Nightmares proven to be over-reactions.

At A Glance Author Ashen Contact Ashen@bme.anon Artist Gre-gory Studio Abstract Arts Location Toronto, Canada

It was getting near my 21st birthday and I was starting to feel down. We were low on cash and it was beginning to look like my traditional "birthday piercing" wasn't going to happen this year. You can't imagine how happy I was when my husband presented me with $80 cash and told me to go get my nipples pierced. He'd been saving every penny I'd given him since the summer so that he'd have enough to pay for the piercings.

I called my piercer and we set an appointment for the following Friday so I would have a few days to heal before going back to school. Unfortunately, he came down with a cold mid-week and called me to cancel. I was able to reschedule for the following Friday. For almost a year I had been having nightmares about how painful the experience was going to be, but amazingly, once the date was finalized, the nightmares ended. I started getting really psyched up about the coming event, and I was amazingly calm right up until about 20 minutes before we left for the appointment. I started sweating like crazy and hopping all over the apartment, so I took a shower to calm down.

After the shower, I felt much more relaxed so we headed out. When we arrived, Greg already had everything set out and ready. He said he wanted to get it over with as soon as possible so we could all just hang out for the rest of the night. I had no problem with that, so off came my top and on went his gloves. He marked the entrance and exit holes and then had me check them in the mirror. They were perfect-but that's when I got nervous again...really, really nervous.

So, I'm sitting down in the chair, and Greg's getting the clamps ready everything's going great, but every time he goes to put the clamps on my nipple I cover it up with my elbow. After a couple of tries, and him cleaning the nipple again just in case and re-marking it, I finally let him put the clamps on. Of course, now that the clamps are on, I won't let him get the needle up there.

(I am the World's Biggest Pain in the Ass!) Eventually Greg gets a bit fed up, and in his usual joking manner demands, "Sit on your hands!" I ask why and he responds: "You're acting like a 16 year old girl getting her navel pierced, you've got enough holes in your body you should know better by now. Sit on your hands!" Chuckling to myself I comply. After a couple of deep breaths i feel the needle-and for the first time in my whole life I actually *watched* the needle go right through a part of my body and come out the other side. I let out a bit of a grunt but that was about it. It wasn't more then a couple of seconds before the jewelry was in and the clamps were on the other nipple.

Greg kept trying to tell me that the second nipple wasn't going to hurt more then the first, and I kept telling him to quit kidding me, I'm not dumb, I know what I'm in store for. After making me sit on my hands *again*, I start my breathing and before I know it the needle's up and half way through. I little bit more pressure and it's through the other side. (The skin was a little tougher then expected, probably because it's the nipple my daughter favoured when I nursed her.) The pain of the second piercing was, as expected, greater then the pain of the first, but I was better able to handle it because of all the endorphins and adrenaline running around in my body. The ring was in a few seconds later and I was off to the mirror to take a look. I love my new piercings. They look(and feel)so great!

It's been a few months and aside from a small setback in healing because I didn't sleep during exams, my nipples are healed really well. Actually they healed so well that this past weekend, Greg put a second set of piercings (vertically) behind the second set (which were horizontal). And of course after their introduction to the second set of nipple piercings, the first set started crusting up again...ugg.

Eventually I'm going to put 10ga rings in the horizontal piercings--but I think I'll wait until the vertical ones are a little less tender.

I still can't believe that I let silly old nightmares keep me from getting such great piercings for so long. But then again, some nightmares are just so vivid....

Take care of your holes everyone....