My piercings so far consist of a navel piercing, 3 lobes and a conch on my left ear, and an 8mm flesh tunnel and a low snug that is basically an anti-tragus on my right ear. After my conch piercing, which was the second to last piercing I had (the last being my daith), I felt slightly "lop-sided" with 4 piercings in my left ear and only 2 in my right. I have a strange affection towards weirder, less common piercings. I discovered daith and rook piercings at the same time and decided on a daith when I saw a girl in the year above me at school had a rook. A friend of mine also wanted a rook, which put me off seeing as how I'm discovering more and more people with them. There were 2 things putting me off about the daith however. The first, was obviously the EXTREME PAIN.. The other was the fact that its not that noticeable and I like very visible piercings. I decided that I liked the piercing too much to worry about these things. And that was it, I was determined..
At A Glance Author Phanie;Rash Contact death-goes-to-disco@hotmail.co.uk IAM Phanie;Rash When It just happened Artist dont know her name Studio Stigma Studio Location North Cheam, Surrey It was 3 days ago when I was talking to a friend about going to get needled. She said she wanted a piercing as well because she hadn't had one in a little while. She asked another friend who had mentioned that she wanted to get her lobes re-pierced as she had them when she was a child, but ripped them out. That day, we headed over to Stigma studio in North Cheam (in a rush as we didn't know what time it would close and we had already been to another studio which was too busy to fit us in, along with being held up by another friend who made us help her with her paper round...)
By then, my friend had decided that she was going to get her navel pierced. So we walked up to the counter and the piercer asked us what we wanted. We each told her what we wanted "a navel piercing", "lobe piercings" and "a daith piercing". After I told her I wanted my daith pierced, her eyes lit up slightly and she got out a camera and showed me a photo of another daith piercing she had performed. "Like this?" She said. I replied "yes, but I'd like a curved barbell instead of a ring please". She agreed and asked us all to sit down and fill in the usual forms.
By this time, I was BRICKING IT!! The stories I'd read on BME either said that it hadn't hurt as much as they'd expected, or was basically unreal pain. I'm not very good with pain, or nerves.. She dealt with both of my friends before me, increasing my discomfort. I was complaining to both of my friends as each of them swapped and sat with me to wait. It was a long wait.
My friend who got her lobes pierced was the first to go in. She was slightly nervous, but was distracted by laughing at me whingeing. After she had finished being stabbed, she came out and told me what the piercer had told her to calm her down.. "Don't worry. This is nothing compared to what your friend is gonna get". Reassuring for me. Thanks..
After her, was my other friend who got her belly button pierced. No biggie, she said it didn't even hurt.
Then, it was my turn.. This was gonna be fun...
She called me down the 3 little steps, and I reluctantly went.. The piercer had told another lady who had loads of piercings herself to get a curved needle and the jewellery and stuff, so it was basically all there and ready. She was still laying out paper and cleaning thing while I was sitting in the chair, but it was good to see that she was being careful and nice and clean. The least of my worries was an infection at this point though.. She took a really long time fiddling with my ear and checking to see if the jewellery was long enough. She planned how she was going to get the jewellery in and the balls on before she pierced me. I really appreciated this afterwards, because the fiddling after would have been extremely painful. However, this did draw out my nerves and every time she touched my ear, my heart pounded faster and harder. I was talking really deep breaths and staring directly at the needle because I get scared that piercers are just gonna poke you and not tell you. I know this is really silly.. I saw her pick up a pen and felt her make a dot on my daith, but she didn't show me where she had marked the piercing. She told me she wasn't going to ask me to check because there was only really one place this piercing could go in my ear and she thought it was going to look really good. Afterwards, I realised that even if she had given me a chance to check it, I wouldn't even have been able to see it, so there was no point. Plus, I trusted her. By the time she had planned out the procedure and told me about it, my heart was pounding so much I thought I was going to have a heart attack.. She asked me if I was ready and I said no. I took a moment to compose myself and told her to go. She didn't clamp me for obvious reasons and I was at all surprised or worried. She started to push the curved needle through and I could really feel it. It seemed to go on forever and the harder she pushed, the more it hurt. She kept telling me to stay dead sti ll through the whole thing. The last push of the needle was the worst. My eyes were clenched shut the whole time and she kept asking me how I was doing and if I was okay. After the needle was through, she pushed the jewellery straight in, which wasn't bad at all compared to that. I didn't even feel it. She let me have a little rest while the jewellery was in but told me again to stay completely still. We had a really quick little chat about mods and I told her I was ready to get the ball on and "get it over with". The whole time, the lady with a nice collection of piercings was standing there, watching. The piercer struggled a few times to get the ball on herself, again constantly telling me to keep completely still. After a few tries, she ordered the other lady to put on some gloves. Just as the other lady was putting on her gloves, the piercer tried one more time and got it on.. Sod's law.
When we left the studio, we had all been in there for exactly an hour and 20 minutes. I was so relieved when it was over.. It was a very painful experience, but I love my little daith and it was well worth it. That means alot coming from a pussy like me..
After it was finished, she told the lady with lots of piercings to have a look because "its not something you see every day". The piercer took some photos on a digital camera and told me she was going to put them on the studio's myspace. I tried to look in a mirror at my new metal, but because of the fact I got a bar, not a ring, I cant see anything. The piercer showed me the photos on the camera so I could see. I'm the only person who cant enjoy my new piercing :( But I love it anyway! And I can see it if I get 2 mirrors and reflect it off the other mirror..
The piercer, the lady who worked there with all the piercings and all my friends who have seen it have said it looks really cool. However, my parents thought it was pointless because "you cant even see it".
Yesterday (the day after the piercing), I went to Thorpe Park (a massive theme park for those who don't know what it is). Like I said before, I'm SUCH a pussy with nerves, so I didn't really want to go on the scary rides. However, my friends convinced me to go on Colossus (which is the world first 10 looping rollercoaster...) As I was waiting in the line to go on it, a sign said "remove all earrings". I just thought to myself why.. Besides, I couldn't take out my daith because it was too fresh. As soon as I got on and the bars came down, I realised why they tell you to take out your earrings... The 10 loops make your head knock from side to side quite violently. I tensed up and tried to stop my daith from getting hit because it was aching a little. It was fine, but my conch did suffer a little..
Overall, I LOVE my daith and my experience was completely worth it. It has been a little hard to clean, purely because I cant actually see what I'm doing. It doesn't hurt as such now. It just aches from time to time and feels sort of like an ear infection. One bad thing about this piercing is that I cant fit my earphones in and I'm going to have to buy some that either go right inside the ear or ones that fit over the outside. This is a really cute piercing and I'm glad I didn't chicken out of getting it. If you're contemplating it but worried about the pain factor, I'm not going to lie, it hurts, but if a wimp like me can take it, anyone can and I recommend you just go for it!
Good luck!