| At A Glance | |
| Author | FrinkLemur |
| Contact | boryjim@hotmail.com |
| IAM | FrinkLemur |
| When | A year ago |
| Artist | Brian Skellie |
| Studio | Piercing Experience |
| Location | Atlanta, GA, USA |
After some research, though, I started thinking about getting something else. I looked at apadravyas, ampallangs, and PAs. I researched each of them, and got firsthand accounts about what each felt like. I talked to women who were sexually active with pierced men. I wanted something aesthetically pleasing, and I wanted something that could increase pleasure for me and my partner. After a lot of thinking, I decided on an apadravya.
My girlfriend Sonya and I drove down for a weekend of piercing in Atlanta. She was to get her fourchette done, and I my apadravya, figuring that if one of us was going to be incapacitated... we might as well both get pierced. We got into town on Friday evening, and Sonya got her fourchette done. (You can read about her experience here).
Saturday was the big day. We got up and had an enormous delicious late breakfast, then headed over to Piercing Experience. My mind was spinning - I was thinking all sorts of things at once: How much would it hurt? How would it feel? How would it look? Do I -really- want to do this? ...and on and on.
We arrived at Piercing Experience, and it began. I had spoken with Brian Skellie, the piercer there, before, and I have always been incredibly impressed by everything about Piercing Experience. I talked to Brian a little bit about the piercing, and then we went back to the piercing room to measure. Brian used a set of calipers to measure the head of my penis, then marked the entry and exit points, as well as a line marking the plane of the piercing with the wood end of a sterile q-tip that had been dipped in a purple dye.
I've been marked!(146k)After he made the marks, I was a little surprised - I think I thought that it would exit higher, closer to the ridge of the glans. Brian said that the proposed placement would cause it to tilt forward at a gentle angle during penetration which would ease entry. He said that an inch-and-a-quarter-long barbell would be about perfect, and offered me a choice of six or eight gauge. I decided on six gauge, as I had heard that larger gauges tend to heal better and be more comfortable. The six gauge wasn't available in titanium, so I got a plain steel bar with matching steel balls. Brian set all of the stuff up to autoclave, and Sonya and I sat in the waiting room. I could feel my anticipation growing by the minute. Finally the time was at hand. Brian, Sonya, and I all went back to the room where the piercing would be done. Brian had sterilized two pairs of nitrile gloves along with all the jewelry on the autoclave tray. I started by pulling down my jeans and underwear, and lying back on the table. Brian scrubbed up and donned his first pair of gloves. He put on a clear plastic eye shield and surgical mask, then put a piece of gauze with a slit in it around my penis. Brian rubbed in a local antiseptic that would clean any nasties from the surface of the skin. Then he massaged the tissue a little bit to loosen it, and thus ease the passing of the needle. Then he donned another pair of sterile gloves. Fortunately, Brian is not a proponent of using clamps - they tend to be one of the most painful parts of a piercing procedure, and can actually damage tissue. Instead, he simply uses his hands. So there was no anticipatory pain of the clamp.
I closed my eyes as Brian instructed, and tried to breathe slowly and deeply. It worked, and I was relaxed... until I felt the pressure of the needle on the underside of my penis. Then my breaths became more rapid and shallow. I was trying to relax, and my fear was fighting me. I could feel the energy of my anticipation and fear and excitement thrumming through my body. I felt a sharp pinch; it stung a little. Brian said, "OK, congratulations..." and I thought "That was it? That wasn't so..." and then Brian continued, "...we are on our way." In retrospect, I think that, at that point, he had only pierced the tissue from the bottom of the penis through to the urethra - in effect, I had completed the PA part of the journey. The whole time, Brian was talking calmingly, telling me how great it would look when it was done, telling me to relax and breathe...
And then the needle went in. I screamed, loudly. My hips spasmed wildly off the table. All my nervousness, all my fear, all of the pain and energy came out in one big loud noise. I could feel my heart pounding. Somehow, Brian's hands had stayed with me, and the needle was through. I felt simultaneously distant and very much a part of the experience. Brian continued, "You're going to feel tightness go to smoothness", and slid the jewelry in. It was over, and I felt a million different ways about it. Brian's comment kind of summed up what I was feeling at that instant: "That's a strong feeling!"
Fresh apadravya!(161k)
After finishing the piercing, Brian wrapped some gauze around my penis, then pulled up the little sheet around it, then covered the whole thing with a sterilized glove. (The fingers stuck up like the comb on a rooster's head. Jokes were made about "cock-a-doodle". It was funny.) I was grinning. I couldn't stop grinning. I felt great.
Wrap this one up to
go!(163k)Brian's aftercare instructions were simple: Keep it dry, and don't mess with it. The body has an incredible ability to heal itself, and he told me to simply let it do its job. I asked him about urination. He said that there was a slight tingle the first time, but nothing to worry about. He instructed me to keep it wrapped in gauze and covered in a condom for the first three to five days. At this point, it was about three in the afternoon. I thanked Brian and Sonya paid (what a wonderful present!!!), and we went back to the hotel. We stopped at a grocery store to pick up condoms and gauze (and some mac & cheese, and motor oil. Just to mess with them).
Some time later that afternoon, I peed for the first time. Frankly, I was pretty scared. Brian had said that the pain wasn't a big deal, but this was a guy who did his own apadravya, and had lifted 150 lbs with his nipples. I gingerly removed the layers of dressing. I sat down on the toilet, facing the back of it, holding on to the water tank. I braced myself. And...it was fine. It was a slight tingle, like I've experienced if I've gotten soap in my urethra. No big deal. So I wrapped it up in fresh gauze, covered it with a condom, and went on with my life.
That evening, I felt euphoric. It was a combination of feeling that I had conquered my fear and a wonderful feeling of "I've got a secret" as I walked around Atlanta. I babbled about it. One of the strangest things was, I would tell anyone who would listen for thirty seconds, how the pain didn't crescendo. Every other time I've been physically injured, whether burnt or bumped or cut or scraped, the pain takes a few moments to really kick in, then slowly diminishes. Think about bumping your head or burning your finger or any sort of non-piercing pain: There's a split-second where you realize that the painful thing has happened, before it actually hurts, then the pain sort of blossoms out from the spot, and, depending on how bad it was, slowly recedes. With the apadravya, though, the pain went from nothing to intense to nothing again. There was a moment of white-hot intense pain, but no rise and fall - it felt like I had gone from a standstill to a hundred miles and hour and back to a standstill in an instant.
The next morning, a bizarre thing happened: I got up out of bed, went to the bathroom (with associated unwrapping and rewrapping), and as I was about to go back to bed, I collapsed on the bathroom floor. I slept there for about fifteen minutes, and then went back to bed. I was fine, and later that day, I called Brian and asked him about it. He said that, when I had urinated, I had probably flushed out the remnants of the dopamine, adrenaline, and endorphins that were dumped into my system, and not to worry unless it happens again. It didn't. Other than that, the aftercare for this piercing has gone very well. For the first four days, I kept it wrapped in gauze, covered in a condom. When I would urinate, there would be a small discharge of blood and dried blood. My first post-apadravya erection was fairly uneventful. I was very aware of it, but it didn't hurt. Showering was interesting, though. Per Brian's instructions, I wanted to keep the area as dry as possible. For the first few times, I sort of washed around the area. As time went on, though, I found that a latex glove, pulled over the penis and testicles, was the best way to keep it dry in the shower.
After about 12 days, I 'tried it out'. There are some condoms on the market that have some extra material at the head for a loose and slidey sensation; I would highly recommend these, as they slip over everything quite nicely. I was worried about the painful tugging I had felt when I had worn jewelry in my frenum, but there wasn't anything like that. The sensation was unbelievable. The only way I've been able to describe it is this: Without the apadravya, you only feel sensations on the outside of the penis. With it, though, it transmits every bump, every nuance, throughout the penis, much like the needle on a record player transmits vibrations. It was intense and fantastic and amazing. Afterwards, I urinated and rinsed everything with clear, fresh water, then blotted it dry with clean tissue.
Per Brian's instructions, I left it alone. Crusties formed around the balls of the barbell and they looked awfully gross. Brian had said not to disturb them, so I didn't. I later got clarification on that instruction - I could flake off the crud from the ball, but not the crusties that were actually around the hole, as they were really scab material. I followed these instructions, and the healing has gone fantastically well. I didn't swim for at least six months - I wanted to be really certain that it had healed. It's been about nine months now since I've had it done. I enjoy it tremendously. The only ill effects that I've found are that I sometimes dribble a drop or two after I pee, even when I try to squeeze everything out. Sex is wonderful and fun, though it tends to get a bit sore after a real marathon session.
The Apadravya today!(42k)