And where would you like your hole madam? (Body Piercing)

Member Name: michaird

Product:	Body Piercing
Date:	15/07/02 (353 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: I think it's cool

Disadvantages: Most people Dont

Okay then, in the wake of my 'how to get a tattoo op' I've also decided to do a 'how not to get a piercing' op. Please note that the tattoo op is required reading for this part of the course (not really, but it never hurts to advertise)

Now I'm not particularly pierced, I have two in each earlobe and a navel piercing. There are people who have far more self-inflicted holes and know a lot more than I do. One thing is for certain though, each and every piercing I got I did the wrong way.

My first was, of course, the ear lobe. On my sixth birthday my aunt took me into the local in-shops to get me my ears done as a present. She had, unfortunately, neglected to tell me what we were doing or even ask me if I wanted it done. Cue temper tantrum, kicking and screaming on the floor of the hairdressers that did the piercing until I was manhandled into a chair my aunt holding me in place while the woman gunned me with a little gold stud that had a green stone in it. I wasn't happy at all, I hate green.

I got over it, my mum bought me some studs with a blue stone in them and after a few weeks of turning them daily and bathing them in surgical spirit I was quite pleased with my little studs and very cool as all my friends had plain ones.

My second lobe piercing was when I was 14, I was walking down to the Bull Ring in Birmingham city centre and saw a sign outside a grotty little hair accessories kiosk that said 'ear piercing, £2 with gold studs' and decided there and then. The place was a dump and I hadn't prepared by getting antiseptic for aftercare, needless to say it got infected and was painful and smelly for a while.

My navel was equally unplanned. I was 19 and at Ozzfest at the Milton Keynes bowl. It was hot; I had money to spend and nothing to spend it on. All the t-shirts were crap, there were henna tattoos but I'm allergic to henna and the beer was watered. I noticed the piercin
g wagon and a little light bulb pinged above my head and I decided I was gonna get pierced.

I left my friends on the grass and marched over there, pushed my way through the crowd of people with various numbers and types of holes in them. Scowled at the groups of girls squealing at each other 'I'll do it if you do!' 'No I'm too scared, come in with me!' etc. I pushed myself in front of the rather unobtrusive looking middle aged man trying to keep the gaggle of people in check and asked him how much a navel piercing was.
'£20 for a ring, £25 for a bar' he says
'Okay then, I'll have a ring. What kind of metal do you use? I'm allergic to most things you see'
'We use high grade stainless steel, no-one?s allergic to that' he tells me.
So I filled out a form to say I understood what I was doing (ha, ha), I wasn't on any medication or had any illnesses and that I was over 18. I then had to wait ten minutes for my turn; I got a really good view for the Therapy set and half a conversation with a guy who had just had his tongue done.

When it was my turn I was a little bit nervous, I hadn't done any research, or even thinking, about what I was about to do and didn't know what to expect. Even if I had looked into it I wouldn't have expected the pleasant, frumpy looking woman in her mid forties who was about to do my piercing. The trailer was clean but cramped and there was and overpowering smell of surgical spirit made all the worst by the fact that it was so hot inside.

I was going to have a ball closing ring (BCR) a plain ring which pincers together on a ball holding it in place. Not quite the ear ring type hoop I was expecting. She showed me the ring she was going to put in and asked me to choose a trinket to go in the middle, there wasn't much choice, and most of the beads were garish. I managed to find a tasteful little bead in the same colour as the
ring.

She got me to sit on the couch and surveyed the area. She gave it a clean with surgical spirit and penned little dots where the piercing was going to go and checked they were even. She then opened a sealed package holding a needle with a little tube on the end and got hold of a pair of hoop ended clamps.

She talks to me reassuringly that it's going to be quick and wont hurt at all, clamps the area which is going to be pierced and pushes the needle through until the tube is inside the hole it has made. She then took the ring and pushed it into the tube removing the tube when she was finished leaving the ring in place. She was right it didn't hurt, however...

This can be quite a shock to the system, especially if your not expecting it, your blood sugar drops and many people faint. I was already feeling a little bit queasy from the heat and the smell; I could hear Therapy in the background singing 'happy people have no stories'. She went of to fetch something and when she turned around with a huge pair of f**k off scary pliers in her hand I thought 'what the f***ing hell?s she gonna do with them!' and promptly passed out.

I was only out for a few seconds, I came to lying down and surprisingly I felt amazing, the adrenaline rush from the piercing had set in by then. She used the pliers to close the ring on the little bead I had chosen and it was all over.

A leaflet on how to care for it was shoved in my hand and I was pushed out the door. Feeling queasy, grinning like an idiot.

As it turns out I am the only person on the planet who is allergic to surgical steel. I followed all the instructions in the leaflet and other advice I found online and even after a whole year the piercing was still weeping and smelled a bit funny. Finally I gave up and bought a solid gold bar, after that I was fully healed within the week.

Now that's how NOT to do it, its not the worst way (i.
e. doing it yourself) but its is almost certainly the most common. I have since been a lot more sensible in my decisions on this subject, which is why, despite the deeply addictive nature of it; I haven't got any more.

So, what can you get pierced? Well basically, if you can gab enough flesh to go in the clamps you can put a hole in it; the list of piercings I have seen or know people to have is scary:

The earlobes, eyebrow, tongue, that weird bit of skin under your tongue, the lips, nose, the bridge of the nose, the neck, the nipple, the navel, the foreskin, the bell-end, the scrotum, the clitoris, the labia, the bits of skin in-between your fingers, the cheeks and that guy of jackass who had his bum cheeks pierced together.

There are more extreme forms, which involve having metal balls placed under the skin to make a pattern and I have also seen people with strips of metal woven into the skin. This is quite a serious business for a lot of people.

But let's face it. If you're thinking about getting one done, the chances are your not thinking of anything anywhere near this extreme. So what should you think about before taking the plunge?

Social Acceptability.
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You have to make sure that your piercing is going to fit in with your life. If you work in a bank and you want a bolt through your nose the chances are you boss isn't going to be very happy with you. The thing to do, if in doubt, is ask. If they do object consider something more easily concealed.

I considered having my eyebrow done and also having my lip done, but decided it would not be I good idea due to the nature of my work.

Care of your piercing:
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When you have decided what you want to get done, research how it's going to be done and how to look after it. Some piercings will work their way out of the skin like the eyebrow and sometimes the tongu
e, if you don't know this you may end up with a scar around you eyebrow of even a forked tongue.

Tongue piercing can also damage the teeth, as most people cannot resist the urge to play with them, this is the reason I eventually decided against getting this one done.

Keeping the piercing clean is also important, research how this should be done especially for piercings in the mouth or the genitals.

Find a reputable Piercer.
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The best way of doing this is to seek advice from pierced friends. If you don't have any, then my advice is to find a long established studio or a highly respected tattooist as they often do piercing as well. Ask for advice there, the quality of what they tell you should be give you enough to go on when deciding if you would be comfortable letting them put a hole in you.

Inspect their studio, it should be hygienic, a new needle should be used each time and you should see them open the package in front of you. They should also have some kind of certificate of basic hygiene standards.

Steel yourself.
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Don't get drunk! go with a good, sensible friend (you must have one, we all have at least one) take an cartoon of orange juice or something just in case you faint and make sure you eat before you go.



The difference between a tattoo and a piercing is, if you decide afterward you don't like it you can remove it. You are likely to be left with small scars, unless you remove it in the first few days, I don?t think of this as a bad thing, they can show that you've lived a bit and we all know chicks dig scars!

The similarity between these and tattoos is they are highly addictive, after four years I still want another but don't know where just yet.

Now I know that getting holes put in you isn't the most sensible thing to do, but it is essential to be sensible when deciding
to do it, a piercing may not be for life but its certainly not just for Christmas.

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