Movember Update I – Men’s Health with Air Quotes

There is more to Movember than just growing a moustache and here’s one of those things.

The high concept behind Movember is Men’s Health and the lack of interest and knowledge about what can be loosely called Men’s Health issues.  There are plenty of events and knowledge promoting women’s health:  Breast Cancer awareness, Run for the Cure, various medical tests and so on. 

Men don’t talk about their health, specific to the parts we don’t have in common with women.  To paraphrase Spike Lee; It’s a Man Thing, You Wouldn’t Understand.  We were and are brought up to tough it out, no matter what.  If a javelin is stuck through our head, we might consider seeing the doctor, but only because we’re having trouble getting through the revolving door at the office, or can’t get into the cab of the forklift.

Men absolutely will not, even under interrogation, admit to anything being abnormal, unwell or strange below the belt.  We don’t discuss it, we don’t ask our men friends any questions about the goods and we will not tell our doctors about anything that might be off.  It’s all perfect, wonderful, fully operational, potent, big and robust.

Which is utter bullshit.

The penis, testicles and prostate are as susceptible to medical problems as any other human body part, male or female.  Cancer, inflammation, injury, decrease in operational effectiveness and so on are all just as prevalent in men, but being men, we’ll never admit it.  Which is why Movember exists:  Men should talk about it, and do what they can to prevent or find out about the afflictions that can potentially kill us.

As an informal survey here:  How many men check their testicles on a regular basis for swelling, tenderness or abnormal growths?  Hands up please?  That would be none, as best as I can see from here.

You remember Tom Green?  Ex-husband of Drew Barrymore and one-time funny man?  He lost a testicle to cancer because he didn’t check his junk on a regular basis.       

We were never taught or told that yes, indeed you should check the boys every month or so.  Give them a good feel, look for unusual tenderness and run them through your fingers to check for swelling, or something misshapen.  Each testicle should be about the size of a walnut, give or take and shouldn’t be unusually tender.  Yes, testicles are tender, that’s their normal state, but if you’ve owned a pair for a while, you can tell if they’re more tender than they should be.  If you press on one and it goes “OwFuck!” then that’s not right and should be checked by a doctor.

An “Official” Junk test is here: http://tcrc.acor.org/tcexam.html from the Testicular Cancer Resource Centre.  The issue they bring up is not to find cancer with a monthly self-exam, but to get used to what your testicular state of “normal” is, so you find anything odd, early enough.

It’s the same drill with women and a breast cancer self-exam:  Get used to what is supposed to be there (there is a wide range of ‘normal’ be it tits or nuts) so you spot an anomaly early, then get it checked by a doctor.  Most women understand it, so why don’t men get it?  Because we are not as aware and have never been taught or told to check the junk on a regular basis.  Men, you have now been told and click on the link to be taught.

Can you turn this into a saucy event?  With a little imagination, a willing partner and some knowledge, you most certainly can.  One would think that you would have a reasonable base of knowledge about your partner’s bosomy delights and should feel comfortable enough with their geography to go touring on a regular basis, why not?  (As an interesting aside, about ten percent of the time it’s a partner who finds a breast lump.)  Since turnabout is fair play, invite your partner to be more involved in your health.

Bottom line?  Check the Boys on a regular basis.  If you’re not sure about what you’re finding, then get to a doctor and have a medico give you guidance.