At the end of October 2006, I got my first industrial. I always knew that I was going to have two of them...industrials were becoming commonplace among people in my area, and I had always hated having the same piercing as someone else. For many months I had only one, and I loved it, but it just didn't feel done. Finally, yesterday, everything was right for me to get my second one.
At A Glance Author Sara Contact Sara@bme.anon IAM Sara_Timberlake When A week ago Artist Tim Studio Earth Moon Imports Location Wheelersburg, OH I went into the studio where I get all my piercings...Earth Moon Imports, located in Wheelersburg, Ohio. It was pretty much empty, with just 3 people working and no customers. I told the piercer what I wanted done and began filling out the paperwork. We talked for a while about eventually redoing a previous piercing I had (it rejected so I took it out), then moved on to what jewelry to use for this piercing.
I have two bars that I typically wear in my first industrial: a black one with spikes, and a silver one with cones. Of the choices that were in stock, none matched either...so we ended up deciding on a silver one with balls on the end, and I agreed that I could just change the one I had in to match that one when I got home.
For a while, I had toyed around with the possibility of having them cross and form an "X". A couple things made me decide against that and by now I had moved on to the idea of parallel piercings. He marked it up and I checked in the mirror and it looked fine to me.
I was extremely nervous at this point, as it was the first piercing that I had ever done alone...I'm terrified of needles and typically bring someone along for moral support and hand-holding. I know that's a little childish, but that person is always there, so I can be talking to them and Tim, the piercer, and not be thinking about what I'm about to do to my body. (Also, they're there to make sure that the placement looks right.)
Anyway, the placement looked fine to me, and although I was too nervous to really pay attention, I was sure that it would be fine. He cleaned my ear and pierced the bottom hole, then the top. It was excruciating...of course I knew this when I came in, as I've had several cartilage piercings. He got done, and I felt him prodding around on it a bit and then he said that he wanted me to check and see if I was satisfied, because it was crooked and he could redo it if I wanted. I spun around in the chair and looked in the mirror, and to my dismay, he was right, it was the teeniest bit crooked compared to my other industrial. The bottom hole was closer than the top hole, and though it wasn't a terrible difference, it would have driven me crazy had it not been fixed.
"Can you fix it?" I asked, sadly, knowing that I was in for more pain.
"Yea, definitely, turn around," he said. He spun the chair around and got ready to redo one hole. At this point, I was trying to not think about it, and started joking around about how I always come in for something and end up somehow getting more holes than intended. (I had this piercing last year that I had originally intended to be 4 holes going up the outer rim of my right ear with a spiral barbell through them, but somehow the combination of my friend with me that day and Tim had convinced me that really, 5 holes would be so much better.) He laughed, and then I felt the familiar touch of the needle before the piercing, then felt it ripping through my precious ear.
I could feel the blood start running, and knew it was done. He said something along the lines of, "There, that's much better," and put the jewelry in. He cleaned up the blood with a Q-tip for several seconds, and then let me look in the mirror.
I loved it...it was absolutely perfect. I was so happy. He took off his gloves and handed me a paper towel to take with me in case it kept bleeding on the way home. I thanked him, and left the shop. (It didn't bleed anymore after I left there.)
I guess I should mention that everything in the experience was 100% clean. He wore gloves while touching anything that was going to touch me or the needle, the bar was enclosed with its needle in the little blue-ish autoclaved pouch, everything was clean.
So far, the healing has been uneventful, but since it was done less just a few days ago that doesn't really say much. My first thought this morning when I woke up the day after was that it was the best first night I had ever had with a piercing, as I hadn't knocked into it in my sleep, my hair wasn't tangled around it, everything was fine. I've been cleaning it every few hours with a mild salt water solution, which is what I do for all my piercings. It was too tender the first day to change the ends of the old one, but I finally got them fixed. The first industrial didn't really give me any problems in healing, so I'm not too worried about this one. I highly recommend going to Earth Moon Imports if you're in northeastern Kentucky or southern Ohio, as they're very clean, very nice, and do very good work. Hopefully I'll post a picture on here soon, but I'm waiting until the bit of swelling I have goes down, and it looks a little better. I'm very glad I finally got this done, and now one of my friends has me contemplating a third...