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Circumcision leaves a scar. On some men the scar is very wide, dark coloured and obvious and on others it is less obvious. My scar is obvious and about 6 mm wide. I believe that my scar is wider now than before I started to Restore, which is likely given that it has been subjected to the stretch of the Restorer. Scar tissue is however far less pliable than normal skin and would not have stretched as much as the shaft and inner foreskin which was being subjected to the Restorer at the same time.

A natural foreskin has a gliding mechanism whereby it is able to move over itself. It is a continuous layer (tube) of skin attached at one end to the sulcus and at the other to the shaft shin. Circumcision cuts across the layer of skin at two points and then rejoins the ends. Unfortunately my ends were not joined in a way that allows them to glide easily, instead of being a continuous layer (tube) of skin mine now has a scar thickened 180 degree join in it.

To show the difference in glide characteristics between a continuous layer and one with a 180 degree bend in it take a piece of A4 or letterhead paper. Hold one end in each hand with your hands close together move them alternately up and down. Notice how the paper bends evenly through the glide and keeps its shape throughout the whole motion. Now fold the paper in half and make a firm crease along the fold line. Take the paper in each hand as before and repeat the motion. Notice now that the paper no longer glides easily through its motion. The animation below shows how differently two such pieces of paper might react if you don't have them yourself.

My circumcision scar is like a permanent crease in my foreskin preventing it from gliding evenly. It's as if it gets stuck when it tries to glide over the scar. This is not an issue during sex or where I am moving my foreskin with my hand as the resistance to the glide presented by the scar is less than the external force of the hand or the sex partner. It does become a problem when my foreskin tries to move by itself. For example after an erection it is normal for a penis to reduce in size and the foreskin to resume its normal position offering protection for the glans and inner foreskin. Another situation where it may attempt to move down is if I become cold.

During my restoration I became increasingly disappointed that my foreskin would not stay down. I was sure I had enough skin for partial coverage of my glans. Indeed by the time I reached CI-4 I expected my foreskin to stay down without the need for the Retainer - but it wasn't happening. I investigated further and that's when I discovered the 180 degree crease in my foreskin.

In the photo (left) you can see that the scar line forms a ridge around my foreskin over which the rest of my foreskin needs to glide. At the time of the photo the scar line is well inside my foreskin as I had differentially stretched the shaft and outer foreskins much more than the inner foreskin. (Differential stretching is an advanced technique which involves concentrating the stretch either on the inner or outer foreskin depending on which one you wish to stretch more. A discussion on differential stretching follows later on this page)

The location of the scar line so far "inside" my foreskin was causing gliding problems which needed to be addressed.

Frictioning

It was not possible to remove the scar but it was possible to reduce it. Frictioning is a term used by soft tissue therapists referring to a procedure for breaking down scar tissue. As the name might suggest it involves firmly rubbing the scar tissue in order to initiate break down and allow the body to remove it. Each day I spent 10 minutes firmly rubbing across the scar line with my thumb and forefinger, concentrating on the hard ridge of scar tissue. After a couple of weeks the hard ridge had been reduced to a my pliable band which created less of an impedance to the gliding action of my foreskin.

Differential stretching

Another thought I had was to move the scar line further along, which wouldn't remove it as a problem just meant that my foreskin could travel further down my glans before it hit the problem spot. Using differential stretching (a full discussion on differential stretching appears lower on this page) I stretched the inner foreskin more often than the outer foreskin and effectively moved the scar line further along.

The reason the scar line had become such a problem in the first place was because I had concentrated my stretch on my shaft and outer foreskins in an attempt to move the scar to the inside where it could not be seen when I was in the soft state. When I realised my foreskin wasn't gliding properly and wouldn't move down by itself due to the scar line problem I tried to stretch the outer side even more. The thought was that eventually I would have enough bulk of skin on the outside to overcome the resistance of the scar. Maybe if my target had been CI-8 or CI-9 this would have worked but with a CI-5 target I wasn't ever going to have enough foreskin bulk to roll over the scar line when it was located so far inside.

I differentially stretched the inner foreskin more and moved the scar line closer to the midpoint (that's when the scar line is exactly at the end when the inner and outer foreskins are sitting evenly.

Together frictioning and differential stretching reduced the problem of the scar line impeding the gliding action of my new foreskin.

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My circumcision removed only part of my frenulum so there was a slight amount that bridged from my sulcus to what was left of my foreskin. When I started to restore it never caused me any problems or discomfort. After a number of weeks I started to feel discomfort especially if I was using the Restorer pushed all of the way down, for example when differentially stretching my inner foreskin (a discussion on differential stretching follows later on this page).

What had happened was my inner foreskin had grown and the point where it attached to my frenulum was no longer down near my sulcus. When my foreskin was pulled forward (by the Restorer) my frenulum was now bridging the gap as it would in an intact man.

If the Restorer was pushing directly onto my frenulum it would start to hurt after a while, and needed to be accommodated in order for me to have the full range of Restorer positions available.

The answer was to make a groove in my Restorer, wide and deep enough to fully accommodate my frenulum. As my Restorer is made out of soft latex it was no problem to make a groove in it, the only consideration was to keep the groove to the minimum size in order to retain the wall strength of the Restorer. Fortunately the groove didn't compromise the integrity of the Restorer and perfectly accommodated my growing frenulum.

As my Restoration progressed my frenulum grew and had to be accommodated	I cut a small groove in the Restorer to accommodate my frenulum

I have noticed that lots of men who have been circumcised in the 70's (and I presume up to the present day) are left with their frenulums almost entirely intact. Doctors obviously realised that there are many nerve endings in the frenulum and leaving it intact was at least some consolation for the loss of much of their sexual pleasure. I believe that had I had such a circumcision and my frenulum was intact that I would have had to use a Restorer with a groove in it right from the start.

Another issue that arises out of the "modern" style of circumcision is that the underside of their foreskin requires much less stretching than the upper side. This is discussed in the Differential Stretching section which is next.

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Differential stretching involves stretching one part of the foreskin more than another. This is done to achieve a particular outcome, like to move the location of the scar line or to "even up" the foreskin if it has been cut on an angle. My foreskin was cut evenly so I did not need to stretch one side more than another. Things would have been different if I had one of those more modern circumcisions where the frenulum is left entirely intact. In these circumcisions very little is cut from the bottom side of the penis but on the top side almost all of the foreskin is removed. In that situation I would have needed to tape my foreskin in such a way that most of the stretch was concentrated on the top part of the foreskin in order to grow it more so the final outcome was an even foreskin.

I used differential stretching to move my scar line. Originally I wanted to hide my scar line inside my new foreskin so when I was soft my penis would have a scar free even skin texture. I therefore concentrated on growing the outer part (shaft skin) more than the inner foreskin. As my restoration progressed I discovered that my scar line was interfering with the gliding motion of my foreskin so after spending time moving the scar inside I had to move it back out closer to the mid point again.

An intact foreskin has three skin zones - inner foreskin, outer foreskin and shaft skin	Restoration involves stretching the shaft skin to replace the lost outer foreskin and stretching the inner foreskin back closer to the size it was before circumcision. This man has restored evenly so his scar line sits on the mid point of his foreskin.

This man has differentially stretched his outer foreskin more than his inner foreskin. As a result his scar line is some way inside his foreskin mid point.	This man has differentially stretched his inner foreskin more than his outer foreskin. As a result his scar line is on the outside some way back from his foreskin mid point.

To achieve differential stretches I used different Restorer positions accompanied by different inner or outer foreskin tensions. Whenever I determined that remedial action was required (i.e. to move my scar line) I would alternate a differential stretch and a "normal" stretch on consecutive days. The diagram below shows the Restorer and foreskin positions I used for differentially stretching my inner or shaft skins.

I found stretching the outer foreskin harder than stretching the inner foreskin. That seems strange given the fact that there is so much more skin on the outside - a whole penis length of it. However on the inner side there was only a few millimetres to start with. That meant that as a percentage the inner foreskin had to stretch many times more than the skin on the outside. It would seem likely that stretching the outer foreskin and shaft skin would be easier as it has less growing to do as a proportion compared to the inner, but I never found it to be that way.

Maybe my inner foreskin is much more pliable than my shaft skin. Whatever the reason when I started to differentially stretch my inner foreskin it grew really well. Also the quality of the stretch I was getting seemed greater. The inner foreskin differential stretch position requires the Restorer to be pressed fully down on the penis and the inner foreskin to be pulled up firmly for taping. This position is not as comfortable as an outer foreskin stretch position as the tape is adhering partly to the inner foreskin.

In contrast shaft skin stretches were very comfortable. The Restorer sits loosely on top of the penis and the shaft skin is pulled up as far as possible. The tape is adhering the shaft skin some way back from the mid point and I could tape firmly with increased tension on the tension band in order to get a powerful stretch.

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I found it difficult to keep my Restorer perfectly clean. The inside was OK but the outside top part kept getting a layer of adhesive residue from the tape on it. It was sticky and impossible to remove with soaps or detergents. The best thing I found was kerosene but then it smelled for days and I didn't really want something that had been in kerosene directly touching my new foreskin.

The other issue was the time it was taking to keep my Restorer clean - time I could have spent restoring. However I soon realised that the residue actually helped my restoration. The tape adhered to the Restorer much better if there was a sticky layer of adhesive residue on it.

Differentially stretching the shaft skin was easier too. In this stretch the foreskin is rolled all of the way onto the Restorer and taped into position as far along as is possible. The adhesive residue around the top of the Restorer acted like a second layer of tape on the inside. My foreskin would stick to it enough to make applying the tape easier.

I got into a routine where I was using two Restorers (of the same size), one I would be wearing and the other was undergoing cleaning. First a soak in kerosene for 15 minutes and then a firm scraping to remove the residue. Next I washed the Restorer in soap to remove the kerosene residue and left it to dry and air for a couple of days before swapping them over. If I was performing any differential stretches I would use the one with adhesive residue on it to help the stretch.