My friend Ui wanted me to buy a four-gauge needle so I could pierce her ears. She isn't 18 and does not have access to a credit card. When I ordered the needle for her I decided to get a six-gauge for myself so I could do some pulling. When I got the needles after about two weeks, I opened the package and said to myself, "Shit that's a big needle." Heh.
At A Glance Author machinemassacre Contact dazeddrummer@yahoo.com When Three months ago Artist Myself Studio In my bedroom So the needle just lay there locked in my trunk for a few days. Then after a deep knee piercing, and a pulling session, I locked it back up. After about a week I wanted to get a piercing that I could actually put jewelry in and keep. I wanted to do my ears but my parents said "no". (My parents are conservative Catholics and won't let me get anything pierced until I'm eighteen.) So I decided to pierce my navel because that way it would be easy to hide and it was a piercing that I liked.
So I got out the needle, rubbing alcohol, Neosporin, and some paper towels. I began to burn some incense and put on Mudvayne. I closed my eyes and tried to center myself for this rite of passage. I disinfected the needle and cleaned my stomach. I positioned the needle and pushed. Damn the tissue of my stomach is tough to get a six- gauge needle through!! I also was going for a somewhat deep piercing. It seemed like forever until the needle poked out the other end. But this was just the tip of the needle. Now I had to push the rest of the needle through. God, that took forever. After I finally got it most of the way through I chickened out and decided to try getting the jewelry in anyways (because it was tapered jewelry). I inserted the jewelry and pushed. It wouldn't go all the way through. Just the tip of the jewelry was poking out of the skin. So I decided to let it heal like that for now. This whole process took about an hour and a half.
The next morning I decided to try and get the jewelry through. I pushed and got it a little bit farther but still not enough. So I decided to just push it through a little at a time. So throughout the day I would just push it a little bit more. I took the next day or two to get it all the way through.
I have been using tea tree oil and Neosporin to treat it. It is healing quite nicely with only minimal scarring. It almost fully healed after about a week. I hate trying to take O-rings off or put them on, that hurts. Then after about two weeks my dad decided to take me fishing with him. Well he lost part of his rod, and I was helping him look for it when I hear metal hit the rock and then I hear a 'sploosh' in the water. At first I didn't realize what happened but then I felt my stomach and the jewelry was gone. I searched in the water for about ten minutes, but couldn't find it. So the whole ride home I was freaking out because I was afraid that I wouldn't be able to get the other ring in before it closed up. Luckily I was able to push the other one through.
After I got back from Japan and it healed all the way I decided to stretch it to a two gauge. I bought some horn spirals that I will later use for my ears. I lubed up the spiral with some Neosporin and pushed it as far through as it would go. Every few hours I would push it a little bit more. It took probably about three or four days to get it to a two gauge. Then one day in the shower I took it out to run some water through it (stupid me). When I was putting it back through it caught part of the fistula and made a small cut. Well this pissed it off and it started to leak a lot of crap. So for the next week I was cleaning dried blood and crusties out of my navel. I didn't seem to be getting any better and the bottom hole of the piercing looked as if it might have had a bit of a blowout. So I ended up sticking my six-gauge pincer back in it and letting it heal again. After about two days it was healed almost all the way.
But then I made the decision to retire it. It got in the way of my belting (kind of like corsetry), I couldn't sleep on my stomach, and my girlfriend could not lie on top of me. I'm not saying that I regret the piercing, because I loved that piercing, but I do think that I learned a lot from it and it was time to retire it. It was a rite of passage, but it also helped me learn a lot about myself. I was able to discover my limits and figure out what I can do in the future to expand them. Maybe someday I will re-pierce it and successfully get it to a zero gauge. Only time can tell.