Stretching vs. growing

[Jeff]

Hey, I was wondering about something. I don't tug every day, but I do at least 5 days of the week on average. When I do, I tug pretty much all day long. When I take the device off (I use DTR) my skin is very loose and long, almost covering the glans. It will stay that way for the rest of the evening. However, when I get up the next morning, it's pretty much all pulled back behind the corona again, as if it has retracted. I guess my questions is "Am I just stretching the skin and it's own elasticity is taking back over again rather than actually growing new skin?" I know it takes a long time, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of progress as far as permanent change. (I've been tugging off and on for 2-3 years now with some slightly longer periods of rest interspersed.) Thanks.

[parsecskin]

5 days a week should be good. You need rest days for your skin to recover and grow. Are you using an external tugging strap or just the pusher? To grow outer skin, which is what most guys need most of, you need to have a tugging strap or something actually pulling on the device. The pusher will grow mostly inner skin. This process is slow as fuck, especially in the early stages. When you have more skin the process will speed up quite a bit. Keep at it.

[greg_b]

The way to know if you are growing skin is to observe if you have more skin now than when you started. You seem to be saying you do not. If you do not, and you have been doing the same thing for the last 2-3 years, then I suggest you need to experiment and try something different. If it were me, I would experiment with tension. Try a little more for a month or so and see what happens.

My experience is that the amount of tension is the most important variable by far. Just a little less than optimal for me and my progress falls way off. You should also make sure you can set tension the same, ie consistently, every time. And, of course, you have to sort out how to judge progress. I simply look at my coverage, but I do it many times a week, due to the variable size of my penis.

That said, progress is slow, on the order of 0.8 mm per month. So how confident are you that you have not made reasonable progress?

Regards

[Reality]

Hey, I was wondering about something. I don't tug every day, but I do at least 5 days of the week on average. When I do, I tug pretty much all day long. When I take the device off (I use DTR) my skin is very loose and long, almost covering the glans. It will stay that way for the rest of the evening. However, when I get up the next morning, it's pretty much all pulled back behind the corona again, as if it has retracted. I guess my questions is "Am I just stretching the skin and it's own elasticity is taking back over again rather than actually growing new skin?" I know it takes a long time, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of progress as far as permanent change. (I've been tugging off and on for 2-3 years now with some slightly longer periods of rest interspersed.) Thanks.

1. Not "as if" it's retracted. It did retract. Skin is designed to do this naturally. Stretches out, and slowly retracts back to where you started.

2. Temporary stretch doesn't get talked about much on restoration forums. Obviously it exists, and in my experience it can remain longer than over night. But seeing it retract over night is probably within the usual time frame. I don't know of any formal studies that address this specifically. Research calls it skin's "creep" when they talk about skin stretch caused by tension. How long it lasts probably varies from individual to individual. Maybe I can find something on line, or there might be a reference to skin creep in something I've posted here in other threads.

3. I think greg has a point: how can you be sure that some growth hasn't happened? Especially if you're tugging off and on. It goes very slow. It happens on the microscopic/cellular level. and if your skin temporarily stretches then actual, microscopic growth won't be seen at all, and anything that has accumulated will be more than easily hidden in comparison to temporary stretch. And some of the visible accumulation can bunch up behind your corona, not be noticeable for that reason.

[JCT3]

Are you using an external tugging strap or just the pusher? To grow outer skin, which is what most guys need most of, you need to have a tugging strap or something actually pulling on the device. The pusher will grow mostly inner skin.

I'm going to disagree with Parsecskin here. From my (five years) experience with the DTR - never using external tugging strap or anything pulling on the device (& doing so probably would have speeded things up - but for various reasons I didn't want to go that way), I have grown a lot of outer skin; beginning with about 3.25 inches dorsal to now about 5.50. The inner skin (variable from one side to another, front to back, and harder to measure IMO) starting with 1 inch maximum to now 1.5 inches max.

Truly "This process is slow as fuck" for most of us.

[greg_b]

I'm going to disagree with Parsecskin here. From my (five years) experience with the DTR - never using external tugging strap or anything pulling on the device (& doing so probably would have speeded things up - but for various reasons I didn't want to go that way), I have grown a lot of outer skin; beginning with about 3.25 inches dorsal to now about 5.50. The inner skin (variable from one side to another, front to back, and harder to measure IMO) starting with 1 inch maximum to now 1.5 inches max.

Truly "This process is slow as fuck" for most of us.

I agree, there is no need for a strap, emphasis on the word "need". I too have grown outer along with inner, using only an insert that pushes against the glans. Not the DTR, rather tape and an insert, but exact same idea.

I would even go further and say that a strap can grow inner skin as well, without a pusher. It all gets back to applying tension to the skin. if you set it up to tension the skin you want to grow, it will grow, no matter whether it is pulling the skin or pushing the glans. Of course, some methods are easier to do for a specific purpose than others, so most tend to use straps when focusing on outer and pushers when focusing on inner.

It is also good to keep in mind that we only have partial control over this process. We may want to focus tension on inner skin, say, but in practice, we may be getting enough tension on the outer to grow at least some skin, as well. And, this may change as you grow more of one type than the other, unless you change how you are applying tension to the skin types.

Regards

[Reality]

.......I would even go further and say that a strap can grow inner skin as well, without a pusher. ....

Yep, I've seen this personally. Not a lot of expansion, but a little of the ventral mucosa, mostly around the frenulum nub, including the nub itself. And I never focused tension on mucosa per se, during those years of effort.

It seems that some guys only think about what they can readily see, namely the "outer" side of the pinch of skin, especially if they're rolling that pinch over a cone. But there's an "inner" side as well, to that pinch, which sees just as much tension, and the "inner" side inevitably includes any shaft mucosa. This applies to any device including any device with a pusher, whether or not that pusher is used.

[Jeff]

Thanks guys. I really appreciate all the feedback. I'm guessing that I have grown a small amount of skin, and I most likely am just getting impatient. In answer to a couple of questions/comments, I am using the DTR, but I have modified it by using the long post and adding a small ring through the hole at the end that the rubber bands are supposed to go through. I put a screw in the top of the device to hold the plunger instead of using the rubber bands. I attach an elastic cord with an alligator clip to wrap around my leg below the knee. All that to say, I'm using both the plunger and external tension so I'm tugging both ways. In my job I have summers off and work on a family farm. Hot and sweaty all day, so I have found that it's next to impossible to keep the device on during that time, so I don't accomplish too much in the summer...maybe an hour or two in the evenings. Again, I'm sure I'm just getting impatient. I really appreciate all the information and the encouragement...and especially having a venue for discussions. I'm from a pretty remote area and there aren't a lot of outlets for much of anything around here, especially something so niche as this is. It's good to have someone to talk to and ask questions!

[greg_b]

Thanks guys....
Hot and sweaty all day, so I have found that it's next to impossible to keep the device on during that time, so I don't accomplish too much in the summer...maybe an hour or two in the evenings. Again, I'm sure I'm just getting impatient. I really appreciate all the information and the encouragement...and especially having a venue for discussions. I'm from a pretty remote area and there aren't a lot of outlets for much of anything around here, especially something so niche as this is. It's good to have someone to talk to and ask questions!

You may be accomplishing all that you can or need to in an hour or two. I have found that when I have the tension correct, all I need is 20 minutes, twice a day, 5 days a week, to have as much or more progress than I was able to with far more time. Don't forget that manual tuggers are quite successful, yet do not apply tension for more than minutes at a time.

Keep on tugging!

[Science Monk]

I tug pretty much all day long. When I take the device off (I use DTR) my skin is very loose and long, almost covering the glans. It will stay that way for the rest of the evening. However, when I get up the next morning, it's pretty much all pulled back behind the corona again, as if it has retracted. I guess my questions is "Am I just stretching the skin and it's own elasticity is taking back over again rather than actually growing new skin?" I know it takes a long time, but there doesn't seem to be a lot of progress as far as permanent change. (I've been tugging off and on for 2-3 years now with some slightly longer periods of rest interspersed.) Thanks.

What you are witnessing is not “just stretch.” What you are witnessing is the outcome of a daily tug-of-war with the dartos muscle within your foreskin. The dartos muscle (aka, the dartos fasica, or the peripenic muscle at tip of the penis) is a thin layer of smooth muscle just below the outer skin of the entire genitalia (i.e., the foreskin, penile shaft, and scrotum). With constant tugging, the dartos muscle of your foreskin remnant relents in its tug-of-war with your device and eventually becomes fully extended at the end of the day. In foreskin restoration, we are not expanding just skin, but all of the tissues of the foreskin, including the dartos muscle.

The extension of the dartos muscle is especially evident when using weighted methods. The weight keeps drooping lower and lower throughout the day as the dartos relents against the pull of the weight, and extends. However, I, and other T-tapers, have also noticed the gradual daily extension of the dartos, when using our T-tape method.

I would put a new T-tape on in the morning, and I would have to take up some slack in my strap with each trip to the restroom during the course of the day in order to keep a constant tension. By the end of the day, I had taken up about 2.5 inches of slack in the strap, and my foreskin had elongated by an equal amount.

I always felt that when my foreskin was long and skinny at the end of the day, was when I saw the most progress. That’s because you can’t pull the cells within the dartos apart until the dartos is fully extended. When the dartos is not fully extended, you are just fighting the muscular pull of the dartos. Its the pulling apart of cells within a tissue is what causes the kind of damage at the cellular and molecular level that induces cell division per the bodybuilding analogy. With the induction of cell division, cells are added to the tissue, and there is is true growth of the foreskin. Because the growth is due to the addition of new cells through cell division, any gains are to be regarded as permanent. Foreskin restoration by tugging is not due to just a stretching and thinning of existing tissue.

You can demonstrate the rapid extension of the dartos muscle in a section of your foreskin remnant using what I call “jiggle therapy.” Just grasp the tip of your foreskin remnant anywhere around its perimeter using your index finger and thumb. Then gently pull while vibrating your hand as fast as you can. You will see the that section of your foreskin “grow” like magic. The reason it is stretching forth so rapidly is because the vibration of your hand is making the dartos muscle relent and extend very rapidly. If you now apply jiggle therapy piecemeal around the entire perimeter of your foreskin, you are in an excellent position to get results by applying manual Method 2. You are also in a position to give your tugging for the day a head start when you now apply your TLC Tugger or other device to your already extended foreskin.

You have to work fast however. The effects of jiggle therapy are very transient once you let go!….but the apparent rapid growth you see while you are doing it is a harbinger of good things to come!

David
World As Monkey Island

[Jeff]

More great information!!! I had never hears of the dartos muscles, so I'm glad to know about that. I have heard mentioned here several times the "Manual Method...1,2,3 etc. I haven't done enough research yet to know for sure what that is and what it entails. Is there a website somewhere that I can read about this? I'm interested in knowing all different techniques of tugging. Some might be better at times (like during the summertime) than others. Thanks again so much.

[parsecskin]

Perhaps the best way to relax your dartos is, and you're gonna think I'm crazy, is to smoke some weed. Nothing and I mean nothing relaxes your dartos like cannabis. I wonder if one could get a medical cannabis card for this use?

[Reality]

What you are witnessing is not “just stretch.” What you are witnessing is the outcome of a daily tug-of-war with the dartos muscle within your foreskin. The dartos muscle (aka, the dartos fasica, or the peripenic muscle at tip of the penis) is a thin layer of smooth muscle just below the outer skin of the entire genitalia (i.e., the foreskin, penile shaft, and scrotum). With constant tugging, the dartos muscle of your foreskin remnant relents in its tug-of-war with your device and eventually becomes fully extended at the end of the day. In foreskin restoration, we are not expanding just skin, but all of the tissues of the foreskin, including the dartos muscle.

The extension of the dartos muscle is especially evident when using weighted methods. The weight keeps drooping lower and lower throughout the day as the dartos relents against the pull of the weight, and extends. However, I, and other T-tapers, have also noticed the gradual daily extension of the dartos, when using our T-tape method.

I would put a new T-tape on in the morning, and I would have to take up some slack in my strap with each trip to the restroom during the course of the day in order to keep a constant tension. By the end of the day, I had taken up about 2.5 inches of slack in the strap, and my foreskin had elongated by an equal amount.

I always felt that when my foreskin was long and skinny at the end of the day, was when I saw the most progress. That’s because you can’t pull the cells within the dartos apart until the dartos is fully extended. When the dartos is not fully extended, you are just fighting the muscular pull of the dartos. Its the pulling apart of cells within a tissue is what causes the kind of damage at the cellular and molecular level that induces cell division per the bodybuilding analogy. With the induction of cell division, cells are added to the tissue, and there is is true growth of the foreskin. Because the growth is due to the addition of new cells through cell division, any gains are to be regarded as permanent. Foreskin restoration by tugging is not due to just a stretching and thinning of existing tissue.

You can demonstrate the rapid extension of the dartos muscle in a section of your foreskin remnant using what I call “jiggle therapy.” Just grasp the tip of your foreskin remnant anywhere around its perimeter using your index finger and thumb. Then gently pull while vibrating your hand as fast as you can. You will see the that section of your foreskin “grow” like magic. The reason it is stretching forth so rapidly is because the vibration of your hand is making the dartos muscle relent and extend very rapidly. If you now apply jiggle therapy piecemeal around the entire perimeter of your foreskin, you are in an excellent position to get results by applying manual Method 2. You are also in a position to give your tugging for the day a head start when you now apply your TLC Tugger or other device to your already extended foreskin.

You have to work fast however. The effects of jiggle therapy are very transient once you let go!….but the apparent rapid growth you see while you are doing it is a harbinger of good things to come!

David
World As Monkey Island

You need to provide a source (or sources) for all of what you've written above. Most of it goes against everything known by the study of human anatomy and physiology. The rest of it is just anecdotal (to use a kind term). So I have to call nonsense.

The so-called dartos sheath isn't really a sheath at all, unless you're referring to the scrotum, where it's all more pronounced, BUT STILL NOT A SHEATH OR A "TUNIC" OR A DISTINCTLY PLACED FASCIA. And here's the thing: we aren't referring to that area. We don't pull on that area. We pull on penile skin located on the shaft of the penis. It isn't a "sheath" there either. The "dartos muscle" isn't even a muscle as most people understand that term:

1. First of all dartos muscle tissue is made of smooth muscle fibers. Smooth muscle is a type of muscle which is involuntary (meaning it's controlled by your nervous system, not you), NOT skeletal muscle fibers, and it is arranged NOT as a sheath, but as very thin swirls of muscle fiber "here and there", as it were, interspersed in connective tissue, UNDER THE SKIN OF THE PENIS.

2. These muscle fibers do NOT exert the type of force you are describing above. Any resistance we see from temporary stretch is primarily from the skin itself, and the underlying connective tissues. Want proof you can see? The dartos "sheath" is thickest on your scrotum skin. Take a small area of your scrotum and gently pull out the wrinkle. Did that take any force? Did you have to duct tape your balls to the door post and get a running start to do this? See what I mean? No resistance, no force.

3. If you've seen a cross section of penile tissue under a microscope then you know this to be true. It is VERY thin. It took a freakin' microscope to see it, AND THAT'S THE WHOLE COMBINATION OF ALL THE TISSUES, let alone the single "layer" of dartos fibers. You can't see that with the naked eye. You don't see it as anything noticeable throughout the day. What you do see is a gradual temporary stretch of ALL the superficial tissues (epidermis, dermis, ie various fasciae), but again, primarily skin. NEVER the thin dartos swirls.

4. And why, oh why, does anyone have to point out the following at this late date in forum discussion:

"Stretch" is NOT any indication of "good things to come". Stretch, is just an inherent response of skin (now listen) TO AVOID HAVING TO GROW MORE OF ITSELF. Get that? "Stretch" is THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF GROWTH. It has NOTHING to do with ANYTHING in skin expansion, not directly, because it has nothing to do with MITOSIS itself. We DO NOT permanently stretch skin, as is implied several ways above. We grow new skin cells, more than would've been there if we hadn't stimulated skin to respond to GROW. Not AVOID growth by stretching. "Stretch" is a first echelon defense AGAINST growing, and is a myth that will never die on forums. And now you want to throw the puny, can't-even-see-it dartos fibers in that same mythical category. No sir.

I know no one will read this and listen to it because it goes against the chrome plated, hardwood mounted, titanium dipped myth, that freakin' tentacle-waving myth just waiting on periphery to seep in, but somebody who's actually on the side of Science needs to rep this forum in a knowledgeable way. Just for the record.

[Reality]

Perhaps the best way to relax your dartos is, and you're gonna think I'm crazy, is to smoke some weed. Nothing and I mean nothing relaxes your dartos like cannabis. I wonder if one could get a medical cannabis card for this use?

http://www.intheknowzone.com/substan...the-brain.html

Not sayin' your right, because of the reasons I've stated above, but when I can find it, I know there's a study on cannabis and norepinephrine. I'll add it here when I get a chance.

[parsecskin]

HA! I knew I was right. "Smoke a bowl and let your balls hang low".