At A Glance Author curiosa Contact curiosa@bme.anon IAM curiosa When A year ago Artist alex trowell (iam:serenity) Studio Body Mech Location Southport The decision to get my snug pierced came about after I had been searching through the galleries of BME in an art lesson. On stumbling across the page I instantly fell in love with the piercing and it was decided that as soon as it could be financed, it would be done. I was still relatively new to the scene and had had no experience with cartilage piercings before; in hindsight I think this was a positive thing as maybe I would have been a little less eager to get it done. I also think that my decision came about to get my snug pierced, rather then another part of my ear, was due to the fact that piercings were becoming fashionable in my college and so as much as I was becoming part of something I still wanted to be a little bit different. To this day I've still not heard of another person in my town with a snug piercing.
It was a few months later when I finally had enough time, money and energy to stop saying 'I'll get it done next week' and finally book a day with my piercer. Now, my piercer lived with my best friend and so we were already acquainted, therefore I didn't feel too bad when it ended up being around 8 o'clock at night when I made him open up the shop for secret late night piercings. The reason why it ended up being so late is because I stupidly decided to have a fun session of play piercing on the same day with the fore mentioned best friend, although this did result in lots of fun and pretty pictures, due to lack of food and the speed at which she whipped the needles out of my back, I ended up nearly fainting about half an hour before I was going to get my snug pierced. Whether this did indeed affect my body's reaction to getting pierced again I don't know, but I can honestly say by the time I was sat in the white sterile room of the studio I felt fine and was all hyped up and ready to go.
It was about 10 to 15 minutes from entering the room to everything being ready, in which time the atmosphere was very relaxed. I felt as comfortable as one can after just having a 28 needle back corset, and myself, Alex (iam: serenity), and Dina (iam: electricblue) my friend and his girlfriend casually spoke of the days events amongst other things. My friend from earlier on had managed to escape and so Dina came along to hold my hand, which was very nice of her and very much appreciated.
When the time came to be pierced, I sat slightly tense in the chair, Dina sat upon the table and I remember laughing nervously at something one of them had said. I had decided to get my right snug pierced to balance my tragus on my left ear; the plan was to get my ears pierced for a third time to form small triangles from the points. This did eventually happen but the third set was later removed, nonetheless the triangle plan did work.
After a count to three, Alex managed to push the needle through smoothly leaving me with a small white tube sticking out from the middle of my ear. After about five seconds, the pain suddenly kicked in and boy did it kick! Without trying to put people off, I have never felt a sensation like it, worse then breaking my arm and fracturing my skull put together. It was so intense and enclosed within my ear it wasn't fun at all. This however only lasted until Alex replaced the tube with the jewellery – a small silver bar with small balls on both sides, then unbelievably the pain just vanished leaving just a very faint aching. I think I was more shocked at that then the initial pain. Later, after going over how to clean it and such, we said our goodbyes and thank you's and I made my way home.
Obviously before I was even out the door, the cartilage around the piercing had swollen up and this actually lasted for a few months afterwards making it very hard to sleep, clean and carry out my job as a telephonist. Since getting it done, over a year ago now it has got infected only once and managed to sort itself out with minimal intervention from myself. The area surrounding it still looks swollen compared to my other ear although there is no pain and no infection and the bar moves comfortably inside.
It is still by far the most painful piercing I have had done even with all the kind support and professionalism from those involved, however I still love it a year on and can say it is defiantly my favourite addition to my body.