Tweet
So, I've been restoring for a while now. I've learned a lot since I first started, I've seen a lot of progress, and I'm really happy that I feel well on my way to a restored foreskin. I'd like to share a little bit about how I feel, what I think about foreskin restoration, and what I've learned during this time.
(for reference, I've been restoring for almost 7 months, gone from 50% FEC to 106% FEC, and gone from RCI 1-2 to the beginning of RCI 4)
1) Visual State: The visual state of your penis will vary DRASTICALLY during your restoration process. And I don't mean over the months as you restore, I mean over the day, depending on what state your penis is in. For example, right now I would consider myself juuuuust reaching RCI-4. When my penis is really relaxed and in its 'low hang' state it almost looks like I've never even started restoring. When I'm in the shower it appears like a solid RCI-4 with distinct rollover. When I'm wearing tight underwear I get almost full flaccid coverage. When my penis is cold and small it just looks like a solid RCI-2, with wrinkling behind the head. Sometimes when you're looking at yourself and you look like an RCI-1 but you've been restoring for months and months it can be a little bit discouraging...which is why FEC was so goddamn important for me. This brings me to my second point.
2) FEC. FEC has really saved my sanity. Being able to do this measurement every week or two and see solid, measurable, reproducible progress makes you actually -feel- like you're making headway with restoration much more than the transient visual appearance of your penis. I cannot stress enough how using this measurement has helped me, and how good it makes me feel to see it increase. Highly recommend.
3) Sexual sensation. I began to feel my sexual sensation change at around 90% FEC. It's a bit difficult to describe...but for me, instead of a tight, frictiony feeling during sex it's become a bit more loose and organic feeling with the more manipulable amount of penile skin. I can only expect this feeling to get better, but even at only 106% FEC I can distinctly feel a difference. When I masturbate with lube my skin can easily reach ~50% coverage on the upstroke without me forcing anything at all, which is awesome.
4) Routine. When I began, I was counting the hours I had the device on and trying to meet a specific hour per day amount. That didn't last very long. Now, I just put on the device in the morning, wear it until it gets uncomfortable, then take it off for around an hour or two. Then, I put it back on. This has resulted in me getting as many as 8 hours per day of tugging in, or as few as 4. However, this more unstructured approach is working a lot better for me. As people here have said before, you don't need to try and force it, get into a routine and let time do the work for you. As for a days per week amount, usually I'm doing 5, thought whether that comes in the form of 5-on 2-off or a couple sets of 3-on 1-off sort of varies depending on how I'm feeling. .
5) Application and Tension. Started out being super awkward with application. Now I can throw the TLC-X on in like 15-30 seconds. Super easy. The increasing amount of slack skin I have has definitely helped though. For everyone else...I know it might feel awkward and tedious to get a good application at first, but believe me, it gets a lot easier. As far as tension goes, I've been sort of cycling between two different tension levels. One is a very casual tension that I can easily go 4 hours with, but that still feels like I get a good stretch out of. The other is a bit of a higher tension that takes my skin to its elastic limit, but that I can only stand for ~2 hours before it starts to become uncomfortable. This is ditto for the amount of bi-directional tension I use...sometimes I will go for a deep application of my device and less bi-directional tension (plunger depressed less far), and other times I will go for a bit of a shallower application but with the plunger depressed almost the whole way in. I'm just going for variety here, and I think all of it is working to some degree or another.
6) Other indicators: So, what else have I experience since I started restoring that is new, or that let me know that restoration was actually working? Well, for one, I now have to pull up the loose skin that is bunched up around my glans before I can completely try my penis, especially if I intend to put on my device after I'm finished showering. I do remember that this never used to be the case, I could just slap the towel around my penis a few times and be done with it, but now I do have to pay more attention and specifically pull back the skin if I want everything to be dry. Also, the amount of time that it looks like I have full flaccid coverage after I take off my cone from retaining has changed. When I started, the skin would immediately roll back, maybe pause making me look like a RCI-4 for a few seconds, and then stay behind my glans. Now, if I stand still, I when I take off my retainer it will look like I have full flaccid coverage for maybe a minute or so (granted, it's easy to tell this coverage is borrowing a bunch of scrotal skin, but still neat to see), and then the skin will roll back making me look like a solid RCI-4 for maybe 5 minutes before stopping at the 'mushroomy' stage where it looks like it's juuuuuust about to roll over. Even though sometimes the changes come slow and can be subtle, it's very exciting when you start to notice and experience them.
Question, comments, or discussion welcome. Just wanted to share my story and progress with like minded individual.
(for reference, I've been restoring for almost 7 months, gone from 50% FEC to 106% FEC, and gone from RCI 1-2 to the beginning of RCI 4)
1) Visual State: The visual state of your penis will vary DRASTICALLY during your restoration process. And I don't mean over the months as you restore, I mean over the day, depending on what state your penis is in. For example, right now I would consider myself juuuuust reaching RCI-4. When my penis is really relaxed and in its 'low hang' state it almost looks like I've never even started restoring. When I'm in the shower it appears like a solid RCI-4 with distinct rollover. When I'm wearing tight underwear I get almost full flaccid coverage. When my penis is cold and small it just looks like a solid RCI-2, with wrinkling behind the head. Sometimes when you're looking at yourself and you look like an RCI-1 but you've been restoring for months and months it can be a little bit discouraging...which is why FEC was so goddamn important for me. This brings me to my second point.
2) FEC. FEC has really saved my sanity. Being able to do this measurement every week or two and see solid, measurable, reproducible progress makes you actually -feel- like you're making headway with restoration much more than the transient visual appearance of your penis. I cannot stress enough how using this measurement has helped me, and how good it makes me feel to see it increase. Highly recommend.
3) Sexual sensation. I began to feel my sexual sensation change at around 90% FEC. It's a bit difficult to describe...but for me, instead of a tight, frictiony feeling during sex it's become a bit more loose and organic feeling with the more manipulable amount of penile skin. I can only expect this feeling to get better, but even at only 106% FEC I can distinctly feel a difference. When I masturbate with lube my skin can easily reach ~50% coverage on the upstroke without me forcing anything at all, which is awesome.
4) Routine. When I began, I was counting the hours I had the device on and trying to meet a specific hour per day amount. That didn't last very long. Now, I just put on the device in the morning, wear it until it gets uncomfortable, then take it off for around an hour or two. Then, I put it back on. This has resulted in me getting as many as 8 hours per day of tugging in, or as few as 4. However, this more unstructured approach is working a lot better for me. As people here have said before, you don't need to try and force it, get into a routine and let time do the work for you. As for a days per week amount, usually I'm doing 5, thought whether that comes in the form of 5-on 2-off or a couple sets of 3-on 1-off sort of varies depending on how I'm feeling. .
5) Application and Tension. Started out being super awkward with application. Now I can throw the TLC-X on in like 15-30 seconds. Super easy. The increasing amount of slack skin I have has definitely helped though. For everyone else...I know it might feel awkward and tedious to get a good application at first, but believe me, it gets a lot easier. As far as tension goes, I've been sort of cycling between two different tension levels. One is a very casual tension that I can easily go 4 hours with, but that still feels like I get a good stretch out of. The other is a bit of a higher tension that takes my skin to its elastic limit, but that I can only stand for ~2 hours before it starts to become uncomfortable. This is ditto for the amount of bi-directional tension I use...sometimes I will go for a deep application of my device and less bi-directional tension (plunger depressed less far), and other times I will go for a bit of a shallower application but with the plunger depressed almost the whole way in. I'm just going for variety here, and I think all of it is working to some degree or another.
6) Other indicators: So, what else have I experience since I started restoring that is new, or that let me know that restoration was actually working? Well, for one, I now have to pull up the loose skin that is bunched up around my glans before I can completely try my penis, especially if I intend to put on my device after I'm finished showering. I do remember that this never used to be the case, I could just slap the towel around my penis a few times and be done with it, but now I do have to pay more attention and specifically pull back the skin if I want everything to be dry. Also, the amount of time that it looks like I have full flaccid coverage after I take off my cone from retaining has changed. When I started, the skin would immediately roll back, maybe pause making me look like a RCI-4 for a few seconds, and then stay behind my glans. Now, if I stand still, I when I take off my retainer it will look like I have full flaccid coverage for maybe a minute or so (granted, it's easy to tell this coverage is borrowing a bunch of scrotal skin, but still neat to see), and then the skin will roll back making me look like a solid RCI-4 for maybe 5 minutes before stopping at the 'mushroomy' stage where it looks like it's juuuuuust about to roll over. Even though sometimes the changes come slow and can be subtle, it's very exciting when you start to notice and experience them.
Question, comments, or discussion welcome
. Just wanted to share my story and progress with like minded individual.
Comment