Sometime ago I had taken an interest in genital piercing. Where this interest came from I can't be sure, it did however strike decently hard around the time I was 21 or so. Perhaps it was one of my friends talking about his P.A or it could also have been just be the fact I wanted some more metal.
At A Glance Author ductapedave Contact ductapedave@bme.anon IAM ducttapedave When A year ago Artist Scotty Studio Penna Location Halifax The first hitch in the matter happened when I moved back to Halifax. I had very few contacts in the area, especially those involved in the body modification scene. While I thoroughly enjoy having metal in my skin, I do not enjoy it being placed there by someone I didn't trust to do the job correctly, especially skin attached to a fairly useful piece of me. I figured that perhaps some research would be in order - the Internet is many a splendid thing indeed. The details, risks and what to expect from said piercing could be found in short order. Reviews and information about local shops was harder to come by.
At least that's what I thought. I was not a member of the IAM community at this point. I only viewed galleries and experiences, and hadn't thought up to write up my limited experience at that point. Upon lamenting my woes to a friend who was in the IAM community, she offered to do a little poking around for me (pun intended). She knew of some people in the city who had a good feel for shops in the area. She started to ask around for me. The upside of this was I managed to get some great first hand details of places to go that were safe, clean and sterile. The downside was very few people believed I existed. Which really didn't surprise me, I get that a lot.
The one shop that came out on top of it all was Penna. Scotty, the proprietor, was said to be extremely competent, clean and an all around nice guy. This is fairly important when you plan to drop your pants in front of a stranger for the purpose of having a sharp piece of metal shoved through your skin. I called the shop number to set up an appointment and discuss pricing options. Satisfied with that I made a tentative agreement for a Tuesday, first appointment in the shop's day.
When I arrived, Penna was just opening. Scotty's apprentice was taking care of things until his arrival. This gave some time for nerves to settle, paperwork to be filled out and lots of pacing. Scotty finally arrived and talked about what was going to be done today. He asked if I had any other piercing before. We talked about aftercare, what he recommended, what I had done in the past. He also asked if I had eaten, which thankfully I had remembered to do.
Scotty explained the procedure so I was aware of what to expect. Once everything was prepared, hands washed gloves on, etc we would agree on placement and mark the site. Once marked, it would be gently clamped to hold the skin in place. Following that, Scotty would count to three, get me to breathe out and pierce. Simple, right?
I lapsed into a bit of a silence so Scotty said "Drop your pants and let's take a look at your wang" to lighten the mood. So I hopped up on the table, rested back on the paper and whipped it out, when my penis decided that this may not be a happy moment and tried to run away inside. I thought cold water caused shrinkage, apparently I was wrong.
It was a fairly light atmosphere, with the odd joke being made to help calm the nerves down, since in the back of my mind all I could do was create horror stories of things going wrong. Thankfully they didn't. The procedure went exactly as planned. The clamps pinched a tiny bit and the piercing itself pinched, but really wasn't that much at all in terms of pain. After a few brief breaths so that I had some more wits about me, Scotty reviewed the aftercare with me, healing times, activity restrictions and so forth. He also gave me a paper which the information along with some sea salt.
Just for the record, aftercare consisted of sea salt soaks in warm water a couple of times a day for a week or two. I accomplished this using a clean plastic glass to hold the water and dropped in and stood there in the bathroom. The hardest part with either trying not to take a squirt in the cup or trying not to fall over laughing, There are people out there who do their soaks in urine, since your own is apparently sterile to you, but it just didn't strike me as the best plan. I kept up with my usual hygiene routine, making sure to use gentle glycerin soaps without dyes, perfumes and other such things. This kept my piercing clean and happy.
For restrictions I was told no sexual activity for at least a week. After that time any activity should be gentle. I should also pay attention (i.e. If it hurts, don't do it). Once a month or two had passed everything should be great.
I took the aftercare information, salt and new metal and was happily on my way. Though I couldn't quite shake a feeling of familiarity about Scotty and his apprentice. When I returned to the shop the next day to go with a friend to see one of the ink artists at Sin on Skin things started to become clearer. I had played street hockey fairly regularly with the apprentice when I was young. Between Scotty and myself we also figured out I used to mix for a band he was in. Halifax is a small city indeed.
Sadly the 12 g piercing I had didn't stay. Months later it had started to migrate and move about, not at all Scotty's fault however. Eventually I took the piercing out, but that was when I had two other frenums pierced at 8g so it balanced out. All in all it was an excellent experience for me.
Through careful research I was able to find a shop that I can feel very comfortable in with a competent, clean and friendly staff at hand. They offered great aftercare information and an artist who is available to check up on his work if concerns arise. I felt so confident there I have gone back several times for piercings and have even had some tattooing done by one of the tattoo artists at Sin on Skin. I regularly recommend the shop to anyone I meet who is looking for some piercings.
As for the frenums, they are great. It's an excellent piercing all around. It doesn't require lengthy healing times, at smaller gauges weeping isn't a huge problem and it doesn't requires you to change how you pee. That was decently important to me. As a piercing I would recommend it.
Oh and that friend who did the poking around for me also set me up with an account on IAM that I needed to keep up, mostly to prove I exist. So if you're reading this, I guess you know I exist now too.