My first piercing, ampallang

At A Glance Author Ben Contact stasis6@hotmail.com Artist Jeff Studio Skincraft Location Covington Kentucky

I want to state first that I got into body mods in a really round about way, and BME had a big part in it. I regularly visit a site on the net called Cruel.com that gives a daily "cruel" or unusual site, mostly things that are just fucked up. In any case, one day they linked to a BME site that was an April Fool's gag about someone who had transplanted their twin's arm onto their own body as a sort of "ultimate body mod." The story WAS a gag, and I passed it around a bunch of my friends over the net as a sick joke.

I revisited the site later and stumbled across the fact that it was part of a much larger site, BME. I started looking around, and spent the rest of the night looking at pictures and reading stories of genital piercings, fingernail mods, ear restructuring, implants, eunuchs, the works. I marveled at the people who refused to take their body for granted, and the work and dedication that went into this industry.

A while back, a few of my friends got PAs, but I was unattracted to the aesthetics of them and the blood that spotted out of the wound for the few weeks where they went around wagging their penises wherever they could. After they healed though, I found the piercing to be quit pleasing to the eye and very unusual, and after hearing stories of the increased sexual pleasure and female reaction, I started thinking seriously about getting one done.

I went back and forth for about six months, and in that time I became 18, the legal age of consent, making it actually possible for me to get work done. Something I had considered for a long time was now no longer an abstraction, it was something I could do.

But still, I waffled, and pushed the idea out of my mind. A few months later I was perusing BME again and stumbled across something I thought was absolutely beautiful, the ampallang. I liked the way it looked, with the two balls on either said of the head of the penis lending a certain symmetry to the procedure and was interested in the sexual side effects, what those balls would do for vaginal intercourse. I was hooked. I had to get one.

I told my girlfriend the next day and she was all for it after looking at a few pictures of the ampallang, both of us agreeing it looked better than the PA and excited about the sexual rewards. She has had her nipples done for over a year and it was nothing but a positive experience, so she was able to give me some advice about piercings in general. There was no stopping me now.

But I am a fairly cautious person about some things, so I read everything I could about the procedure, looking at pictures and text experiences on BME. I thought I had a learned a lot about the process and what it would be like, although I found that a lot of reader stories were poorly written and left out what I was most interested in, the actual piercing and the procedure of getting one done. I was sold though, and we started calling local piercers and talking to them about it, inquiring about prices and asking general questions. It wasn't long until I called a place that encouraged questions, had a very reasonable price, and spoke glowingly about piercing. I had found my place, and made an appointment to go down the next day to finally get it done.

I started talking to people about it at school (at 18 I'm still a senior in high school) and mostly they were very interested in it. While most expressed shock and the most common remark was "You're getting it WHERE!?!?!" At any rate, after the initial heebeejeebies, most people found it very intriguing after I explained some things about it to them. I've always found that people are a lot more openminded than we may give them credit for. Moving on.

School was soon over and I found myself in the car going to Skincraft, the piercer's place of business. I was shaking from nervousness, and I couldn't get my hands to sit still. I couldn't tell if I was excited or if I was going to bolt out of the car and forget about it. My girlfriend, god love her, held my hand the whole time and cooed sweet nothings to keep me calm, telling me how much she loved her piercings and how much she enjoyed the piercing.

Sooner than I would have liked I was at the counter of the store, talking to the cashier (and piercer) about it as he took my idea and gave me the forms to fill out. My girlfriend was inquiring about some new bars for her earings, and he brough some out from behind the counter. He kept her hand from picking them up though, as he sprayed disinfectand on both her hand, and the balls, and asked her

not to let the balls touch the counter, but to place them on clean cups so she could look at them clearer. The cleanliness of simply looking at earings really impressed me that these people took their craft and health seriously, and I felt a lot better.

While I waited for Jeff (my piercer) to get ready I was still talking to the man behind the counter. He asked me what other piercings I had and I told him this was my first. "You're STARTING with an ampallang?" he asked like he didn't believe me. I nodded. "That's cool man, it's one of the more intense piercings, you do this and you can do anything." This didn't exactly calm me.

Then Jeff took me back into the piercing room, which shocked me as soon as I walked in. The front of the establishment looked just like I imagined a tattoo parlor would, designs on the wall, piercing and tattoo magazines behind the counter, TOOL pumping through the soundsystem. But when I walked into the actual piercing room I was surprised to find that it looke exactly like a doctor's office, with white walls, a folding table with the strip of paper running down the middle, sterilization equipment and anatomical charts on the walls. As Jeff put on rubber gloves I almost believed I WAS in a doctor's office, if my doctor had a Kanji tattoo on his neck and a septum piercing.

Jeff told me to lay down on the table and I did. He then asked if I minded if his apprentice could watch. I figured these people see hundreds of penises in a given week, so it didn't bother me. I dropped my pants and laid back, trying breathing exercizes to help me relax. Jeff left to get the jewelry together, and I took the time to ask the apprentice some questions about how left it took to learn these things, and what she wanted to do. Jeff soon returned with my initial barbell (a 12 gauge) and measured and marked my penis for the piercing.

I asked him if he was going to use a clamp, and he said yes, asking me if that's what I preferred. I had seen some nipple rings done without clamps so without hesitation said yes, even though I heard the clamps for the ampallang were excruciating. I started to really freak out at this poing as I realized it was HAPPENING, he started to bring the clamps towards my poor penis. I suddenly felt VERY protective about the little guy.

He placed the clamps and started to tighten them with a rubber band, slowly, and kept asking me how it felt. To my immense relief the clamps did not hurt AT ALL and were actually comforting, as I couldn't move now and felt that it would be easier to get a straight shot through, and not get a skewed piercing. Then the needle came out and any composure I had collapsed.

I felt him place the needle to the side of my penis where the pen mark was and tell me that we were going to do this. He took me to take a deep breath and when he said so let it out in a rush, and that that's when he was going to do the piercing. I started shaking badly at this point I might add.

"Okay, deep breath in," he said calmly. My deep breath was made up of my saying "fffuuuccckk" under my breath, killing that idea. "Okay, breath out... now." he said just as killing as he pressed the needle in.

I was told that the ampallang is one of the more intense and painful piercings, but I have no means of comparison. I've never had anything pierced other than my left ear when I was in middleschool and thought Eddie Vedder was the SHIT. So I don't compare it to any other piercings.

They were right about one thing, it was VERY intense. The pain I experienced as he pushed the needle through the head of my penis was extreme and beyond anything I had imagined. To give an idea of how long it took I was able to say "fuck" over 5 times through clenched teeth. I didn't think it would take that long and the pain was from another world. A strange thing happened as I realized when it hurt the worst was that I was DOING it, and I felt a rush of adrenaline move through my body and I rode the pain as I cursed like a sailor. Then I felt the needle stop moving. "Fuck," I said, "Just put the jewelry in, I want to be done."

"You mean the barbell?" Jeff asked. "It's in, you're done."

I then looked down just in time to catch him screwing on the other ball on my beautifull ampallang. Then the endorphins were pumped into my body and I felt a high I cannot begin to describe. I felt like I had climbed everest, that I was unstoppable. I had gone through with it, I had not chickened out. I had done something I did not think I could do. That made everything worth it. I began laughing from joy.

I could barely sit still as I was told about the aftercare and was handed a booklet of notes and sea salt for my soaks. I felt elated, and thanked the piercer profusely as the apprentice handed me some water, which I drank in a drought. I went to the counter and paid, after my penis was wrapped in gauze and I was warned about bleeding. At the front of the store a woman asked me if it hurt, and I recounted the experience. She paled measurably and told me in a shaking voice that she was just getting her nose done. Somone else said they couldn't believe they could do that. That's what I thought, but you don't know what you're capable of until you try. Again, that lesson alone is worth the first piercing.

Aftercare is easy, if demanding. Washing twice a day, with fifteen minute sea salt soaks in hot water. Along with moving the barbell back and forth and spinning it. I was nervous about the pain of washing it, until after the first time. Any mild discomfort I felt at feeling something move through my penis as I adjusted the barbell was quickly lost when I realized how much better it felt when it was newly cleaned. And sea salt soaks are a gift from god, and I pictured myself in my apartment, watching the Simpsons with my pants around my ankles and my penis dipped into a bowl of warm water and sea salt. It's that soothing. I noticed a little bit of bleeding and the first erection a few hours later was a little painful but also excited as I thought the erect penis with the ampallang was beautiful, and marvelled at the good job Jeff had done, perfectly straight. Urinating also was easy, as I chose not to pierce the urethra, although I did notice my stream was subtly different. It's now two days later and I'm still in love with my first piercing, and excited about how quickly it's healing and I can't wait to have sex with it for the first time. I also can't wait to go through it again, these things ARE addicting. At a coffeeshop the first night I talk to someone who had a fernum and a PA and was swapped stories and showed each other our piercings, I felt like part of a club, a community. He also was impressed with the straightness and perfect depth of the piercing and told me he was getting an apidravya from Jeff in a few days.

I don't regret my ampallang, and I heartily recommend it to everyone. But check out the piercer first, and if you're not ready for the time and commitment that goes into aftercare and whatnot don't get it done. I hope my story helped someone thinking about it, and I'd love to here from some people about their stories or questions. My email is STASIS6@hotmail.com. Hope you had a good time reading this. And thanks BME, I feel like posting this story helped me come full circle.