Just as a prelude to this story, I would like to say that I am going to express more about my personal body modification experience than I am goimg to go into detail about this this particular piercing.
At A Glance Author Brandon Enright Contact Brandon Enright@bme.anon Artist Curt Warren Studio Koi Piercing Studio Location Salt Lake City, UT Now, for a quick background about myself; I have 11 piercings that I currently wear; as well as 2 tattoos. For al long as I can remember, I have had the urge to modify myself. When I was 9 years old, I got my earlobe pierced after much griping and manipulating directed toward my parents. When I got my ear pierced, the New Kids on the Block were at the height of their popularity (for those that can remember them). Some of these guys had their ears pierced, so you might be able to imagine the amount of shit that I cought in the 4th grade. I was the only boy in my elementary school that had his ear pierced. I did not get my ear pierced so that I could imitate some pop sensations, I just had an urge that I had no way to define at that time in my life. From that time on, the only exposure that I had to conventional body modification were talk shows with titles like "Oh my God, my kid is a fuckin freak"; but these shows excited me. Up to age 18 I really loved many different types of modifications but had no idea of how to facilitate such things (I was incarcerarted from ages 14-17). At age 17 I was cour ordrered to go to college fully paid by the government (what a shit deal huh?, yuk yuk yuk). So, after my first semester, I had to get a summer job, where I met my first serious girlfriend. At that point I had my first run in with body piercing. I watched her get her belly button pierced and that is still to this day one of the most intense and invigorating experiences that I have ever encountered (and I have seen and done done some fucking outragous shit(largely due to the corrections system)), I almost fainted just watching it. The energy was just outrageous to me.
So to try and make a long story less long I will try and compress the events up to now. I had a few tattoos and some piercings, but was never really satisfied. Which brings me to the reason that I am even writing this.
I believe that I have been holding back all this time. I love every piercing and tattoo that I have; but they all seem like band-aids. Small tokens of a real self-realization. Not to say that that I would freely remove any of my piercings. The this is that I believe that I have let me own fear hold me back. I want modifications that my friends and family quite frankly find repulsive. So I have sort of raised the bar one notch at a time, so that when I finally start getting the thinge that I want, they won come as such a shock. Kind of a chicken-shit way of going about it, but thats the way that I did it. To be truly fair, it was not really a concious process. It is just the way that I have come to realize my own realization.
I don't want to put too much weight in body modification as to say that this is the definition of me. There is a grand arena left to define a person besides what mods they have.
Alright, if there is still anyone still left reading this article: I will finally get to the part regarding my piercing/implant.
Now living in Utah, the obvious choice for a slightly more technical piercing is Koi Piercing Studio, and in particular Curt Warren. Curt had already gained a high level of my trust when he did an exceptional job piercing my apadravya. I have been mentioning doing a madison leading to a full necklace for about a year. The problem was that he would only do it with Tygon, and they never had any in stock. So I finally got some of my own. I am glad that it took so long though, because Curts method of doing that particualr piercing changed during this period of time. Before, the idea was to just do it like a regular piercing, just using Tygon as the barbell. But when I finally acquired enough Tygon to get the job done, the method had changed.
What we did was use Tygon as an implant, let it heal for 8 months or so, then scalpel the ends and remopve the Tygon and insert the barbell that I want to eventually wear.
So, if you want to hear the technacalities of the piercing then here we go. The Madison is only the first piercing of my necklace. We wanted to try this and see if it held without migrating. So he did the initial piercing with a 12 gauge needle then we were going to try to insert the Tygon on the end of a 10 gauge taper (the theory is that by having a smaller pierce than the size of the Tygon, we could reduce any vertical slippage of the implant). The Tygon did not stay on the end of the 10 gauge taper so we had to use an 8 gauge taper. The 8 still was not working, so he inserted an 18 gauge taper through the Tygon. The 18 gauge taper bent during the process, so he went to a 16 gauge taper and that worked.
The piercing was longer on each side of the Tygonso that it would fit well within the area and not risk sliding out either side of the piercing holes.
Well, the piercing/implant went off without a hitch. I cannot describe my elation at finally taking the first step towards one of the major projects that I want done.
Everything has been great so far; the holes are sealed, so I cant see how anything can really go wrong at this point.
For people who are wondering about the amount of pain involved with a piercing like this, maybe you should re-evaluate your reasons for getting this modification. Physical pain is usually only temporary and there are many more long-lasting effects that need to be evaluated.
Well, my 150lb. German Shepard is buggin me, I think he needs to leave a shit, so I'm sone with this story. Thanks to anyone who actually went through the whole thing.
Just like most people who post experiences, feel free to drop me a line about anything.
Take care now