Recently, approximately a month ago, I got into stretching my ears. Well I had no clue what I was doing, just that Hot Topic sold the jewelry I needed. So me and a friend both went and got 10g, she got some light tapers for 12g, 10g, and 8g. I right away put mine in, I tried using some vaseline but in the end just said screw it. So I baby-ed my right ear, putting it in slowly and it just hurt really bad, not unbearable just bad, like being pinched hard inside your ear. So I let off my right for a little and went for my left. I don't know how, I just pushed mega hard and on the first try the gauge just went straight in. My friend started screaming and I didn't know why, no mirror available at the time, so I started screaming. Then I was like, "WHAT!?!?" because I didn't know if I was bleeding or had torn my ear, because she was just screaming her head off looking at my ear. When she cooled down a bit she just asked how I did it SO fast, it just went in! Then I gave my other ear a good ten minutes to stop hurting and I did the same thing, just a little more painful than the left because of the previous tries earlier that night. So I put on the o-rings, by the way I had black 10g tapered talons, but I didn't know what they were called at the time, I just got them because they said "10" and my friend got acrylic, or plastic made to look like real acrylic tapers that like I said earlier were 12g-8g.
At A Glance Author Leddy Contact spikecrystal@hotmail.com When A month ago Location Albuquerque, New Mexico But she STILL hasn't done her ears and seeing that I went from a standard 18g-10g which is unusual as I see it because from all the stories I have seen, you go from 18g to 14g or 12g, oops jumped the gun on that one I guess. But my parents don't know, I just leave my hair down around the house and when I leave I put it up sometimes, but I go to a private catholic high school and am surprised that when they questioned my large, odd earrings they believed me when I said they are tribals from Africa. Stupid administration, but anyways now I'm following in my pothead sisters footsteps and am learning that you don't have to buy more jewelry every 2 weeks or so, because that gets dam expensive buying that much stainless steel, so what we both have done is just put more and more earrings (regular 20g or 18g) in our ears along with, for me, my 10g.
At the moment I believe that I have about 8g because hanging earrings are about 20g and I have 6 in and one stud (18g), I figure it adds up. Tomorrow I'm gonna get my friends tapers and see if I'm at an 8 because she says she won't gauge her ears anytime soon. Also, because my ears are hidden from my parents I am SO SO SO lucky that my ears never got infected, I am not very sanitary with them at ALL. I do shower every night and I mess with them all the time and take them out occasionally, but never with clean hands, this is VERY BAD!! You should NEVER do this. I have been so unsafe in my stretching process, I have never talked to a piercer until today, over a month after stretching my ears, with PLASTIC talons, which were barely washed with Purell HAND sanitizer? I have no clue what I was thinking, but make sure you do your research before you get any piercings, I am SO blessed to not have an infection, let alone a serious one, seeing that I would get a mega guilt trip from my parents about "turning into my pothead sister".
So the moral of the story is, no matter how excited/ready you are to jump into piercings and stretching your lobes, DO YOUR RESEARCH and be sanitary about it, in the past month I have seen many horror stories about stretching and am so grateful that mine are ok. Oh, and also I gave you a couple tips, if you don't want/have the money to spend on TONS of jewelry and you want to stretch more, I DO recommend putting more and more earrings in but I see it as useless to buy a 10g for like $14 (because I'm cheap) and not risking it again but buying 8g and 6g then 4g each at about $50-$80 matters with organics and etc... but I am at about a 9g, which doesn't really exist but I am between a 10g and a 8g so to me it does, well good luck.