Ensayos geofísicos para estimación de esfuerzos

Traditionally, men with erection problems have tried to enhance their enthusiasm with aphrodisiacs. Mandrake root and other roots that resemble a penis have always been thought to have penis- invigorating properties. Certain animals have also been credited with magical sexual properties, because of the way they look, or behave. Rhino horn is particularly prized in the East, and the hunt for rhino horn to be ground up into sex tonics has made the rhino an endangered species.

Dogs, too, have had their day. In 1889 a distinguished French physiologist, Charles Brown-Sequard, then seventy-two years old, told an audience at the Société de Biologie in Paris that he had recently removed the testicles of a vigorous three-year-old dog, cut them in pieces, mashed them with water and injected himself with the filtrate. After ten years of abstinence, he said, he was once again potent and had just that morning had sex with his much younger wife. The announcement caused a sensation, but others who tried the experiment did not obtain the same results.

Thanks to modern technology we now have proven techniques for dealing with impotence, and no man needs to consider chopping up Fido to get relief.

PENIS IMPLANTS

Dr. Kaminetsky showed me a sample penis implant, the most effective permanent treatment for impotence. It was made of clear plastic and consisted of two thin tubes to be surgically inserted into the two erectile bodies in the penis, and a bulb called the reservoir that gets filled with saline solution and inserted behind the abdominal wall. A switching device is sewn into one of the testicles. ("Jack” described to me a similar device used by some female-to-male transsexuals.)

When the penis is at rest it's flaccid, but a bit stretched out. When a man wants to have sex he squeezes the wired testicle and the fluid in the reservoir fills up the cylinders, producing a nice erection. When sex is over, he presses the device in the scrotum again and the fluid drains back out. It sounds more like a physics experiment than a sex organ, but according to Dr. Kaminetsky it works quite well. It is a last resort, though, because it permanently destroys the erectile tissue.

Also, because a penis implant requires surgery, many couples decide against it. Dr. Kaminetsky described a typical scenario: “A man will come to see me who's impotent, and we'll go through all the

things he might try and very often the woman he's with doesn't even know he's here. We'll talk about the penile implant and that's it; that's what he wants. He gets all excited. Then he comes back and says, ‘My wife won't let me do it. She said, What are you, crazy?'”

“So what I do is I try to meet with the man and woman together, to explain to the woman that men view sex differently. Women view sex more as part of love, and they can have affection other ways. But if a man's not getting laid, if he can't fuck, he doesn't feel like a man. The woman feels guilty that the man's doing it for her when she doesn't care that much, or she's scared something's going to happen to him and it's going to be her fault. And I tell her, ‘Your husband Mr. Jones loves you and he wants to have sex with you, but he's not doing this for you, he's doing this for himself, this is very important to him.’”

ERECTION DRUGS

The first anti-impotence drug, alprostadil, went on the market in 1995. Alprostadil, which goes under the trade names Muse, Caverject and Edex, is either injected into the base of the penis (Caverject, Edex) or inserted with an applicator into the tip of the penis (Muse), and it works by relaxing the smooth-muscle cells and opening up the arteries. In men for whom this drug is effective (over 50 percent of cases), erection comes on within five to twenty minutes; in fact, the man gets an erection whether he feels like it or not. An alprostadil erection can last an hour or more; in rare cases, particularly if the drug is being used recreationally by a man with normal arteries, it can cause a dangerously prolonged erection. A man with an erection more than four hours old is suffering from priapism and ought to visit a doctor for deflation. Eventually, a constant erection can lead to “wooden penis” the penis becomes so fibrous from lack of oxygen that it can't get erections anymore. (Priapism may also be a side effect of sickle-cell anemia and certain tumors. It should always be attended to.)

VIAGRA: THE MALE PILL

By now most people who are interested in penises know about Viagra and related oral erection medications. A man takes a pill, and if it works for him he should have an erection within an hour or less. Men who were quoted in the media when Viagra first came out said the results were miraculous; they felt like teenagers again.

Viagra (generic name sildenafil) became an anti-impotence drug by accident. It was tested first as a drug to fight angina, the pain that comes from narrowing of the blood vessels near the heart. Though it wasn't effective against angina, test subjects wanted to keep their samples. The reason: The drug was giving them erections.

Viagra is said to be natural-feeling because it works with the chemicals released by the nervous system when a man is sexually aroused, and it won't be effective if he isn't aroused. There don't seem to be many side effects aside from an occasional flushed face, headache or upset stomach. Oh, yes, and 3 percent of men see everything with a slight bluish tinge, temporarily.

Viagra apparently has also been a factor in a number of deaths. The drug went on the market in April 1998, and by the end of November the FDA had received reports of 130 deaths that seemed to be Viagra-related. Viagra itself didn't kill anybody. Some Viagra users who had heart conditions probably died from the unusual exertion. Others may not have heeded the warnings. Viagra lowers blood pressure and shouldn't be taken with nitrates and other drugs that also lower blood pressure. (Those off-limits nitrates include amyl nitrate. Several men have died after taking Viagra and then getting high with poppers of amyl nitrate.)

Viagra's debut was an enormous success. By its third week on sale it had captured 94 percent of the impotence drug market, and doctors were writing forty thousand prescriptions a week. In its first three months, 2 million men were estimated to have tried it. Men began fine-tuning their dosage—100 mgs

or 50, taken on a full or an empty stomach. Now that there was a cure, they didn't mind admitting in public that they might not always be rock-hard when they wanted to be. Even former senator Bob Dole admitted it. He said he'd had surgery for prostate cancer and later participated in the Viagra clinical trials, and he thought it was a great drug.

The advent of Viagra, a boon for men, has also been good for certain endangered species. Early in 1999 I heard a report that as a result of the availability of the impotence pill in the Far East, the trade in rhino horn and tiger penis had greatly diminished.

Viagra doesn't just give men their erections back, it changes the sexual equation. As soon as it came out, women began worrying in print about the effect on marriages and other long-term relationships. If old men could get it up again, they'd leave their wives for younger women. Younger men would start fooling around more. Why didn't they invent a pill to make guys considerate instead of potent? Men said they needed Viagra to regain the ground they'd lost to the women's movement. Philip Weiss of the New York Observer saw Viagra as an obvious baby boomers’ drug. “They invented Viagra because their lives are too structured, they're in stuffy monogamous relationships and can't turn on. Forget all the window dressing—Viagra's not a gay drug, it's not a drug for women, it's not a drug for impotence. Viagra is the drug that is supposed to cure monogamy. Because monogamous sex is so … so, so fucking great.”

On a more earnest note, articles here and there made the point that impotence was almost always a complex problem, part physical, part emotional. And that Viagra, which merely treated its physical aspects, could cause havoc in some relationships. Viagra was in that sense a stereotypical male solution. A man could take a pill and he wouldn't have to talk about it.

The fact is, though, that all of us are talking about it. For months after its launch there were new Viagra headlines every few days. Gradually, more related stories began cropping up in family newspapers, about everything from the structure of animal penises to the structure of penis-friendly bicycle seats. My friend Enrique thinks amassing information about penises and using it in conversation may be, like Viagra, a substitute in this age of sexually transmitted diseases for the former joys of promiscuity.

After many a long month's immersion in Penis World I still believe the more we know about them the better. No one's ever going to get bored with penises, because in the flesh each one is different —"just like snowflakes,” I heard comedienne Margaret Cho say on TV. And as for the sanctity of the male mysteries, let's clear up the confusion. There are mysteries and then there are secrets.

Secrets aren't the same as mysteries, though they seem to be when they're hidden. Secrets can be told; mysteries just exist. The more we know about penises, the less we hide our feelings about them, the freer we can be with each other. Penises themselves are mysterious and powerful, and they always will be, no matter what anyone says.

EPILOGUE

FAMOUS FOR