April is Testicular Cancer Awareness Month, and we’re grabbing it right by the balls. Every day for the entire month, we will be publishing a new story aimed at getting men to better consider — and cherish — their family jewels in hopes of helping prevent a diagnosis that, if caught early enough, shouldn’t prove fatal. Read everything here.
Have you ever looked down at your nuts and wondered why they seem to be stitched together? You know the line I’m talking about — the one that goes down the middle of your scrotum and divides your balls into two parts. Well, if you have pondered this age old question, you’ll be pleased to know that you weren’t cut open and sewn up again as a child — everyone’s scrotum features this line, and it’s called the “perineal raphe.”
As reported by Healthline, the raphe “joins the internal septum with the scrotum,” while the septum “splits the scrotal sac in two parts with similar anatomy.” Basically, that seam separates each of your testicles internally, while externally, it exists as a result of fetal development — it’s the fusion of the urogenital folds, where the scrotum and penis closed toward the midline and fused in the womb. The external line extends from the anus through the gooch and the scrotum, and upwards through the penis.
Because fetuses all have the same “genital ridge” until around seven weeks of pregnancy — meaning everyone’s sex organs come from the same foundation — the raphe also exists in women, this time extending from the anus through the perineum (the female gooch) and to the labia.
There’s lots of other ways to phrase this explanation of the perineal raphe. One person on Reddit succinctly (but not completely accurately) described it as “where our vaginas would be had you been born a girl instead of a guy.” Another referred to it as the “vagina-nutsack-anus scar,” adding: “Every dude has one.” And someone else posed the hypothetical question: “Who wants to see my prenatal pussy scar?”
Alternatively, you could ignore mine and Reddit’s eloquent explanations and believe the platform’s plethora of other, I guess equally believable, suggestions. Take, for example, this person, whose brother told him: “That’s where they zip you up after they put your skeleton in your skin.” Or, is it “God’s way of making the balls look more fashionable”? Maybe you could just follow in this person’s footsteps and “replace it with a zipper for convenience.”
Whatever you believe, just know that your nut seam is normal — and, actually, maybe don’t try to unstitch it.
Brit Dawson
Brit Dawson is a London-based journalist who mostly writes about sex, women's rights and sex work. She is also the staff writer at Dazed.
