AndyJ's stricture and scarring rehab

So, the urologist threw up a hand and rolled his stool backwards, shaking his head. “Nothing I can do for you, you need to see a plastic surgeon.”

Great, after waiting almost two months for an appointment..

I had a staph infection, and then boils, and then a strep infection. After eight weeks on antibiotics my doc managed to get that knocked out, and then we realized that I had been left with massive scarring, adhesions, and urethral strictures. He sent me to what was supposed to a high-end urologist who could fix it. As if.

And then the Coronavirus panic hit, and “elective surgery” wasn’t a thing any more, at least in my area.

Needless to say I was pretty bummed. There was a fair amount of pain involved as my shaft changed size during the day, tugging on scar tissue. And the stricture at the meatus made it impossible to take a leak without pissing all over my feet, my pants, and half the bathroom. It was bad enough I’d undress and stand in the shower to go. I wasn’t trapped in the house, but I couldn’t go too far before hydraulic pressure became an issue; at over 60, when you gotta go, you gotta go.

As the weeks of ‘lockdown’ passed I realized surgery might not happen for a long time.

And then I got mad and decided to do something about my problem, myself.

I cut a piece of PVC pipe to make an extension to pee through. Didn’t work; the stream, coming through the tiny orifice of my meatus, zips out at about Mach 3, hits the side of the pipe, takes a helical path down the inside wall, and spins out the end like a giant fan. Okay, maybe a longer pipe.. Then I got a brainstorm, made a $5 eBay purchase.. It’s a “crevice tool” for a vacuum cleaner; round on one end, flattened out to a slot on the other. The rectangular slot turns the lawn sprinkler into a dribble. Perfect. The crevice tools come in 8” or 14” lengths. I ordered a spare. One for the bathroom, one for my motorcycle tank bag, which I carry around as a “man purse.”

I started checking into catheters. If I can put a contact lens in my eye, I can manage a catheter. But the standard size for catheters is 8mm, which is the bottom of the “normal” urethra size range. I knew I had a stricture, but how bad was it? I ordered a some of the bumpy silicone rubber sounds off eBay; two overlapping sets gave a range from 4mm to 13mm. The 5mm one would go in, the 6mm wouldn’t.

Well, so much for that.. I looked at urethral sounds, then discovered penis plugs, and then that there were hollow penis plugs. Bingo! I ordered a 6mm plug. Took a while to get it in, but after that I could pee like a laser beam. Until it fell out. So I ordered a 7 and an 8. And wound up ordering several more 8s and 9s, sanding them down to intermediate sizes to step up. Penis plugs are basically jewelry. Other than a handful of square-ended plugs (all larger than I could handle), they’re intended to be worn a while, then removed if they don’t fall out on their own, since they expand the urethra and meatus eventually.

About this time I discovered the tetherspout web site. The tetherspout is basically a hollow tube with a small flange, you shove it in, then you push a washer behind it, turn the washer inside the glans, and push the spout back through, so the washer traps it in the fossa navicularis. I bought a set and most of the accessories, and thought I was good to go.. But after removing the 9mm plug, within hours my meatus clenches back to 5.5mm or so. I worked through expanding it a couple more times - much faster now - but the flange on the spout is 8.5mm and the neck is 6mm; if I put it in, getting it back out later might be an adventure.

After a while I figured the spout needed a sleeve. I found some stainless steel tubing with a 6mm ID and 9MM OD, and some clear vinyl tubing. I ordered both, but they have yet to arrive, so I’m still using the tube for now.

The sleeve will hold the meatus open so the spout can be removed, and hopefully the meatus will eventually adapt and stay that size. One thing I noticed after the 8mm plug fell out was that I could pee in straight streams again, so my problem is a simple stricture and not gross deformation of the opening. (and then I had to fish the plug out of the toilet.)

There is a recognized procedure urologists use for dealing with strictures. Several clinics have PDFs of the procedures on their web sites. First they administer general anesthesia or a spinal, then they ram dilators in, tearing whatever is in the way. The average time for the procedure is 20 minutes. Then they send you home with an admonition to go to the ER bleeding becomes a problem. And if they damage the meatus you’ll still have control problems, and the strictures often return, requiring a repeat procedure every year or two. Nooo.. I’ll just stay with my plugs, stretching one or two French sizes at a time.

Phase 2:

With the urination problem addressed, I moved on to the adhesions. There was a dime-sized adhesion at about 2 o’clock, between the corona and the circumcision scar. The skin had grown onto the inner shaft. A plastic surgeon would doubtless have effective ways to fix that. To cut to the chase, I worked at it for a few days and basically ripped it loose, then kept manipulating it so it wouldn’t grow back together while it healed.

Yes, it hurt. But compared to the months of staph infection, what would once have had me screaming for Demerol only rated as “modest annoyance.”

Phase 3:

I had had a perfectly average penis, with a circumcision scar that was just a slightly darker color band; no difference in texture or sensation from the rest of the skin. A ring of boils had formed around the circumcision band, which left a nasty scar.. And since I’m very much a “grower” and the skin rolls up the shaft when flaccid, that’s the exact area that rubbed against my underwear, so the scabs kept getting peeled off, and I not only wound up with a thick scar band, it was so tight that when erect, it shut off blood circulation to the end of my shaft. Unless I’m completely flaccid, it also obstructs urination. Imagine a tiny cock ring halfway down the shaft, that’s too tight and can’t be removed. Most of the other scars have faded, but the ring scar apparently isn’t going anywhere.

There’s a procedure called a “cosmetic circumcision” that’s still somewhat rare; instead of removing the foreskin, they remove a wide band of skin near the base, pull the foreskin back down the shaft, and sew it to the skin at the base. I don’t have a foreskin, but it looked like the same basic procedure could remove the ring scar. Except.. The ‘rona.

Okay, try something else. In the 1990s I played around with a homemade tube and a Mityvac. I was quickly able to pack the 2” tube, was able to get to 7” in the tube, 5.75” erect outside. But I started to develop an upward curve where I had formerly been straight, and prominent veins were an annoyance when masturbating, so I stopped pumping.

I dug out the tube, lubed up, and pumped. At 1/2” Hg there’s noticeable tension on the scar; at 1” Hg it’s getting painful, even by my revised standards. I backed off to 3/4”, more or less, giving a short pump when pressure dropped. After a 20 minute session I had stretched the scar enough so it slid freely up and down the shaft. Yeah-buddy, maybe I can’t get an ideal cosmetic result, but if I can get a hard-on without the end of my shaft turning black, I can live with that.

The 2” tube wasn’t going to cut it. I packed it 20+ years ago, and I’m still packing it. Pumping for length wasn’t the answer here; that just tugged painfully. I needed girth. I ordered a 2.5” no-name cylinder, which I never could get to seal very well, and then a 2.25” LeLuv cylinder, which works OK. The LeLuv cylinder is actually 2-3/8” in diameter inside; I would have preferred a true 2.25.

One of the problems with the 2.25” cylinder is it’s just big enough to let a testicle get wedged at the base. I found the Froehle cylinders from Germany, that look like dildos with testicles. They had one that’s pretty much my (former) erect size, so I ordered it. Of course, shipping from Europe is slow now, too.. Hopefully since the Froehle tube has a place for my balls, they’ll go there and stay.

I was making good progress until I tried (very gently) to masturbate a week or so later. The scar didn’t like that at all, even though I wasn’t actually touching it. It was flexing as it lipped up over the glans, and I guess it didn’t like the flexing. It felt chapped, and scabs re-formed, and, maybe because of my age and because it’s summer and sweaty down there, I’m not healing very fast any more.

I’m letting it heal up now. I had started pumping before it was completely healed, with the idea that if I could keep it stretched while it was healing, the larger the diameter of the healed ring would be. Which I think is still valid, but as slowly as I heal now, I’m starting to worry about the open wounds (small as they are) collecting a new infection.

Part of the healing problem is that the skin rolls up over the scar, which either leaves the scar damp or pulls it off when unrolled. Reading here and other places, I learned about extenders. They sounded like just the thing to deal with that. I ordered one and it came in promptly, but it turns out I have a relatively small glans; the noose doesn’t want to stay on without more tension than I feel is safe. The band crosses one of the scarred areas, which doesn’t like that at all. After a while I realized I can make a new end piece for the extender to accept the tetherspout; I’ll put a picture of that up later. Basically a piece of aluminum angle a couple of holes and a slot so the spout can hook to it. That will keep the shaft extended.. Once my freaking tubing comes in so I can make the spout sleeves.

So, maybe TMI, but since I’m working more for “restoration” than “enhancement”, hopefully some of my questions won’t sound as odd.

My Froehle tube came in yesterday. It’s an “anatomically correct” tube with a big pocket for your balls.

Took about three weeks out of Germany. Once it hit the US the vendor sent me a USPS tracking number, which showed it entering the US in Philadelphia, going to Illinois, back to Pennsylvania again, to some place *else* in Illinois, and back to Pennsylvania again before veering off in my direction. Strange and mysterious are the ways of the United States Postal Service..

When I resumed pumping a couple of months ago I was having trouble with my balls getting pulled up against the edge of the tube, with the usual “discomfort.” I decided to step up to a larger tube, found the German Froehle, whined about the price for a week or so, and finally ordered one from from a German vendor called “orion.de” which had an English site and would ship to America. With postage it came out to around $120 in $USD.

The tube I ordered was PP013-L, the closest I could get to my size. The length is 8.2”, which is way longer than I need, and the diameter is 2”. I was already packing a 2” tube, but most of the girth was at the base, so I figured I’d try it even though I can’t get into a straight 2” tube any more. Froehle makes larger diameter tubes, but they all have an exaggerated baseball-bat shape that I dislike.

After all the waiting I was a somewhat underwhelmed. The tube has a lengthwise mold line with a few sharp edges on the outside. The gasket at the bottom had an injection sprue on the inside that stuck out a bit. There was a hand bulb with no gauge, and the hose is only a foot and a half long. The inside of the tube still had what looked like mold-release powder.

NEW TOY! I washed it off, lubed up - including my balls, which was a bit different - and gave it a spin.

What I hadn’t considered is that the “balls” section and the way the mouth of the tube is shaped makes it, topologically, a “full package” tube. Which was bleeding obvious in retrospect.. The problem I expected was being able to get my shaft and balls in the tube at the same time. In recent months my scrotum has been very tight, with my balls riding mostly inside the body cavity.

It turned out to be a non-issue. I entered mostly flaccid, then pushed the tube down toward the scrotum as far as it would go. The gasket opening is a bit under 2-1/2”. I was able to get enough of a seal on my scrotum to pull some vacuum. I felt my testicles slide around the gasket into the tube one at a time, no problem. And they were entirely comfortable; no pulling or stretchy sensations. This was the first time my balls encountered any vacuum, so I did have some concerns there..

I liked the tube a *lot*. It didn’t pinch like the 2” tube or dig into my pelvis like the 2-1/4”. I wound up extending from my usual 20 minutes to 30 minutes just because I liked the feel of it. Bear in mind I was pumping at my usual 3/4 to 1 in. Hg. To stretch some scar tissue on the skin; I’m not working for length or girth, at least not yet.

I never could get a decent seal, so wound up working the pump every 30 seconds or so. I re-seated the tube several times, even tried replacing the pump and hose with the one from my MityVac that I use with the other tubes. I thought I might be getting some leakage in the scrotal area, but I didn’t feel any air moving through, and I wasn’t getting the slobbery noises I sometimes got before I expanded to fit the straight tubes. “More research is required.”

After 30 minutes I reluctantly stopped pumping, the gauge fell to zero, and I tried to remove the tube. Um, nope. There’s a fairly sharp rectangular corner on the inside of the gasket, not enough to be an issue while pumping, but my balls didn’t want to pass it. If I’d waited a while I’m sure it would have fallen off on its own, but I had to go to the bathroom. I pulled at the scrotum skin outside the tube and used it to pull my balls out one at a time. Worked just fine.

In the morning I had another session, also at 30 minutes, and just left it on when I was done. Another 15 minutes for me to shrink and it pulled off without much fuss.

So, while I was a bit disappointed with the build quality and the cheesy pump, it is exceedingly comfortable and I plan to spend much time in it in the future.

That is not easy.

Be Well!!!

Trying to get the scabs to heal is a hassle; when I’m flaccid the skin rolls up around them and it stays sweaty down there in summer weather. I’ve managed to heal several times, but the skin is so thin and delicate that just pushing it back to urinate tore it once. Why some of it is that way when there are thick scar ridges right next to it, who knows..

Looking at the “penis extender” section, I thought “aha!”. I could keep the shaft extended so it could stay dry and heal. I found one of the generic extenders on eBay for $15. It came with a flat strap and a noose. Excellent. The strap was a no-go; it was wide enough that it overlapped some of the healing areas. So I tried the noose. It took a while to get strapped in - I could really stand to lose some more weight - and I got to try it out.

Actually, astonishingly comfortable, even when I experimentally cranked the tension up all the way. And the pivots were arranged so that I could point my shaft up, straight out, or down, and it would stay there. Folding it down, I could sit and walk about without any problems. After fifteen minutes I took it off to let blood circulate. But I wound up not using the extender again.

I don’t quite have a “baseball bat” shape, but my shaft is quite thick behind the glans, and the glans itself is on the small side, and more pointy than bulbous. My wife thinks it’s fabulous, but the fat shaft/small glans thing requires more tension on the noose than I was happy with.

I looked at the Penimaster Pro, which uses vacuum instead of a noose. Perfect! Except.. Man, that’s not a $15 extender.. $300 to $400 depending on the accessories, and the sluices and diaphragms are expendables. But it’s suitable for all-day wear, and that was *exactly* what I was looking for. I was looking for loose change under the couch cushions when I found a Size Doctor on eBay for $55. Same basic idea, except it uses flexible gaskets instead of the sluices and diaphragms. I clicked back to Thunder and read some Size Doctor threads, then clicked “buy.”

What came in looked fine, but it didn’t have the fitted box shown in the listing, nor did it have any directions. So I went looking for directions, found the Size Doctor web site, and.. What I bought was a counterfeit. Frack. I sent a message to the customer support address on the Size Doctor web site describing what I’d bought and including the link to what I’d purchased, but they never bothered to respond, so I guess if they’re not worried about it I’m not either. BTW, an authentic Size Doctor isn’t *that* much cheaper than the Penimaster Pro..

The fake Size Doctor worked; at least once I found the correct gasket it pops on and stays in place even with some tugging. The problem was, I was only of average length to start with, minus whatever I lost during the infection/scarring (I’ve been afraid to measure) and I have a thick fat pad. The extender has really beefy springs, and they have to be fully compressed for me to try to pump the glans into the chamber. If I had three hands I could do it, but then the tension would be the max the device could do. I’m working on the scars now; I don’t want to complicate things with a powerful stretch too.

Last night I dragged it back out, disassembled it, and measured the springs. They don’t come out in even measurements in either inch or metric. The closest I could find was 11/32”, which is pretty much a weirdball size. A full evening on the web found some, all .047” wire. The existing ones are .032”, so that’s going the wrong way. I finally found a place that had springs that would fit: .343 OD, 3” long, 25 turns, closed-end coils. Available in .018, .022, .025, and .028” wire diameters. And they were less than $2 each.

There was, however, the problem of the $40 minimum order, plus shipping..

Um. I’ll keep looking for springs. Arrrrgh!

While sulking about the situation last night I noticed that the spring tubes of the vacuum cap were open on the front end. I rummaged through a drawer and found a length of paracord. It just about fills the small diameter holes. I cut off a piece, fed it through, tied knots in the ends, and now I have a yoke to use it as an All-Day Stretcher. The Mrs. Donated an unwanted leather belt (out of style, I guess) that I cut off and punched some new holes in, to buckle up over my calf. I have a couple of coils of small diameter elastic cord around here somewhere.. I have two because the first one crawled off and hid when I needed to replace the one on my shoulder rig, only to reappear when the second coil showed up from eBay. Now they’re both hiding. They can crawl, but they can’t hide forever!

If I can wear the vacuum cap as an ADS for a week or so I guess I’ll blow $40+ on some less-authoritative springs.

Thanks, Stixman!

I’m enjoying your lateral thinking and creativity Andy. I hope you get the results you need and want.

Well, it’s better than sitting around feeling sorry for myself!

Thunder’s Place has been a valuable resource for me. I’m not doing anything that members don’t do all the time, I’m just starting from a different place.

If my blithering doesn’t help anyone out, maybe I’ll at least be entertaining.

Correction: the fake Size Doctor did come with a manual, but it’s written in chicken tracks that I assume are Chinese.

There was, however, a picture of the lines on the spring tubes, apparently showing the tension as the end of the rod passes each line. The lowest setting is 1Kg; reasonable given the preload on the springs. The fully compressed setting - adjustment of tension is only by changing rod lengths, there’s no screw adjustment - is 2.1Kg. I don’t feel so bad about failing to manage 4-5/8 pounds of spring tension with one hand while trying to work the valve and squeeze bulb with the other while everything is coated with lube..

And in other news, the DIY ADS appears to be a success. In our thrilling previous installment, I had strung a paracord yoke for the vacuum head of the fake Size Doctor, shortened a belt to go over my calf, and rigged some elastic cord with a cord stopper. I completed the ensemble with a carabiner between the elastic cord and the yoke on the vacuum head, which let me remove the head to urinate, and the carabiner doesn’t quite touch the floor when hanging loose.

The fSD came with six gaskets, marked 1-5 and one unmarked. The unmarked one was the largest, and centered. The other ones were offset as much as their center holes allowed. There was no indication of which way was “up”, nor did the Chinese fold-out have a picture.

I started with the largest gasket, which held briefly, then popped loose. I worked my way down to #5, #4, #3, and finally #2 which was just right. I then tried it in both orientations; it seemed to hold better with the hole offset to the bottom. This took about an hour of fiddling and it was late, and I fell asleep before taking it off, instead of starting in the morning as was the plan. A couple of hours later I woke up, everything was still firmly attached, and when I removed the vacuum cap there was no edema, soreness, or anything unusual that I could feel. The gasket had overlapped part of one of the scars on installation; I could feel it, but it didn’t actually hurt, so I didn’t worry about it. On removal the scar wasn’t abnormally sensitive.

With the glans under vacuum I expected some swelling, but it seemed perfectly normal. I don’t know why, but I’m not going to complain.

I really wanted to put it back on, but I figured 2+ hours was enough for a first test; no need to overdo it, there’s always tomorrow. Well, later today, given the time.

As far as I’m concerned the Anti-Turtling Device is a smashing success. I’ll have to get some boxer-style underwear so I can wear it around the house during the day.

There’s been a lot of “hurry up and wait” with all this, so it’s nice when a plan comes together.

So, I was looking forward to a session with my new tube last night, maybe followed by the vacuum ADS. Alas, it was not to be.

My blood pressure runs about 160 when untreated; that was “normal”, forty years ago. Then they cranked it down to 140, and now it’s 120, depending on who’s lecturing. My doc preferred to treat it with a diuretic called Bumex. The stuff actually works; if I take it daily as directed, it will drop my BP from 150-160 to the high 1-teens. But the drawback is that from 5 PM when I usually take it, until around midnight, I have to go every fifteen minutes. Which is annoying, and the raw patches on the shaft make it painful, and we have only one bathroom and my wife has a bladder about the size of a walnut, meaning use-collisions are frequent. With the Bumex, the line between “go NOW!” and “nice try” is pretty narrow.. “Woman, what are you *doing* in there? How long does it freakin’ take to pee?”

I was getting sort of sloshy and my BP was up at 160 again. I took the full dose instead of my usual half-dose, which was a mistake. It made my kidneys hurt, which is fairly normal for me with diuretics, and then my bladder started to hurt, like I’d been punched about the pubic hairline, and I was dribbling a lot. That’s not usual. It’s getting better slowly, but I hope it’s not a bladder stone. I know what a kidney stone feels like, and that isn’t it, anyway. Maybe it’s just generalized “prostatitis.” I don’t have any ongoing problem there that I know of; if I go while changing plug sizes, I flow like a garden hose. Nice to have *something* that works properly. So far.

The Bumex works fine for controlling blood pressure, but that means about a third of every day I’m stuck in the house within gimping distance of the toilet. I can’t make it back into the house from outside between the time the urge hits and it’s too late. It might not be that sudden for everyone. So I’ve been doing a half-dose every week or two, which puts my BP in the mid-130s, which is actually fairly spectacular, considering the space between doses. But this is the first time I’ve had this particular reaction. If it doesn’t clear up in a few days I’ll call the doc.

If I *had* to be on diuretics all the time I’d buy some catheters and bags. After the meatus stretching and plugs, I’m not afraid of the catheter. Going out with a bag of warm piss strapped to my leg would definitely be a downer, but there comes a point where getting out of the house and living something within sight of a “normal” life would be worth it.

A few weeks ago I was delighted to find this thread by x10d: DMSO + Iodine Experimental Treatment for Deflated Glans and Firm Flaccid It looked like maybe 1/4 to 1/2 the people who tried various DMSO-based mixtures had positive results, and in the worst case they had no results and bad breath for a while.

It appeared safe and the investment was modest, so I ordered an assortment of chemicals and some brown glass dropper bottles. Everything has finally arrived.

For most PE uses, the DMSO is a deep penetrant carrying scar-reducing payloads down into the tunica and ligaments to treat PE-induced micro-scars. I’m treating a surface condition - the scars on the skin itself - and a penetrant of lesser authority would be just fine. There are various "natural oils" that are supposed to be able to do that, but I’ve found no trustworthy listing of their relative penetrating ability.

The standard for measuring penetration, which I did find, is to take the sample liquid, add one of the commonly used medical stains or dyes, and brush it onto cadaver skin. At intervals you slice a strip off and measure how far the dye has penetrated. It’s not exactly rocket surgery as far as research - you can even buy human cadaver skin from tissue supply companies on the web - but if anyone has actually done such testing, I haven’t found the paper with the results.

Some percentage of users have unwanted reactions to DMSO; if I turn out to be one of them I’ll follow up on the oils. Meanwhile, DMSO is known to work, even if it is overkill for my purpose.

Got back to the vacuum stretcher last night. Had an interesting failure.

I had replaced the tiny carabiner connecting the shock cord to the yoke on the vacuum cap with a larger carabiner and used the cord stopper to take up the slack. I’m just putting enough tension on for “anti-turtling”, not actually stretching. But I was only just fluffed enough to get the vacuum cap on, and when I tensioned the shock cord I didn’t think anything about it. Eventually about an inch of shaft worked itself inside the vacuum cap, and I had a sizeable donut inside it.

I worked the cap off without any drama, figured out what had gone wrong, and the donut went away after a few hours. But now I know I have to maintain some tension until the shaft is fully elongated. I’ll try it again tonight.

The shock cord runs around the belt and through the carabiner, with the ends joined through the cord stopper. I didn’t realize that doubled the resistance of the cord. Tonight I’ll re-rig it to get rid of the loop.

The inside corners of the leather belt are sharp and dig uncomfortably into my leg. I need to round them over.

Yo you like a soldier man, good luck with everything.

Thanks, Dick!

Over the last few days I’ve been reading up on cryolipolysis. I’ve lost sixty pounds in the last year, but the fat pad hasn’t changed any, and the turtling is still keeping the damaged part of my shaft from properly healing. I was looking into liposuction, which is both temporary and expensive. Temporary would be okay, but unfortunately the price was out of my range, though I did briefly consider going DIY.

Cryolipolysis popped up while searching on liposuction. I has been around a while, though it was new to me.

The idea sounds like something from crackpot in a strip mall, but the FDA approved it and few people seem to have any complaints other than the price.

Basically, cryolipolysis (I’m just going to call it "CL" from now on) applies a cold object to the skin over the fatty area. The cold isn’t enough to damage the skin, but the fat underneath is more sensitive, and slowly dies off and is eventually flushed from the body, though it can take months. Treatments range from $750 to $1500.

Early CL systems ran as low as -14F, newer ones as high as 49F. Procedure times run from half an hour to two hours. So there’s a lot of range there. After a few months, patients will normally lose 5mm to 7mm of fat. I’m guessing that’s about as deep as the cold effectively reaches, given circulation etc. keeping the fat below that above the critical temperature. Hence the "sculpting" marketing angle, since if you have much fat to start with, you might not notice the change.

The big dog in the market is CoolSculpting, which has a number of patents and an impressive marketing and licensing system. There are also a number of competitors, and even "at home" kits.

CoolSculpting has some patents, but they’re all on applicator systems as far as I can tell. The basic CL idea is not protected. Everyone who sells a system warns that you should never, ever try to DIY or horrible but generally unspecified things will happen. In particular, you should never think you can just slap an ice pack from the freezer over the area and get away with it.

The viewpoint of a doctor who uses the process, but isn’t too impressed with CoolSculpting’s marketing system:
The Cold Hard Truth About CoolSculpting® | IAPAM

This guy did all the research I had started, and came to the same conclusions that I was starting to arrive at. I followed some of his references and found his conclusions reasonable. If you have any interest in CL at all, I urge you to check out his site, which is the result of much painstaking work:
https://fellrnr … i/CoolSculpting

After reading a number of the anti-DIY web pages (frostbite! necrosis! subdermal infections!) I got a cold pack out of the freezer and took it to bed last night. I’ve been using them on my knees for years and somehow they didn’t rot off.

I sleep on my sides, so holding the cold pack on the fat pad isn’t simple. Really tight underwear might do it, or maybe a hernia truss like you used to see advertised in old issues of "Popular Mechanics." But I decided to try a different area. I’ve lost 60 pounds, but I’ve gained flab in areas I’ve never had any before; most annoyingly, "bra fat" bulges under my armpits. WTF dude? In the last five or six months they’ve gotten so big they actually sag down. DEATH TO THE BRA FAT!

After extensive consideration I constructed a plan:
A) raise up on one elbow
B) slide cold pack between bed and fatty area
C) drop down
D) read Thunder’s on the tablet until I fall asleep

Despite its complexity I actually managed to accomplish this. When I got up to pee during the night, I put the used pack back in the freezer and got a fresh one, then laid down on the other side.

By accepted criteria both sides are now fully treated. It’s not an area where I can get a good measurement, at least not a repeatable. Results, if any, may take months. On the other hand it was absolutely free, and I can repeat the procedure as often as necessary.

My underwear kept rubbing the raw ridge. I bought a plastic jock cup to wear when mowing the lawn, etc. With a little lubricant I hope it will avoid rubbing through the thin skin.

The DMSO+iodine mix worked almost instantly - as in half a day - relaxing the hardened scar, and it has stayed that way. I’ve been applying the mix several times a day. I’m apparently one of the lucky ones; no bad breath or BO from the DMSO. But I’ve seen none of the other benefits reported in x10d’s thread. I’m so happy with the effect on the scar I don’t care. I’m going to drop back to once a day and see if the scar tightens back up. I got a slight tingle the first time I applied the mix, after that nothing. I’ve been applying Vitamin E oil as a moisturizer since before I started the DMSO. The E oil doesn’t last very long, so I’ve been using castor oil every other time. The castor lasts a lot longer. Vaseline lasts a very long time, but it gets all over my crotch by the end of the day.

The USB heating pad I bought for my pumping cylinder is useless. It just barely gets warm enough to notice. 2A at 5V, I should have paid attention.

Another forum has been extolling the virtues of “red light therapy.” Turned out that the 650 and 850nm wavelengths are commonly available in IR heating lamps. I bought a 60W lamp with the correct specifications from eBay to try.

I ordered one of the LeLuv static extenders. The fake JES extender and the shape of my glans don’t get along even with the shortest rods. Hopefully the LeLuv will let me hold the shaft out without putting much tension on the glans so it doesn’t slip through.

I thought the Size Doctor with a strap would be the answer, but the gasket setup and the raw area on the shaft overlap sometimes, and it won’t stay on unless there’s a minimum level of tension, since the tension is what maintains the vacuum. It took me a while to figure that out. Once I heal a bit I’ll go back to using it. I have an idea for changing to threaded rods to turn it into a static extender, but my round tuit list is getting pretty long nowadays.

The wide oval shaft/small glans thing is a real hassle with extenders. I’ve been wondering if something like a Bib hanger clamp might be better than a strap, noose, or vacuum cap. It might be too wide to fit between the rods, though.

One of the JES extenders is modified with an aluminum crossbar so I can snap the end of the Tetherspout into it. In theory, this is the ideal extender solution: slide the extender on, slide the sticking-out part of the spout into the U-shaped slot, done. Just flip it down to disconnect to pee, though that might not even be necessary. But it takes a lot of stretching to get the spout and retainer in there, and manipulating the glans to get the bits lined up has been more painful and frustrating than I’ve been able to overcome, so far. Not the spout itself, but when I pull the excess skin back and start kneading, it tears the raw spots up. Which is why I’m messing with the other extenders.

The L-argenine came in, and I started taking it. Nothing to report yet.

Ordered an “infant blood pressure cuff” after reading about air clamps in some old threads. My idea is to use one of my spare pumps to turn it into a “dick squeezer” to help pump blood around in the shaft while sleeping. There might be plenty of blood already, but for $8 and some bits from the parts box, why not? I could always try using it as an air clamp later.

I’ve collected an impressive amount of hardware, some of which may not be useful, but it’s still cheaper than surgery…