I first got the idea of me getting my back pierced after I had seen a picture of a girl with a similar piercing. So I began planning when I would get it done. I figured the best time to have it done was during winter break. This way the piercings would have time to heal before I went back to school. When it finally came down to it I was extremely scared, but also extremely excited. Then came the time when I was going to get it done. I wasn't as nervous as I thought I would be. We decided to do the piercings after the shop was closed. We figured it would be the easiest time, seeing as how we would be the only ones there. The less interruptions the better. So about 1 O'clock in the morning we went to the studio.
At A Glance Author Luridbeauty Contact luridbeauty@yahoo.com Artist Paul Morrow Studio Headzup Location Sarasota, Florida At the studio, the piercer began marking where the holes would be. After about an hour and a half of marking and remarking, we decided it would be best if I came back the next day to try again, since by this time it's like really late and everyone is started to see little purple dots everywhere they looked. So I had to go through the whole process of being scared for another day. Fortunately when we went back to the piercing parlor the next day everything was ready. He had all the 12 gauge needles and all 12 gauge one-inch bar bells all lined up and ready to go. It looked as though someone was about to under go some major surgery. It only took a few minutes to make the marks, since this time he had made a stencil of where the holes would be. Then the piercings began. He started on the lower left side. The first one wasn't bad. I thought, "Ok, I can handle this." Then he continued to go up my back. Once he had started he just continued to go up with out stopping. He would clamp the skin, pierce it, then put the bar bells in, unclamped it and then went right to the next one without even a little hesitation. As he went up my back, the pain seemed to increase greatly. The left side only took about 15 minutes to complete. Then we took a small break. The break only lasted for about 5-10 minutes, just long enough for me to drink some water, my boyfriend to see if he's hands weren't broken, and the piercer to re-glove. It was kind of odd I wasn't in any pain. Once he had taken off the clamps, I guess it was just so much of a relief that I couldn't even feel the fact that I had 6 bar bells in my back. The piercer put a wet paper towel over the left side. This was such an amazing feeling. I hadn't realized how hot my skin had become. After this, he began piercing the right side. This time he started at the top and worked his way down. I guess with the idea of getting the most pain out of the way in the beginning. This didn't work. The pain seemed to increase as he went down. I'm assuming by this time I had almost completely lost my tolerance for pain. When he finished he thought it would be cute to show me the cloth, which had all the little bits of skin and blood that had, came out when he was piercing. The whole experience only took about 40 minutes. When it was all over it was such a relief. Everyone who was in the room with me was very impressed with the fact that I hadn't cried, screamed or passed out. And everyone is always amazed when I tell them that I did the whole thing sober. Now I have two sets of 6 horizontal 12 gauges in two vertical lines going down the lower half of my back.
For the first few days of having my back pierced, they were pretty swollen and red. I was really scared to go back to school, in fear of being slammed in my back in the hallways. Luckily nothing to painful happened. After about 1 1/2 weeks I was able to sleep on my back and pretty much go on about my life as usual. That is until about 2 weeks after being pierced, I got into a pretty bad car accident. And seeing as how the piercings were still kind of fresh, they were one of my main concerns. At the time, it appeared that they were fine and that nothing had happened to them. But a few days later I noticed that the skin around one of the top right balls was beginning to swell up. So much so that I had to keep "popping" it out of my skin, which hurt like a motherfucker and was really gross. I waited a few days to see what was going to happen. Just when it seemed as though the swelling was going down, I noticed that a couple more had begun to swell up around the balls. So I went down to the place where I was pierced. He told me I needed to have longer bar bells put in. So he took out 5 of the 1-inch bar bells, and replaced them with 1 1/4 inch bar bells, which hurt like 10 times worse then when he had pierced them. I actually cried this time. I couldn't take anymore. So I had to leave and come back another time. I came back a few days later. He took out the 3 remaining bar bells, which had swelled. This seemed to help a lot. I wasn't in any pain, but my skin looked really bad. In the places were the balls had sunken it, there were deep red (almost purple) indentions. This part of the skin didn't seem to be healing. So about 3 months after getting my back pierced, I had to take them out. This was extremely upsetting to me. I had put so much of my money, time, and effort (not to mention all the bitching from my parents,) into them. When it came down to taking them out, it hurt so badly. It was a lot worse the when I had gotten them pierced in the first place. It's now been a few months since I took them out. They are heeling nicely. In the future I would love to get my back pierced again. I truly loved them. I thought they were so beautiful. They were worth all the pain I had to go though.