normal penis

LegacyUser

Hi,
Hopefully mods don't mind me going anon for this.

Precovid was with a girl and she pointed out something on my penis, to this point in my life I had always assumed was perfectly normal.

Just wanted to ask other guys, so when erect at the base of the head are very small tiny pin sized dots/bumps for lack of a better word, base of the member before it meets the shaft. Without adding a picture - which I wont it's as best I can describe.

Clearly a doc is the best to ask, but just wanted to ask here.

Flickerfusion

They sound like pearly penile papules, which are a normal anatomical variation. If you’re concerned, consult your GP.

ronivek

Could be Fordyce Spots or Pearly Penile Papules; both benign and fairly common. As usual to be sure you’d need to check with a doctor.

Flickerfusion

Just shows how little information we have about that aspect of our own bodies - still very poor level of information, knowledge or discussion of the practicalities of male anatomy.

Women seem to be at least 20 to 30 years ahead of us on that discussion and breaking down unmentionable topics. For the most part guys are still more likely to just make bad jokes about issues like this.

At least forums like this make asking questions possible!

H3llR4iser

anon_please wrote: »

Hi,
Hopefully mods don't mind me going anon for this.

Precovid was with a girl and she pointed out something on my penis, to this point in my life I had always assumed was perfectly normal.

Just wanted to ask other guys, so when erect at the base of the head are very small tiny pin sized dots/bumps for lack of a better word, base of the member before it meets the shaft. Without adding a picture - which I wont it's as best I can describe.

Clearly a doc is the best to ask, but just wanted to ask here.

As many replied already, it's most likely papules, which are a perfectly normal variation - some don't have them, some have, some have a lot. Just shows the young lady in question doesn't know much about the tools.

Go show your...junk to the doc if you wanna be sure.

Flickerfusion wrote: »

Just shows how little information we have about that aspect of our own bodies - still very poor level of information, knowledge or discussion of the practicalities of male anatomy.

Women seem to be at least 20 to 30 years ahead of us on that discussion and breaking down unmentionable topics. For the most part guys are still more likely to just make bad jokes about issues like this.

At least forums like this make asking questions possible!

Hold on a moment - this is true if we speak about knowledge of their OWN GENDER's toolset; We remain trapped in a "don't tell, don't ask, you're supposed to know" mentality.

When it comes to knowledge about the male genitalia, their workings and even broader male arousal, a vast percentage of women are shockingly ignorant - and there's a general assumption that what applies to their own, must be true for guys as well.

I've met 30+ years old women, degrees on the wall, nice job et cetera, who were firmly convinced an erection to be a controllable, voluntary thing - not to mention the consideration of teenage magazine "tricks" as gospel...

sydthebeat

Same as some people having ear lobes and others not, some dicks have papules and others don't.

Once they are regular and consistent, and none much different than the rest, then there's nothing to worry about

Flickerfusion

I was talking about women knowing a lot about their own bodies. It’s not thanks to anything that happened in Ireland but just the broader openness that cropped up in media and women’s magazines and so on since the 1970s. They are definitely several decades ahead of guys on this.

Yeah. I also encountered the notion that erections were voluntary a few times and the worst I have heard was someone who thought that urine was stored somehow in the testes ?!!! and he was a guy and has a pair!

I’d say the fact that we have had at best very patchy sex education has a big role to play in this. Whatever about the present day state of it, many people would have had none whatsoever and the influence of extremely conservative religious groups, often being educated in single gender environments and all of that does not help.

I mean I remember my mam telling me that when they did biology and also physiology (which was a course aimed at students who were considering nursing at the time) the nun on day one handed out bottles of glue and asked the girls to glue the “dirty pages” together - all the pages referencing male and and female anatomy.

I also heard a story from a woman in her 60s who said when she was going into labour she had no idea how the baby came out and started panicking and asking and the medics didn’t know what she was on about, but she literally had no idea how it worked and had never been told or read anything about it. I would suspect that finding out how that works in real time would be fairly traumatic if you had no idea what to expect.

You’ll also still get guys who’ve absolutely no clue about periods etc too for the same reasons.

The anglophone world in general is very conservative about discussing those topics and Ireland, while it has improved a hell of a lot, still has huge legacy of hang ups about discussing anything relating to sex. It’s either glossed over or joked about.

Present day Ireland is fairly sensibly open about things but we always have to be aware of how deeply conservative the place was and the fact that just because you may be well informed doesn’t mean that someone else is.

It’s also worrying in terms of understanding of sensible strategies for preventing STIs, contraception, fear of seeking medical advice, lack of understanding of the opposite sex’s point of view on many things and so on.

None of this stuff is particularly complicated or controversial but it’s just when you’re in a part of the world with a legacy of extreme hang ups, lack of discussion and so on - you can’t assume anything.

We can certainly compare to the USA on this legacy of conservative nonsense, but I think we are very far behind most of Northern Europe, other than Britain (which probably now claims it’s not in Europe anyway...)

It’s one reason I think the HSE should ensure it always has very comprehensive, easy to understand information online about all of these topics. You cannot assume that there’s universal, accurate information out there and it’s a dangerous void when it often ends up filled with misinformation and nonsense.