Part 3
Adult Initiations

The following compilation of letters are all inter-related and it is difficult to categorise them in separate sections.
"The Late Initiate" is an attempt to analyse these experiences.
The Medical Studies confirm that some men are unaware of their phimoses.

My findings are very similar to Dr. Beauge who interviewed around 350 young men between 18 and 22 yrs. old with phimosis (defined as a preputial ring). "From the interviews it appears that the great majority of these subjects are virgin, and that among those who have had sexual experience, many have failed, with difficulty in penetration, pain and loss of erection; except perhaps in cases of the tightest phimoses who were successful in penile penetration with the glans covered. The remainder expose themselves to considerable risks of paraphimosis by persevering in intercourse."

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TABOOS and ILLUSIONS
There are many ways to avoid pain and difficulty.

e.g.15 A doctor wrote: "I had thought that I was the only one with this problem. In those days it was a psychodrama for me, ... I was among the young men, who were themselves not aware that they had a phimosis, as you have adequately described. ... In those days it had really bothered me and I postponed any correcture, the consequence of which was angst about sexual encounters and an extreme shyness. ... It was first at age of 24 yrs. when I was deeply in love that I experienced all the obvious problems in bed."

e.g.16 "I realised that something was different about age 10 when other kids' could expose their glans and I couldn't. It was disturbing at the time...but I was still young...so I forgot about it ... It makes me both embarrassed and angry that I spent all of these years under the illusion that no male could ever fully retract their foreskin(!)."

e.g.17 The title of the following letter was "I`m Stupid": "After reading your site I broke down and cryed, I'm a 23 year old male that never knew that my foreskin was meant to go back, I also suffer from impotence and after being to see 5 different doctors they could not tell me what was the cause, is it possible that my problem with the foreskin is related to the impotence?" (RS Though phimosis does not directly lead to impotence it certainly would not help.)

All of the sufferers who experienced no conscious pain have thought that they were normal. One man who I spoke with, after describing how he washed under the foreskin with an extreme phimosis, (by flushing the area out with a squeezing action), told me he thought that "everyone's normal, we're all just a bit different". (When asked about his sexual interests, he answered that the woman's pleasure was more important, it is a great sadness that for over 20 adult years he had had no intimate relationship. - I was the first person who he'd spoken with on the subject).

	The Passages to Manhood - 6 of 12