I have a few non-ear piercings, my tongue, and my 3 navel piercings, but they have all healed and are doing beautifully. One day I decided I wanted another piercing (actually, I was PMS'ing so horribly my entire body was achy and I would do anything to take my mind off the pain) so I started considering what I could have done without it being too 'open to the public.' I'm picky about that, so most of my mods are only visible if I want you to see them.
At A Glance Author Becca Contact becca@darserv.com Artist GiGi Studio Kolo Location L5P, Atlanta, GA I'm not a fan of facial piercings on myself, though they can be gorgeous on other people. So I said to myself "How about a nipple piercing?" I did some reading on BME and decided that's what I would do. I made plans to go to Kolo where I had 2 of my navel piercings done and over the next few days did more reading and looking at others' nipple piercings. On the day I was supposed to have it done, I was really excited and ready to go, but my boyfriend couldn't go. He begged me to wait for him so he could be with me to share the experience, so I didn't go. I was sorely disappointed.
However, I'm not one to give up. Later that day I began browsing BME again and came across the female piercings section, namely the "Other" part with the Christinas and such. I didn't pay much attention to it, but looking at another website of a piercing artist's 'showcase' of work, I saw some incredibly pretty surface piercings going all the way from the pubic mound up the lower abdomen and even to above the hips of one girl. I fell instantly in love with that look and showed the pictures to a friend who reiterated my thoughts of how nice they were. I was converted: from nipple piercing to pubic/lower abdomen surface piercings.
I kept the whole thing a major secret from my boyfriend (the surprise factor is always nice) and printed out my 2 favorite 'example' pictures to show my piercer so I could describe more accurately what I wanted. My boyfriend, our friend, and I headed to Little 5 Points in Atlanta, where Kolo is, with the goal of getting me pierced eventually. We went on a Saturday when we all had time. Unfortunately, everyone else in Atlanta had time on Saturday too. I had to wait almost 2 hours before I ever got to talk with GiGi, the lady who has done my other piercings there, one on one.
She had me undress from the waist down (I kept my socks on because I'm obnoxiously cold-natured) and she checked out my pictures and my skin. She said "It looks like it'll work out better than I was expecting." We spent a long time marking and positioning and eventually decided on a spot about half an inch higher than a Christina would be positioned, and as centered as we possibly could get it.
She put the clamps on my skin (clamps are evil, she always ends up sliding them into the perfect place which hurts like crap) and told me to take deep breaths ("No, REALLY deep") and she pushed in the needle as I breathed out. It HURT. It was more painful than my navel because it was a bit deeper so I moaned "owww" which my boyfriend heard out in the waiting room. She used a 12g, about 7/8 of an inch long curved barbell to follow the needle. That wasn't terribly painful, just a bit of feeling. She ended up changing the balls on the barbell out (I forget why) but she finished and we checked it out in the mirror. Wonderful!
I put my undies and jeans back on – I suggest wearing looser pants, or a skirt, or something. Jeans weren't horrible but as soon as I got home I put some pajama pants on which didn't rub my new piercing as much. It bled a bit, just enough to dry and look kinda cool. After a shower and gingerly washing the blood away with antibacterial soap (which stings for the first few washings) it looked fine. The second day it was bruising, but no pain whatsoever.
To clean it I use antibacterial soap in the shower and a saltwater soak (1/4 tsp of salt for every 8 oz of water) for about 5 minutes every evening. As rejection potential is high for surface piercings, I hope this is sufficient enough to keep it from rejecting. Since this is only the 2nd day I've had it I don't know what its future is, but if it behaves nicely I'm going to add some more barbells around it. If anyone has tips to help me prevent migration/rejection, I'd appreciate it!
In conclusion, I love this piercing. I think it's beautiful, and my boyfriend liked it too when I finally showed it to him. If it rejects I'll probably redo it or something like it later. It's painless as long as I don't forget about it when I take my pants/undies off - pulling on it is pretty scary, it feels like I'm going to rip it out or something. Avoiding blue jeans is a good idea too. They are a bit uncomfortable. Otherwise, it's good, no complaints so far.
Tip: Shave. Don't even consider doing anything like this without shaving, and do it pretty recently before you get pierced because you won't know how long before you'll be comfortable enough to shave around your jewelry.
Thanks! 28 October 2001