At A Glance
Author	San
Contact	San@bme.anon
IAM	BlueStar
When	Six months ago
Artist	Pierre

I had my navel scalpelled to 4ga mid-November. I'll recap briefly on the experience. I went to Pierre's house, where he had one room set up as a studio. I had already given him jewelry, to autoclave, and sterile gauze the other day. We small-talked for a bit, and I admitted to being a bit nervous. My navel was disinfected with iodine and alcohol. He marked my navel with me laying down, flat, just two dots where a typical piercing would go (after commenting on the scars from my old one being crooked, which is part of the reason I took it out). Then I stood up, he surveyed them, and drew lines where the cuts would go. We made sure they were straight, and used calipers to make sure they were a good space apart.

I lay down on the bed (mattress covered in plastic) with my t-shirt tucked into my bra, trying to relax. He was playing music on his computer, which I could hear and relaxed to, even though I didn't really like it. (I had Tool – Third Eye in my head. Its amazing how I can remember every detail). He told me the clamps were going to kill, and I nodded. I had been eyeballing the packaged #11 scalpel for a while, which he unpackaged. The clamps were on, they weren't tight enough to be uncomfortable, I knew they were there. Getting them on pinched a bit, but nothing terrible. I was warned it would be slower than a piercing is. I relaxed and closed my eyes, then he told me to tell him when I was ready. I took a breath in, and said I was, and felt him position the scalpel over my navel. A second before this I was thinking "I wonder if I should of used EMLA?", since he offered.

The navel cut through my skin, behind the obnoxious amount of scar tissue (badly done piercing, the crooked piercing, and a few self-attempts from when I was much younger) and I felt the scalpel exit. It was slow, but the pain surprised me. It wasn't what I thought it was going to be: It was a sharp, burning feeling going through my navel. It got a bit more intense at the exit, but wasn't near what I expected. Sure, it hurt, quite a bit, but it was a very tolerable type of pain. The taper is what I was most scared of. I had been eyeballing that too! When I thought he was adjusting the scalpel, he was putting the taper in. There was no pain, I just felt it. He said my plug was too short, as he did it a bit deep, just so it wouldn't reject (I don't have a flap on my navel, my normal piercings 'shrank' quite a bit). He grabbed a 4ga CBR and put that in. It bled all night.

The next day, I soaked it in salt water when I woke up, until all the blood was gone: That was a lot of blood, and it took a while. I cleaned the blood that had dripped to my pants (I stuffed paper towels in them so I wouldn't drench them) with gauze, and then rinsed the salt water off and went to school. Tying my shoes was hell, standing and sitting was hell. It throbbed during the day. I thought the procedure was a piece of cake, but the next few days aren't fun! It bled for three days straight. The day after I had it done, I went horseback riding. At a canter, it moved up and down. Ouch. It wasn't enough to break my concentration, but I knew it was there. I had put sterile gauze over it and taped it loosely in case it bled, and to keep it still. When I got home, I talked to Pierre on ICQ, and he said if I wanted to take the bead off and put o-rings on, it would help a lot. I did it immediately.

After the bleeding stopped a few days later, it started to crust. Then it got red around the top, but not really around the bottom. After a couple weeks the redness went away, but it kept crusting. I bought a UV cbr a few months later, which I didn't know was two gauge until I got home and put it in. Ouch. (It was sold to me as a four gauge). After a couple weeks it was incredibly irritated, so I put the 4ga cbr in. I wasn't in the best of health, starting in December, for a while, and it never seemed like it would heal. After a while the crusting stopped completely and there was no discomfort at all. I left it for a while, knowing it would probably get irritated again, like it had before.

Finally, I put the plug in for a few days, and my navel didn't eat the o-rings. I left it in for a while, and it was fine! I admit, I did scant on aftercare after the first couple of weeks, but it healed fine. There is very little scarring and it looks great. Below is a picture of it fresh, and a present one with the plug in.

If you have any questions about my experience with healing or aftercare, contact me on IAM or email me.