All of the school year I'd been waiting and wanting to get a spider bite, meaning two piercings on my left lip (as though a spider had bitten you and left the holes, hence the name). When I asked my parents, over and over they said no. I managed to convince my mum to let me.. But I couldn't convince my dad. In the end I decided to just do it myself, I figured I would be able to hide my piercings if I got some clear piercing retainers and did it over the school holidays. I spent ages checking up on how to look after piercings and looking at pictures so that I knew where to pierce. I tried to find what was best to use when piercing as well but I couldn't get any needles without my parents realizing what I was up to or thinking I was doing drugs or something else that would lead to me being in trouble.
At A Glance Author Courtney Contact Courtney@bme.anon When Three months ago Artist Myself When the school holidays finally came around, I went out and bought the clear retainers and some spiked lip studs that I could wear outside of home. I got home and I was finally ready to pierce my lip, so I searched around the house for something that would be sharp and thick enough to use when piercing my lip. I ended up finding a fairly sharp safety pin and I tried to sterilize it by burning it with a regular cigarette lighter; this, as I found out later, is not a good way of doing so and only contaminates what ever you're trying to sterilize more. Lucky for me though, I got no infections or complications from it.
When I was finally set up and ready to do it, I went into my bathroom and cleaned the area I was going to be using, I also got some rubber gloves. I really wanted to avoid anything that could mess things up because I was doing it myself and thought that there's a lot more chance for something to go wrong. I found a permanent pen and marked two dots on my lip, referring to pictures of other people's piercings so that I'd mark the right places.
I kept going back and forth to my computer and bathroom so I could report to my friends what I was doing and how it was going. I pierced my lip without using ice or anything to numb it first. I figured that it wouldn't hurt much if it hurt at all. I pierced the first hole without it being in anyway painful and then I looked at it in the mirror to check how it looked. I thought it seemed a bit too low, so I went to my computer turned on my webcam and asked my friend if they agreed, they did and so I went back to the bathroom, took the safety pin out of the hole and pierced it again just above the original hole. I checked with my friend and they thought it looked better, not that they have any qualifications to say so but I still thought it would be better to have a second opinion.
When I took out the safety pin this time when I was happy with the placement, I tried to put one of my clear retainers through my lip, I found it was too thick and couldn't be forced through so I quickly found a sewing needle which was as thick as the safety pin and blunt so that I wouldn't make another hole. I tried to sterilize it by burning it and put it through my lip. I needed a way to make the hole bigger so I moved it around a lot and pulled on it, trying to stretch the hole so I force the retainer through.
After a few hours of this, I managed to force the retainer through. I realized I'd have to do this with my second hole as well because I had nothing else to make a hole with and by this time my lip was rather swollen. I'd already drawn the dot to mark where I was to pierce before my lip had become swollen, so I decided to just go by that and hope that when the swelling had gone down they'd both be in the right places.
This time I left the safety pin in and moved it around until the hole was big enough to force the second retainer through. When I'd forced the second retainer through the second hole I was happy with my piercings and tried not to touch them.
The swelling went down after three days and they looked perfectly fine. I didn't eat or drink acidic foods and drinks and swished my mouth with salt water after I ate anything for the first week to avoid getting infections. It wasn't a painful experience and I still have my spider bite now. My sister ended up noticing, she's not as blind as my parents and so they found out but don't mind so much.