaine. The baby was screaming and as I watched the doctor quickly get to work with her tools a rush of weird sensations came over me. Every intuition in my body was screaming NO! It was like I was frozen and couldn’t move or speak. I didn’t want to look but I couldn’t look away. I watched the doctor repeatedly jam an instrument under the baby’s foreskin to separate it from the glans (which I later learned feels comparable to separating a fingernail from the finger by carving under it with a knife) After she separated it, she was able to cut around circmference of the penis and remove the foreskin. And then she tossed it in the trash like it was a worthless piece of skin.

When I got home that day, it was all I could think about, that poor baby and the glazed look he had in his eyes after the procedure, like he had given up, had been defeated. I couldn’t believe this procedure had become a routine thing to do to babies. I felt awful knowing that men in my life had endured this procedure. It was one of the first things they had had done to them. Some welcome to the world. And just because they can’t remember doesn’t make it right. I tried to describe to my husband that day what I had seen and told him that I could never do that to my baby. We didn’t really talk much more about it since we were still a few years away from starting a family.

Fast forward to when I became a post-partum nurse. Luckily, working nights I never had to deal with a circumcision taking place, but I did have to take care of babies in the nursery who had been circumcised earlier that day. You could tell which boys had been circumcised. They were the ones that awakened with a scream as they peed. No doubt it stung their fresh wound. It was during that time that I entered my second trimester with Noah. My motherly instincts must have been in overdrive. I remember knowing that I would never let my baby hurt like those poor babies. I took those weeks to do some internet research and my husband and I both read a couple of books that one of our doctors had donated to the postpartum unit. The Hidden Trauma of Circumcision, and Circumcision: What Your Doctor May NOT Tell You About. Everything I learned further cemented in me that circumcision is wrong. I remember the day we found out we were expecting a boy. We were so excited and felt so blessed. There was never a dilemma as to whether or not he would be circumcised. We were, and still are, at peace that both of our boys have their whole perfect bodies. It horrifies me me knowing what I know now, that had I not gone into nursing, I may never have explored circumcision and I would have “just done it.” I am so grateful I am a mother who found out before it was too late.

I have been researching circumcision information for 6 years now and try to keep up with the lastest studies and statistics. I have tried in the past to gently share this information with some friends and some family and some patients….and sometimes I just don’t have “the fight” in me or the know-how to talk to certain people about it. I am sad to say that there are some people I never even tried to educate, and now it’s too late. It can definitely be a hard topic to bring up with some people, it has taken me years to realize that sometimes social conformity is more powerful than me, but to not be afraid and to not be silent. I hate feeling sad when I hear someone is having a boy just because I’m sure they’ll circumcise him. I hate feeling that because as the mother of two little boys, I know that little boys are amazing little people with or without intact genitals. I’m not some “crazy hippy” and parents who don’t circumcise their boys aren’t part of some “tree-hugging cult” or bizzare stuff that pro-circumcision people sometimes spout off because the truth is too painful to fully comprehend.

I am a firm believer of when you know better, you do better. I’m sharing my story with you, because if life hadn’t taken me down the path that it did, I may not have learned the truth about circumcision. I just can’t fathom this barbaric “custom” going on for another generation. I can’t be silent anymore.

I have just started to see a man who was circumcised as a baby and was shocked when he told me that he has very little sensation at all in his penis and that he can’t really feel anything during penetrative intercourse as a result. This lead me to do some research on the internet and there is so much information and similar stories out there about this.

From what I can tell he has had the foreskin removed as well as some of the skin from the shaft rendering this area numb effectively. I was amazed too that he has never discussed his parents decision with them, as personally I would be angry and hurt that someone had made this life changing decision for me at such a young age.

From a woman’s perspective, I can see no benefit from circumcision. If men were not meant to have a foreskin they wouldn’t have been born with it and I truly believe you shouldn’t mess with what nature provides us. I’m saddened that men have to live with the results of their parent’s decisions and the impact that this choice can have on their sexual relationships.

(Ed: Circumcision regularly removes three-fourths of penile sensitivity.)

I am only 21 years old. I got pregnant with my first child when I was 20. As soon as I found out it was a boy I started doing research on circumcising. I knew from the very start I didn’t want to do it. My fiance and I fought long, mean battles about it the whole time I was pregnant. In my heart I knew it was wrong. I had my baby boy on June 8th of this year! The best day of my life!!! HE WAS PERFECT!

The day after I had him my fiance’s parents and sister came to visit me and my son in the hospital. His father said to me, “I heard you ain’t gonna get him cut.” His exact words! (more…)

The Gomco circumcision device is one of the most barbaric inventions ever created. It was used on my second son at his bris. He shrieked and writhed for the full 20 minutes as if he were being slaughtered, while the mohel smiled and kept saying, “Just another minute.” I knew I had betrayed my beautiful baby. Something in me died that day; something in him, as well. I lost my milk. His sleeping and eating patterns were totally disrupted for 11 months. This was nearly 26 years ago and I still cry whenever I think of it, which is too often. It was easily the worst day of my life. What will it take before people can see babies and humans and understand that the foreskin and male genitalia are sacred?!!!

I wish I would have read something like these stories in time; my two boys have been cut and I regret it with every ounce of my being. My pediatricians never told me of any of the risks, nor the fact that circumcision is medically unnecessary, they never even asked us why we wanted them circumcised. I found out later about dangers and complications from circumcision, and both my boys have had to endure problems from their circumcisions. This surgery has been traumatic, physically and emotionally, for our whole family.

With our first born, E, I am ashamed to say that we hardly discussed it beyond answering the hospital staff’s question of when, and signing the consent form. It was just a given that E would be circumcised because his dad was circumcised. At that point, I had never seen an uncircumcised penis, not even E’s. I never changed his diapers in the hospital. Today I regret that. I should have changed his diapers and seen what he looked like naturally. I feel like even more of an idiot when (more…)

I was born at Community Memorial Hospital in Sidney, Montana. At that time it was rare for anyone to escape the knife, although I know a few who did. It was probably considered medical malfeasance at the time if they missed you somehow. The majority of boys in the U.S. are still cut, but the rate is getting down a lot closer to half nationwide, though it’s much higher in some states and much lower in others. It’s like the luck of the draw anymore, rather than a done deal, although the chance of growing up with the dick you were born with is still poor.

Having been cut twice, I feel I am qualified to write on this topic. I remember about the time of puberty, around 12 years of age or so, how uncomfortable (more…)

Many years ago, I witnessed an infant circumcision in person at the invitation of a mutilator. He invited me to attend, to prove to me that there is nothing wrong with mutilating babies. He also decided and told me that he would not do a complete circumcision, just a little dorsal slit, to minimize trauma, damage, injury, and blood loss. “I will cut on the center line. There are no blood vessels there.” (Right.)

I decided to go. White mutilator, black baby, southern USA, 1972 or so. With the first probe under the foreskin the baby screams a blood curdling scream and keeps screaming. With the crushing of the center line of the top of the foreskin with the hemostat the baby’s screaming and thrashing ratchet WAY up (he was restrained by tie-downs, put in place in preparation for this human hurricane they already knew from long experience was coming) and when the clamp comes off and the dorsal cut is made the baby begins to vomit—projectile vomiting—the most violent vomiting I have ever witnessed from any human being. Blood from the baby’s penis spurts everywhere. The vomiting interrupts the screaming and the screaming interrupts the vomiting. The mutilator takes out his sewing kit and (more…)

I want to share with all of you an event that drew me into intactivism (Ed. activists devoted to keeping baby boys intact)

Back in 1996, I began an OB/GYN hospital clinical as a student nurse. One day, I was enlisted to attend a ‘routine circumcision.’ I did not realize how much that event would shatter the very foundation of a career choice made in ignorance. I appeared in the doorway of the circ room and saw the little newborn boy to whom I was ‘assigned’ for the day. Twenty years-old, and not having kids of my own, I did not anticipate the lurching sensation that gripped my heart. Laying strapped down to a table—so small and new, pure and innocent, trusting, all alone, and defenseless—I walked toward the baby and wanted to grab him off the table and shelter him, to tell him that nobody would hurt him.

In walked the doctor. Loud, obnoxious, joking with his assistant, as if he was about to perform a 10 minute oil change. Not once did he talk to this little baby. Rather, he reached for his cold metal instruments and then reached out for his object of mutilation, this sweet newborn’s perfect unharmed body. As I recall the screams of pain and terro, his small lungs barely able to keep up with the cries, I turned in horror as I saw the doctor forcefully pull his foreskin around a metal object. Then came the knife, cut, cut, cut.

I stood next to the baby and said, “You’re almost done sweety. Almost done.”

Then came the words as that son-of-a-bitch said while he dangled the foreskin in midair, “Anybody care to go fishing?”

My tongue lodged in my throat. I felt like I was about to vomit. I restrained myself. My duty was to then take the infant back to the nursery for ‘observation.’ Here is where I realized I couldn’t do it. I could not be a part of such a cold, sterile, out-of-touch medical model. Rather than observing, I cradled the infant. I held him and whispered comforting words as if he were my own. I’ll never forget those new little eyes watch me as if in a haze. He knew I cared about him. He knew he was safe in my arms. He knew that I was going to take him to his mommy, but deep in his little heart, at some level, I know he wondered where his mommy was while he lay there mutilated in what was supposed to be a safe and welcoming environment.

I made a note in the chart and then caught a glimpse of myself in a mirror. My chest and face had broken out in purple splotches. My next thoughts? I can’t do this. I refuse to do this. This is NOT for me. I took the baby to his mother, who was complaining about ’some pain’ she was experiencing. I never addressed her pain because I left to go to my locker. I grabbed my belongings and hoped that my rejection of this ‘medical system’ could serve as some type of redemption for the violation of that newborn that I cradled in my arms that day. The next day, I withdrew from nursing school and never looked back.

On July 1st, 2004, my Wife and I welcomed a healthy 7lb, 10oz. baby Boy into the world. A few days after the birth of our Son, we took him back to the hospital to get a circumcision. My Wife could not watch the procedure so I stayed in the examination room with my Son while the procedure was being done. I watched as the Doctor stuck a needle into my Sons penis with anesthetic to numb him from the pain and put this metal contraption on it to hold back the foreskin for circumcision. My Son wailed like a banshee in pain and it was an incredibly heartbreaking procedure to witness. Part of my heartbreak was that my Son’s arms were bound to his side and he could not move. After it was over, I gave him a bottle and he seemed to calm down right away.

I’m telling you this to lead up to what is somewhat bothering me. I read an MSN article entitled, ‘Mohels to Mozambique’, which talked about the issues concerning circumcision, which mentioned how Dan Bollinger had flashbacks of his circumcision even though he was only a few days old. They made it seem like that was a ridiculous notion because at that age it was “biologically impossible”. Well, I believe it 100% because that seems to be an issue with my Son.

He just turned 2, and from the moment he received his circumcision until now, he does not like his Mother or myself to touch anywhere near his penis. If we need to wipe him while changing his diaper or clean him in that area when he gets a bath, he
makes a fuss, sometimes cry, or may just try to block you from touching his penis or the undercarriage at all. Myself or my Wife is with him 90% of time so we are positive that he has not been touched down there inappropriately by friends, family members, or childcare personnel. First of all because we dont have him around anyone who has that type of history, secondly, because we had him checked out at our family pediatrician, and thirdly, because he has disliked any kind of touching in that area since
his circumcision.

So, I strongly believe that people can have flashbacks. I cannot explain any other reason why my Son hates any kind of attention to his genitals, except that he has some kind of memory of the horrible pain he experienced while getting his
circumcision. Of course, the article went on to talk about how more and doctors are not advocating circumcisions like they used to and how the benifits are “not sufficient to recommend routine neonatal circumcisions”, and that, it is an unnecessary procedure that has no known positive bearing on a Man’s life.

After all is said and done, I am glad that my Son was circumcised. What I don’t like is the fact that my Son may still have some residual memory of the experience he had at the hands of his pediatrician. It could have been a bad experince because the doctor may not have given him enough anesthetic, cut him wrong, or just the experience itself. Who knows?

My reason for this letter is to say that I do believe that men may have flashbacks because of the reaction my Wife and I get when we are near our Son’s genitals, and to say that I do not believe it is “biologically impossible.”