Shedding the Snake: Peeling to Remove Discoloration

Yeah it was mentioned. Nonetheless, a good whitening cream would be hydroquinone. But the problem with that is that it only works on regular type of discolorations, not the iron deposit kind. I got rid of most of the discoloration above my circ scar with the combination of retin a and hydroquinone. But like I said it did nothing for my iron deposit discoloration (below the circ scar).

You can only get 2% hydroquinone over the counter (wal mart), need a prescrption for 4%.

Here’s my experience with this “shedding,” so far. I’m skin type 2 or 3.

I bought “Mosco” liquid Callus & Corn remover. Salicylic acid 17.6%, no colloidal stuff.

My darkening is extreme (about 1.5” wide around the midshaft) and I have about 10 days until I’d like to be “ready” so I tried a full 10-min burn on the entire darkened area. While expecting some pain, I didn’t think it would be so intense. There was virtually no pain on top — it all seemed concentrated on the underside of my penis. I’ve had kidney stones before, and the pain was almost at that level for 3-4 minutes. Maybe I’m just a wuss? …. Another difference is there were no tingles afterwards, and no puffiness. Next time, I think I’ll do nitrous during the peak periods of pain.

Anyway, it’s been 24 hours, and I see no difference in coloration. Maybe the skin just can’t get any darker?
There is a difference in texture, though — the skin looks a little “wrinkled.” At this point, it doesn’t seem like any shedding will occur. There’s been absolutely no tenderness, no swelling, and no change in sensitivity. I’ll be really surprised if this fixes my pigmentation problem, but I’m hopeful. Did I do something wrong? All I can do now is wait, I guess…

Give it time. My skin took a few days to turn dark.

Active Ingredients
Salicylic Acid 17.6%
Ingredients
Alcohol 27% , Ether 57%

Damn, it’s a wonder the fumes didn’t kill the pain. :)

lol! so THAT’s why they put the ether in … apply, and huff the bottle like a madman!

It’ll be interesting to see different people’s experiences. My skin turned dark in less than 24 hours.

I wonder if the pain when using the Mosco was due to the effect that the inactive ingredients have on transporting the salicytic acid through the skin.

With mega-peel (over-doing it with 15%, then 25% solutions, and for too long), felt tingly/burning immediately, skin turned crinkly later, and eventually darkness set in. Using wart remover the second time, not near the effects (including darkness of skin).

Day 4: The snake is beginning to shed. Little bits of brown skin are starting to come off. So far, only the peripheries of the badly discolored area have started to shed, so it’s still too early to assess how well this has worked.

As of yesterday, the tenderness was completely gone. This whole process has been very easy for me so far, and I’m very eager to see how this looks in a week.

You know what… st. Ives tha one with salicylic acid is doing wonders to my dick. though it took 2 months though and the shade is still kinda brown.

Day 5: The shedding has really snowballed. Dry, brown bits of skin are coming loose everywhere, revealing a dry, thin, pinkish layer underneath. The most discolored area has still not peeled. I don’t know whether I hit it harder with the acid or whether it simply requires more time to heal than the adjacent areas.

ModestoMan, I was done at this point (at five days) in my first (mega) peel, but as I recall Hobby was still two days away at the five day point. Be sure and keep vasoline or other such ointment on the affected area to help keep the area moist until it is ready to peel. I hope you have hugely fantastic results with your first (and only?) peel. Mine took two peels for total results - but I over did it, with other side affects. I remember that Hobby’s took a couple more than two (I think).

Thanks for the good wishes, Alffie. I’ve been using Eucerin cream to keep the affected areas moist.

Day 6: The big chunks of skin are all off. There may be a few tiny bits still to shed, but my skin is back to being smooth. There are a few pinkish spots where the skin may have come off too quickly, but they’re already starting to normalize. Overall, the trauma has been slight.

Unfortunately, so have the results. The area of dark discoloration is still quite prominent. I can see a couple of areas where the acid seems to have made an incursion, but, for the most part, the area is as dark (or nearly so) as ever.

I suspected this would happen, because I never really “felt the burn” of the acid in this area. It was just not painful enough. It seems that the really discolored skin is possibly thicker, or is somehow more resistant to the acid than the adjacent areas. There is much more work to be done.

On a positive note, the areas that were only slightly discolored did respond very well to the acid. I am now fairly confident that the dark areas on the dorsal side of my shaft (which this application did not hit) can be cleaned up quickly with a single application.

I’ve noted that the directions for the wart remover asks one to “apply warm water” before using. I didn’t do this. Maybe that would have helped. The directions also suggest reapplying the gel every day. I obviously didn’t do this. However, now that I’ve seen that the single application has had such a little effect on the badly discolored area, I may consider reapplying the gel daily just to this area, until I feel a very good burn.

I would not do that. Remember, you are not burning off a wart. All of the medical-type sites I researched before I did my first burn used a one-time application, then waiting for results, then some time later another application, and so on. One site, and I could not find it again, talked about waiting a few weeks and then reapplying with higher application time for each subsequent application. Here are a few sites that might be helpful.

http://www.ijdv l.com/article.a … =90;aulast=Bari
http://www.emed … rm/topic533.htm Rosacea Chemical Peels Chemical Peel Myths - Debunking Seven Common Misconceptions

I believe the warm water is suppose to get rid of some of the oil in your skin, for the purpose of providing a deeper penetration. I washed my penis with soap and warm water for about 5 mins before applying the wart remover. Considering that you had very little pink, I suggest you do another application in a couple weeks. I still have to wait for the rest of this other type of hyperpigmentaion to fade away before I can try this again. Well anyways, good luck.

Thanks, Narcolepsy. I did my peel immediately after taking a shower, so I was certainly clean. I suspect that warm water may have something to do with increasing the permeability of the skin, thus allowing the acid to penetrate more readily.

Alffie: Thank you for the warning and for the links. I took a quick look at the pages and they seem to be very informative. I look forward to reading them in more detail later.

I’ve taken some photos (for my own comparison purposes). Looking at my “before” photos, I can see that the acid has in fact done some good in the highly discolored area. There used to be a very distinct border between the “clean” skin and the discolored skin, which coincided with the leading edge of my hanger. That edge is now less distinct. Also, it seems that the area may still be peeling at a lower level. The area looks cleaner this afternoon than it looked this morning.

If daily application of acid is a bad idea, perhaps a repeated dose would work. Apply the acid, let it burn. Remove the film and repeat until a good burn is felt. Then just let it heal as usual.

Day 5 for me. Most of the peeling has begun and ended .. the only real difference is where all the pain was
centralized, the circ. scar. The skin there looks new and pink. There is no peeling on the top, and minimal peeling all other places. the top looks a bit worse than before — the skin is all crinkly. I’m guessing it will just stay that way until i have time to do a serious burn.

All in all, pretty poor results so far. I can see where this stuff can be useful, though. But I’ll have to keep some things in mind:

For major discoloration (my discolored skin is dark grey, that part of my penis could easily pass for a black man’s!) the only solution is a major burn. This sort of burn does not occur in most areas with a single application. I like Modesto’s idea of applying, taking off the film, and burning again in a single day. Also, a major burn will mean major pain. For this type of burn, I’m going to need some sort of painkiller! Simple distraction doesn’t seem to be enough.