Last November, I was in the midst of a very difficult and frustrating job hunt. Being heavily tattooed wasn't an issue; I wore Dermablend makeup to cover the backs of my hands, and wore conservative suits with long sleeves and pants. My ears, though, were a sticking point. At that time, I had a total of approximately 30 piercings, including 3/4" lobes, an industrial, and 2 large-gauge dermal punches in my right ear. If I wore my hair down to hide the earrings (which wasn't always 100% successful), the recruiters told me I had to wear it back (more 'professional' looking). Of course, if I wore my hair back, all the ear jewelry was on display.
At A Glance Author Mrs. Penguin Contact Mrs. Penguin@bme.anon IAM Mrs. Penguin When A month ago Artist Brian Decker Studio Pure Body Arts Location Brooklyn, NY It's hard enough for someone in her late 40's to find a job. It's even harder if this is your 3rd job search within 3 1/2 years. Add highly visible and very non-traditional mods to the mix, and it gets even worse. I had to do something to tip the odds in my favor however I could. I can't do anything about my age, and couldn't do anything about my job history (it did help somewhat that before the previous couple of years, I had a VERY stable employment history -- 2 jobs in 16 years). The one factor I could control was the visible piercings. As wrenching as it was, I decided that given the choice between maximizing my chances of finding a good job and keeping the piercings, practicality and reality had to win.
The smaller piercings (10 gauge and smaller) weren't a problem as far as 'after effects'; there were holes, but small and unobtrusive enough that they wouldn't stand out to a casual observer. The real issues were the 4 gauge and 0 gauge dermal punches in my right ear, and the 3/4" lobes. I think the effect of several glaringly gaping holes in my ears would have been worse than leaving the jewelry in. But I had to tone things down as much as possible. I have a pair of pale pink stone plugs (agate? marble? not sure) for the lobes, and they're unobtrusive enough that if you don't know what you're looking at, you won't notice that they're stretched lobes. For the dermal punches, I went online and found flesh colored retainers. The color match wasn't perfect, but it was good enough to pass with a casual observer.
Ultimately, it did pay off. I wound up getting just the sort of job I needed -- in a very large, stable financial institution with an international presence. Unlike my last job, which was based in Chicago and had a small office in New York, this company is based right here in New York. Even if the position I'm currently in doesn't work out (which doesn't look to be an issue), there are plenty of other places within the company to investigate. In addition, I've seen a very large number of employees who look to be in my age range. And the other administrative assistants there (most of whom have been there for many years) all say that once you get there, you're in forever unless you decide to leave or screw up royally. So in the end, while removing the jewelry was hard, it was worth it.
As it turns out, my department is actually pretty okay with my mods. I started them off slowly by wearing the tongue bar (which came out for interviews) from day one. At that point, I was still wearing the unobtrusive ear jewelry. I then moved on to other plugs -- no problems at all. After several months, I stopped wearing the Dermablend on my hands and wrists and again, no issues.
Theoretically, at this point, I could have started putting the rest of the ear jewelry back in, but I decided not to. Since I started the job, I'd gotten my long hair (mid-back length) cut for the first time in 10 years, and really liked the more streamlined, stylish look. And the minimal jewelry in my ears now really highlights my lobes. The only thing that was starting to bother me was that my ears were asymmetrical -- right ear had 4 gauge punch in the upper cartilage, 0 gauge punch in the conch, 16 gauge rook (somehow forgot to take that out with the rest of the jewelry) and 3/4' stretched lobe. The left ear only had the stretched lobe.
I started giving some serious thought to evening things up. As always, I thought ahead. In the hopefully unlikely event that I DO wind up interviewing again (even if only within the company), I'd have to keep my options open as far as being able to minimize the impact. I decided to make the left ear mirror the right, knowing that if need be, I'd have the option of wearing retainer jewelry in both ears.
As far as who would do it, there was no question. Brian Decker (IAM: xpurex) has done other work on me (as well as a lot of other people I know) and there's no one else I would trust to come near me with a sharp object. In addition to being a skilled practitioner, he's a real stickler for sterility, and a consummate professional. I decided that I wanted to have all 3 procedures (conch punch, upper cartilage punch, and rook) done at the same time so I wouldn't have to go through 3 separate healing periods.
We made an appointment for April 21st. That was going to be an insanely busy day for me; I was away in Pennsylvania and was leaving there at 5:15 for the 4 hour drive home, had to pick up my VW, bring the car plus the new tires I'd just gotten to the mechanic, and then hop the railroad from there. By the time I got to Brian's shop, I was already exhausted (it didn't help that my non-existent directional skills caused me to lose 40 minutes after I went north instead of south). Because of all the frantic rushing I was doing, I didn't have a chance to eat, so when I got off the subway I stopped at a deli and got some Gatorade and a cinnamon bun. Bad idea to get pierced or tattooed on an empty stomach (unless you enjoy passing out). My friend George (IAM: Hooked) met me there for moral support (and fortunately thought to bring his camera, since in my mad dash I'd forgotten mine).
Brian had started setting up for me, so we went into the piercing room. First thing he did was autoclave the jewelry (glass eyelets) I'd brought with me. I chose glass because I've found it's an easy material for me to heal with, being totally inert. In retrospect, I should have ordered actual conch plugs (more on that later). Brian has one of those super-fast autoclaves, and the jewelry was ready fairly quickly. In the meantime, I took some pre-emptive Ibuprofen; I remember how much it hurt in the immediate aftermath of my other large-gauge dermal punches, and wanted to try to head some of that off.
Because the new piercings had to mirror the existing piercings perfectly, Brian took his time marking, checking, and remarking the sites. The plan was to do the piercings from largest to smallest, which I guess makes sense; get the worst one out of the way first. I remarked to Brian that when I'd had my right conch punched (almost 5 years ago, by another practitioner), it had bled profusely enough that my ear canal filled up and I was still fishing chunks of clotted blood out of there later that night. He put a wad of gauze in my ear this time just in case the same thing happened. He did one last 'line-up', lightly pressing the dermal punch onto the site to leave an imprint and check one more time.
It was time. I've been pierced many times (and have over 250 hours of tattoo work) so I'm no stranger to pain. I wasn't exactly nervous, but there was a bit of adrenalin-fueled anticipation there. I'm one of those people who HAS to have warning before I'm pierced, and Brian knows this. I heard him say 'take a deep breath in' as he has so many times before, and steeled myself for the next line, 'breathe out'. While I'm exhaling, I felt the anticipated colossal pain in my ear as a chunk of my ear parted company with my body forever. I managed not to jump, move, or yell, but I did grimace. Once the deed was done, my ear felt a bit stunned. Unlike my previous 0g conch punch, this one bled very little. He put some pressure on it to slow down the bleeding, cleaned it up, and carefully inserted the jewelry and put on the o-ring. One down.
Next was time for the 4g punch in the upper cartilage. Once again, we went through the painstaking marking and measuring procedure to be sure it mated perfectly with the right ear. I was definitely not looking forward to this, as my ear already felt as though it had been run over by the subway, but steeled myself. Once again, careful line up, warning to breath and exhale, and crunch. For some reason, the smaller hole bled more than the larger one, although it was still less than the 0g punch from 5 years ago. Another mop-up operation, and in went the jewelry. End of round two.
The only thing left to do was the 16 gauge rook. Brian said that the existing one in the right ear (done by someone else several years ago) was at a bit of an odd angle, and he had to take some time to get the markings just right. At this point, my ear was not happy and I was really dreading having it impaled by a sharp object yet again. But it turned out to be much easier than I thought - the 16 gauge needle is so much smaller in comparison than the 4 gauge and 0 gauge dermal punches (and my ear was already so traumatized (that I barely felt the needle going through.
It was a bit fiddly putting the captive bead ring in; it's a rather inconvenient and difficult to get to spot. Brian remarked that virtually all the other rooks he's done have been with barbells. I've never seen one with a barbell, and prefer the look of a ring. In spite of working in a very small space with a tiny bead, Brian got the bead snapped into the ring.
I asked to see the pieces of ear that had been removed. It was both fascinating and a bit queasy looking at the cross-sections of ear cartilage that had been attached to my body until recently, and seeing the clearly defined layers. I gave some thought to bringing the pieces home with me and keeping them in a Ziploc bag in the freezer, but decided against it. Interestingly, the chunks looked a lot smaller than I thought they would have, considering the size of the holes they left behind.
By this point, not unexpectedly, my ear was rather swollen and a nice shade of red -- it looked almost as though it had been sculpted out of wax. But it looked absolutely perfect. Brian did a spectacular job of getting the new work to mirror the existing piercings. I was symmetrical and happy.
Now, bear in mind that I'm no stranger to healing large gauge and/or complicated cartilage piercings, so I know what to do and what not to do. Things TO do: keep it clean, and leave it alone. Things NOT to do: over clean it, use anything excessively harsh to clean (i.e. peroxide or rubbing alcohol), touch it with dirty hands, play with the jewelry. Essentially, YOU don't heal a piercing, your body does. Your job is to create optimal conditions for healing. Besides things like eating a decent diet and keeping hydrated, keeping it clean is important. The best thing for that is a warm sea salt water soak (I believe the correct proportion is 1/4 teaspoon of sea salt to a cup of water). Soak it, gently swab any loosened residue with a clean q-tip, and then flush it good with clean water. This way you're removing any crusties or dried blood/lymph with the hot salt water, and rinsing any leftover residue with the clean water, without irritating it by getting something like soap into a raw wound.
So far, so good. Then I had a moment of insanity come over me. After 3 weeks, I decided it was doing well enough (and it was doing well) that I'd remove the jewelry from the 0 gauge conch punch so I could clean it. The jewelry came out easily enough, and actually didn't look gunky. I washed it with antibacterial soap and rinsed it very thoroughly. In the meantime, I looked at the still VERY fresh punch, and it looked a lot more raw than I had thought it would. Which makes sense. I encountered a problem when I went to re-insert the jewelry (which was about 90 seconds after I removed it). Since I was using glass eyelets, the ends are kind of flat, not rounded. And in the extremely brief time I had the jewelry out, the still raw and newly traumatized hole swelled up a tiny bit -- just enough that the jewelry wouldn't slide right back in. And believe me, when you try to guide a relatively flat piece of jewelry through a raw hole in your ear cartilage, you will feel it. I finally had to resort to using some liquid antibacterial soap for lubrication, and it proved to be just enough so I could get the jewelry back in. Of course, putting liquid soap into the raw area was not a good idea, but at that point it was either that or lose the piercing. So let's see, 2 stupid mistakes -- removing the jewelry way before I should have (which I knew), and using a totally inappropriate substance as lube (which I also knew). My poor ear was red and throbbing, and I was cursing myself for setting the healing process back considerably. At least I had enough common sense not to go messing around with the other punch.
This was on a Saturday. The ear continued to be painful, and started lymphing quite a bit (not surprising, considering the trauma I'd subjected it to). So, being the genius that I am, I further compounded my stupidity and gave in to the urge to pick off the crusties -- and then wipe the seeping lymph fluid away with my fingers.
For a couple of days, things continued this way -- my ear being painful and kind of red, but not enough to concern me. Wednesday, though, things seemed to kick up into high gear. The 4 gauge upper punch, which had been quite docile through the process, started swelling up alarmingly. By lunchtime, it was painful enough that even a monster dose of Ibuprofen (6 tablets, about 3 times the recommended dose) didn't make a dent. I saw that it had swollen enough that the front of the glass tunnel was starting to become indented into the surface of the ear. I decided I had to try to loosen the o-rings, and went to the bathroom and washed my hands. I discovered that it had swollen enough that the o-ring was actually below the surface of the piercing. Very carefully, I managed to reach it and loosen it (and dislodged a large chunk of dried stuff which had gotten trapped between the o-ring and my ear). By relieving the pressure, I got very quick relief, although the pain did not by any means disappear.
Fortunately, I'm not a complete and total idiot. I've read enough warnings on BME and seen pictures of badly damaged ears to be aware that a cartilage infection can quickly progress to the serious point and literally destroy your cartilage in a matter of a day or two. I realized that this was most likely an infection rather than a result of the trauma of messing with the jewelry, and that I had to get medical attention quickly. Fortunately, my company has an on-site medical department with walk-in hours. I went down to medical, and the nurse had me see the doctor. He examined the ear and said it definitely was infected. Not surprisingly, he recommended removing the jewelry. I mentioned the issue of a piercing's surface healing over and trapping infection inside. He said that while that was true for a simple abscess, it looked like what was happening with my ear was actually cellulitis, with the infection potentially trapped between the layers of cartilage. He also said that he wanted me to see an ear/nose/throat doctor, and had one in mind. He called that doctor up while I was in his office to discuss it, and ask what sort of antibiotics were best for this type of problem. After discussing it with him, I decided to leave the jewelry in for the time being and get started on the antibiotics immediately, and see what the specialist had to say.
I got an appointment to see him for the following day, and in the ensuing 24 hours, the antibiotics and warm salt soaks had already made a dramatic improvement. The doctor examined the ear and said it looked like it was going to be fine -- and said that the jewelry did NOT have to come out. If he'd said it did, I would have removed it. As much as I didn't want to lose the piercings, I was even more reluctant to potentially lose the ear.
I was on Cipro and Keflex for 10 days, and they did their job. The ear feels great now -- no discharge, no pain, no redness, no swelling. A very nice surprise was that neither of the doctors came across as being 'mod-unfriendly' or judgmental. They dealt with the medical issue at hand and that was that. No 'why did you do that to yourself' sort of thing.
In the meantime, I did what I should have done in the first place, and ordered actual conch plugs. These are a bit longer than regular jewelry, allowing a bit of extra room in case of swelling. They also have a sloping front (a ball), so instead of having the end of the jewelry flat against the piercing, it curves away from the surface so that you have a bit more room and less chance of debris getting trapped. And finally, the end is nice and rounded, making insertion much less traumatic. I did swap out the jewelry 2 days ago, after carefully washing and rinsing it. Between the fact that a lot of healing had taken place, and using the correct jewelry, it went in this time with no issues whatsoever.
I guess the ultimate moral of the story is -- don't be a fucking idiot like I was. The less you do to/with a new piercing (especially something like a 0g dermal punch, which leaves an awful lot of raw flesh exposed), the better off you'll be. Don't touch it. Don't screw with the jewelry. Start out with the right jewelry in the first place, instead of waiting till the last minute like I did and having to settle for something that's not quite right.