MIRichards - Hanging with FIRe

Hi all,
New here and encouraged by what I’ve seen in terms of progress from “Hanging with FIRe”. I decided to try it for myself so bought a TM vac hanging setup with his FIRe heating pad. I felt I had everything in place to give it a go so today was my first run. I wasn’t really sure how to tape but watched TMs video’s and read posts here. I started by stretching my penis out to ensure no pinched skin and then put a band of tape on the shaft just below the coronal ridge. I then taped in T and X patterns until the glands were covered. I used some coconut oil to get into the bell and then pulled down the sleeve ensuring no skin was folded anywhere - my first time doing this, it’s awkward to say the least. I knew I was going to go very light so felt it wouldn’t be a big deal if everything wasn’t perfect. I started with the “bucket” empty (9oz) and then went up by 8oz after adding the heating pad on high. After 30min I added another 8 oz and removed the pad - 15 min cool down, although even at the end of this my penis still felt warm. The heating pad also seemed to shut off on its own during the 30min heated session, not sure if this is expected or not, I had to keep turning it back on. After I was done I removed the bell and then went to the sink to start removing the tape with warm water and soap - this wasn’t too bad but I noticed something disturbing. My circumcision scar seemed darker now and there appeared to be a ridge in my shaft right at the scar. I think was actually where the bottom edge of the tape ended up, since I taped stretched out a bit I am wondering if that cause some fluid buildup or something just where the tape edge was? Anyone else experience this, darker scar and a “ridge”. Do folks think it would be better to not tape below the coronal ridge or maybe tape even further down the shaft past the scar? - appreciate any guidance here!

I also turtled for a while - reading older posts about ADS or other means to prevent turtling, I didn’t see much talk about turtling in other hanging with FIRe threads, is the cool down supposed to prevent this, are others doing something else after the cool down to prevent turtling?

I ended up with a 1.85% strain even at this low weight but I don’t think I will do this again until I figure out best taping method after seeing what others here have to say.. Also plan to buy a robe going forward, a little chilly the way I did this today.

Thx in advance for any help with the above!

I was hoping someone more knowledgeable would answer, because I’m not a taper. Not yet, anyway. But I’ve been doing vacuum hanging for a while now.

I have different vacuum bells of different depths, and I’ve used pieces of cut-off sleeve as bands to help the main sleeve seal, and I’ve had different amounts of fluid build-up/edema depending on the configuration. And sometimes no fluid at all.

I think your ‘ridge’ is just an artefact of the edge of the tape keeping fluid from building up underneath, while the area under the sleeve can still get slight edema. I don’t think it’s anything to worry about.

I’m a long time pumper, recent vac hanger. Early in my pumping adventure my circ scar would get darker as would some of the shaft. Somewhere along the way it stopped being so pronounced. I suspect it may have been when I started using heat regularly, but that’s just a guess. Bottom line I think it is it a non event.

I agree with Andy that the ridge is an artifact of the tape, and should go away in a few hours.

I decided to step back and get comfortable with using the TotalMan setup before continuing with my journey - this has led me to a couple of questions:

1. I feel I am between sizes when it comes to the chamber, maybe I’m not, but I can fit easily into a large or have to grease up and work my way into the medium. I’m not “large” by any means but my coronal ridge is just large for my size if that makes sense. So what is better to do? Stuff myself into a medium or have room in a large? I figured stuffing into a medium would end acting like tape and prevent blisters but will it have any other detrimental effect?

2. I notice during hanging my glands seem pretty red, I then started thinking. Hmm the glands are under vacuum which is pulling blood into them, is the blood circulating enough? Am I risking anything by doing this for too long? I started relating this to using a pump where you need to stop every 15-20min which I assume is to swap out blood so to speak - any concerns here? I know it’s not exactly the same thing but the redness of the glands made me concerned enough to ask the question.

Thanks for the help - looking forward to getting to a point of comfort with what I’m doing so I can get to growing!

I use the smallest chamber I can reasonably fit into… but I have a small glans and a ‘torpedo’ shape that means the junction where the sleeve meets the chamber tends to pinch - well, it feels like a pinch - unless everything is perfectly arranged when I fold the sleeve down.

The Total Man chambers come in fairly coarse size steps. You can get some in-between sizes on eBay. They don’t look anything like the Total Man bits, but they work just the same. If you do that, note most of them use a different pump arrangement than the small-diameter nipple that TM uses, so make sure you get the matching bulb or mouth tube.

The longest I’ve hung has been four hours so far. My glans usually turns white after a couple of hours. It never gets numb or has any other signs of circulation problems. There’s nothing restricting the blood flow.