Last updated on August 27, 2020
Question:
Hi. I would like to ask a personal question. I’m 15 years old and I have started to masturbate probably about 8. Pretty young at that time to be doing that. I would masturbate about four times a week. As time went by, my penis started to get crooked. I would like to know if this is normal. I’ve found out that there are surgeries available for these kinds of problems. I would like to know if there a way to fix this problem without using painful surgery.
Answer:
I’ve mentioned this a few times, but it is worth repeating. People have a strong tendency to link two events together and assume one causes the other without any more evidence than that they happened close to each other in time or involved similar things. Because you masturbated, you assume that it caused your penis to be crooked; yet, there are millions of boys who masturbate and this doesn’t happen to them.
Instead, let’s talk about what causes the shape of your erect penis. You have three chambers in your penis called the “corpus cavernosa.” Two are on top and one is on the bottom. The image to the right shows a cross-section of the penis with the chambers. The chambers are not empty but have networks of fibers holding the outer layer which keeps it from ballooning out too much. The pressure of the blood in the chambers, pushing outwards, but being restrained by the fibers is what causes your penis to both swell and become stiff.
No one is perfectly symmetrical, so small variations, such as tighter fibers in one area will cause the penis to bend slightly. Bends of twenty degrees or less are considered to be perfectly normal and are very common. However, sometimes damage can happen to one of the chambers, such as extreme bending of the penis when it is erect, a blow to the penis, or even damage from a disease. Though there are no bones in the penis, the erect penis can suffer internal breakage, such as the tearing of some of the fibers. In repairing itself, scar tissue can form which doesn’t allow the blood to flow evenly in the penis. The result is a bend that is called Peyronie’s disease, even though it isn’t a disease. The bend can be in any direction and can go from mild to severe. A penis that makes a 90-degree bend (“L” shape) or more (“U” shape) is considered severe. Sometimes the body is able to repair itself, but if a severe bend remains for more than six months, surgery is about the only option for removing the blockage. Sometimes Peyronie’s disease is accompanied by painful erections. Since the body avoids pain, such a person doesn’t get full erections and there is less chance for the body to repair the damage on its own. In these cases, a doctor will inject the area with something to lessen the pain and then wait a few months to see if the body heals itself. If you have a severe bend or painful erections, you need to see a urologist regarding treatment.
Slight bends are normal and nothing needs to be done. Such won’t affect sex with your wife because a woman’s vagina is flexible and can accommodate small bends easily.
Response:
Thanks for the advice. I really appreciate it. 🙂