Would appreciate your thoughts on this theory.
Assume POIS is a autoimmune reaction to semen. How would this happen in the body?
1) Semen is not made in the body during orgasm - it is stored in testicles regardless of sexual activity.
2) Semen DOES NOT get into blood during ejaculation - it merely gets out from the testicles and then out of the body without entering the blood. How would the act of ejaculation, then, cause autoimmune reaction?
3) If the body reacted to semen, wouldn't it react to it always, even when it is in the testicles?
Please help me wrap my head around this, or maybe my statements are correct?
Hi vaarmen,
A few comments:
1) Only part of the semen comes from the testicles. some other components comes from the seminal vesicles, the prostate, and the bulbourethral glands ( for more details, see
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semen#Human_semen ). If an auto-immune reaction is indeed present at the root of POIS, it is certainly not from a component coming from the testes, because vasectomy, in which the canal coming from the testicles is cut, do not bring any relief to POIS, as seen in many members, myself included. So, the allergenic substance has to come from either seminal vesicles, the prostate, or the bulbourethral glands ( Cowper glands)
2) and 3) There is usually a lining that prevent direct contact between our blood and the content of the seminal vesicles, the prostate, or the bulbourethral glands. Just like there is a protective lining in your stomach, preventing your stomach to digest itself with its own acid production. If the lining in the urethral path is somehow broken or is leaking somewhere, this would explain the possibility of a hypersensitivity reaction.
We could then suppose that, in normal individual, with no POIS, the natural barrier is doing its job. I sould also suppose that, in order to have a hypersensitivity problem with semen, one would have to present BOTH a defect in urethral lining AND an immunological imbalance. This would explain why POIS is quite rare ( but these are only hypotheses, for now).
