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I've just been activated (yesterday) and tried pumping for the first time. I have the AMS pump which seems pretty common. I find it very stiff and not yielding when I squeeze it. Also it was pretty painful when the doc did it. Can anyone suggest a way to improve or minimize the pain when using? Is it true that hot baths help? If so, why?

Thanks,

You can use hot wash cloth or bath or heat pad it will soften the plastic the pump the cylinders etc.
Before you inflate make sure can deflate first you get inflated and can't deflate you will not be a happy camper
Once you are sure you can deflate then like slide your thumb from the side over the pump to the inflate bulb
The tissue on the front of scrotum is probably sore yet. To activate the second had part is give it a hard quick squeeze
if you don't feel the little pop and the bulb is half flat then then push the deflate button to reset the pump until you get it
It can be a real pain in the butt. Ha ha but till the thing gets broken in. Search the ams web site. You tube etc
You'll get it endeavor to. persevere
Mike

It would help some to ease the pain to take a Tylenol 30 min. or so before you pump. Until you get your scrotum
callused, it is going to be a teeth grinder.

Jerryhios wrote: I find it very stiff and not yielding when I squeeze it. Also it was pretty painful when the doc did it. Can anyone suggest a way to improve or minimize the pain when using? Is it true that hot baths help? If so, why?

Thanks,

I got activated November 28. Same experience with my doctor when he activated it. PAINFUL. Got home and the bulb was like trying to squeeze the inside of a golf ball. Back in the day when you were a kid and peeled them apart? Couldn't squeeze it or hang on to it. I just kept at it the rest of the day and it got softer and softer and easy to handle with one or two hands. started with a few pumps and ended up around 8 the first day. Taking a bath maybe helped a little bit? It wasn't painful enough to take Tylenol but it wouldn't be a bad idea either. Now i cycle 3-4 times a day for about an hour at a time. Mainly because I can't leave it alone and am jacked about having a solid erection for the first time in many, many years.

Mark

I had lot's of discomfort the first week or so. My activation was about a month after surgery. It was a little harder to deflate, which kept the discomfort high. The video has to hold the deflate button 4 seconds. In the first couple of weeks, I could hardly get any deflation. As time went by, I learned to keep squeezing deflate until I felt the vibration stop. Then sometimes, wait a while, squeeze some more, feel more vibration. At first, I was afraid to squeeze the cylinders as they were hard, and I was afraid they would break. Now they feel a little softer and I can push them shorter while deflating.

I also found at first, that the pump felt hard, almost impossible to squeeze, because I wasn't getting much fluid out of the cylinders when deflating. Keep practicing, it gets easier. I am 4 months after surgery, 3 months after first deflation. I pump it up a couple of times a day usually, I try to pump to the point of discomfort, but I am having much less. At first, the girth near the head didn't seem full and hard to get cylinders near the glans. I am now noticing that there is more girth near the end, and when pumping to the max, the cylinders get closer to the glands. It is very useable now, hoping the end keeps getting a little more girth, and I will be very satisfied with another 1/2 inch. Lot's of info if you read back on the forum, everything takes time. My surgeon was pretty good about giving info, but those first couple of weeks after activation, I was wonderning "WTF" have I done.

Pumping in a hot bath is wonderful! Make sure you doc says it's ok first, though. You don't want to risk an infection.

Heat helps in two ways: Makes your sack looser so you can feel the parts, pump and deflate button, more easily, and it makes the pump softer and easier to press. A hot bath is the best since your balls are surrounded with heat that conducts well, not just some heat from the air. For me, it also eased discomfort immensely for the first couple of weeks. My favorite, and most comfortable, place for the first couple of weeks was in a hot bath. I even bought a hot tub after the first week and still use it. It's still much easier to pump and feel the parts in the hot tub, and I'm 6 months out from surgery.

Best wishes during these first weeks. It gets better. But IMO, the hot bath will be great forever.

Quincy