As the months are going past, my ears are quickly getting full up of various piercings, ranging from tunnels, industrials to rook piercings. I thought I'd try something a little different so I browsed around the BME for ideas of what to get next and came across one which I thought looked rather pretty. The snug. I've had just about every type of cartilage piercing done I could find, so the snug seemed like the next step to go onto get pierced. I am quite picky with where I get piercings and like to arrange my piercings in my ears and not just get them randomly and I thought the snug would fit right in on my right ear. Only problem was, I was not expecting it to be this much of a bitch to heal. It took me by shock. I have had it for about a month and it is STILL a nightmare.
At A Glance Author Ali Contact Ali@bme.anon When A month ago Studio Punktured Location Brighton The actual piercing of the snug was great. No problems there. I went to my best piercers who have done literally every one of my piercings except labret and lobes. I got it done with a 1.2 as I thought the smaller barbell might fit in better and I was calm like normal and always get the comment of "You are so relaxed while you get pierced!" which always seems to take my piercer by surprise. The after pain however was not like anything I had felt before with my other piercings. It was much worse. It was more of a pinching pain than just a throb. It did not help either that it was a windy day I'd got it done, as when I walked outside of the studio the wind hit my ear. The pain pretty much started from then on and did not stop. In the days after the piercing I got bad headaches and the side of my face hurt as well as my throbbing ear. I actually could not talk for a day without it hurting. Laughing was a mission of its own! I had to take pain killers in a pathetic attempt to stop the nasty little bugger from hurting but they still did not seem to make any difference.
About a week after I'd had my snug pierced, I went to my local hospital for my regular ear check up which I have every six months. My doctor who is knowledgeable in ears did not like the look of my snug one bit. He's used to seeing me with new piercings every time I go, but this one he seemed to be worried about. The nurse who was with him kept telling me I should have it removed, but I told my doctor I wanted to keep trying with it so he gave me antibiotics to try and calm it down. I was on them for about a week. At first I thought they'd maybe made a little bit of a difference, but still, the pain continued and my snug was turning into one of the biggest mistakes I have made.
The pain is a lot less now a month on. I can touch it and turn it without much hassle, but one side of the barbell has sunk into my ear. It does not look too good. I have to clean it two or three times a day. I'm using saline solution on it which helped heal my other 12 piercings. There's no way I can sleep on this side without a nasty little jolt springing up my ear. Even my Rook, which I thought was nasty to heal, is an angel compared to this. I often wake up in the middle of the night because I have accidentally rolled onto it, or even slightly turned my head to the right. The clever might say to take it out, but I am still working with it. I think what it needs is a bigger bar. I went to another studio to check it out and they seemed to agree with me but did not have the guy they needed to help me, so I will go and sort it soon.
I personally would not recommend the snug as a first piercing. I'd have taken it out now if I had not got any previous experience with cartilage piercings. I think it's best to know what you're doing when you're healing a piercing and to know that some piercings take longer than others. If you are thinking about having the snug done before anything else, I'd think very carefully about it. Maybe get something in the helix first, or even the rook. I just hope my snug will heal sometime soon so I can go and get some new piercings I have been planning a while. The only good things about the snug I have come across so far is, even though it's been so painful, it has not bled once, and I'm normally quite prone to piercings bleeding. It fits in with my other piercings and looks quite pretty.