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But condemnation and promise of Hellfire still wasn't enough of a deterrent for me. Dealing with my hungry teenage penis was like picking up a hot kettle with nowhere to set it down. With great shame, I masturbated constantly and stuck my dick in every vaguely vaginal orifice I could find—couch cushions, vacuum hoses… Like most children growing up in an aggressively moralistic culture, I thought I was the only one who dealt with these impulses. So there was no one I could talk to it about—confessing to masturbation would be enough to get me kicked out of school. Coming in the palm of your hand or inside of an unwed uterus was utterly disgraceful. Worse yet was if you were ever caught with another boy—another boy, equally tortured by his own body, desperate for somewhere to put that hot kettle.The swelling continued until my scrotum puffed out like one of Dizzy Gillespie's cheeks.
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I was having plenty of sex, but keeping my little secret hidden from the woman I was bumping pelvises with was exhausting. Years later I heard artist Brigid Berlin explain that she never wanted men to see how fat she was during sex, so she'd always be naked and under the covers before they came into the bedroom. I could relate. When my girlfriend and I would strip down to our awkward, juvenile skin, I'd always make the sure the room was dark, the blankets were plentiful, and the sex positions were minimal.By this time, I'd moved out on my own and the world was becoming a very complex place. My biblical literalism was being challenged by critical thinking. Morality and desire were in a constant battle. Years later I would become a thick-skinned atheist, but at 18, I still hated myself for the sex and drugs that had become a part of my everyday life. Though by that time I was starting to accept that the world was more complex than the mythology I'd been raised in.I wasn't ready to accept the idea that the universe was an explosive mix of complex beauty and untethered chaos—but I was ready to see a doctor. I'd had very little contact with hospitals as a child, and had little idea how to navigate that world as an adult. I'd explained all the details of my fist-sized testicle to a woman over the phone, but she was just the receptionist. After repeating my story to a half dozen other people, I was eventually penciled in for an appointment with a urologist."When I lowered my trousers, the doctor gasped, stared, and then left the room."
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Today I'm all about pills. Can't get enough of them. I'd swallow an iPod shuffle if convinced I'd get the same effect as Oxycontin. But back then, I had a deadly fear of medication. While I was recuperating at my Grandmother's house, my dad's voice was still a locked groove spinning constantly in my head: "The word pharmacy is derived from the Greek 'pharmakeia,' which translates to witchcraft, or sorcery." Therefore eating pills was tantamount to engaging in a Satanic orgy.So I refused all the prescribed opiates and just dealt with the pain. Or at least endured it, because as bad as you may think the healing process of a broken bone or third-degree burns are, try having that treasure chest between your thighs sliced like a Thanksgiving turkey, sewn back together, and then throb like a screaming infant for weeks. With no drugs.After a while, I moved back to my apartment and was cared for by my girlfriend, who made a big show about me not telling her about my condition or the surgery. She was hysterical, but I was sure it was an act. After all, how could she not have noticed my giant organ slapping her in the ass like a fleshy blackjack every time we had sex?She'd most likely been in some mind-twisting state of denial, hoping the issue would just go away if she just didn't acknowledge it. I was 19 by then, and was getting too old for such childishness. After a few weeks of constantly sitting on bags of ice while I smoked weed and discovered the novels of Tom Robbins, the swelling went down and I once again had a balanced bag of balls. Staring at my now-restored coin purse in the mirror, I realized there was nothing shameful or evil about my body, and was looking forward to the years ahead of shame-free sex.Until I discovered crabs.Follow Josiah on Twitter."Try having that treasure chest between your thighs sliced like a Thanksgiving turkey."