The best thing to ever fancy my chest was done on June 5, 2002, my first surface piercing. The long awaited event, which changed the way I enjoyed piercings forever.
At A Glance Author stumbleine Contact stumbleine@bme.anon IAM stumbleine When Two years ago Artist RJ Studio New Tribe Location Toronto, Canada My opportunity came when I saw a sign at New Tribe, the piercing shop I had been going to for the two past years, advertising free surface piercings. The piercers needed to learn how to do them therefore were offering the procedure at the cost of jewelry. The call could not come at a more convenient time as my High School Formal was coming up, and it would be a perfect complement to my chest, which was to be exposed by the corset I planned to wear.
It was early June, and I had booked my appointment the week before I had it done. My friend Katy and I left after classes were done, and drove downtown for the appointment.
I wore a white and red pin striped button up shirt with a white bra, so I could easily undo my shirt and have it pierced. The colour of the shirt does have relevance.
I was introduced to my piercer, R.J, and the supervisor, Greta, a piercer from British Columbia, who at the time, had had a lot of experience with surface piercing, and who was going to coach R.J through the procedure. Joanne, a piercer, who had pierced my labret a year earlier, was also going to observe, as she was also learning how to surface pierce.
First thing we had to do was decide on jewelry size. I pictured myself with something longer, but they said I could not have it too long in order to provide for sufficient drainage. The jewelry we settled on was an inch and a half-long, staple in shape and made of Surgical Steel.
After picking out the jewelry at the front desk, we went into one of the piercing cubicles and I was told to unbutton my shirt. My friend Katy and I, Greta, R.J and Joanne were all in there to experience the crowning of my cleavage. I was warned that R.J would take his time, as it was his second time piercing the cleavage area and his first time doing it vertically. R.J put on the classic New Tribe purple gloves and started to inquire about the placement I wanted. We had to make sure the placement was perfect, so after a lot of back and forth movement between the mirror and his marker, we finally found the right spot, centered a bit over the center of my cleavage. I was told to lie down at this point, and was informed of the sterile clamps, needle and jewelry that was to be used for the procedure.
Now came the painful part. The Clamps. Throughout my experience with piercings, I had heard stories of how clamps hurt, but I never understood what they meant until R.J clamped my skin. Not only was it painful, but I had to keep going through the pain since he was not able to get them on straight the first time around.
Anyway, I hardly felt the needle go through. I did the same old routine of closing my eyes and breathing out while the needle went through. It actually felt nice. Slow penetration through the skin with a sharp needle. I wanted more, except, the clamp was still a pain, so I was glad he took that off rather quickly. I lay there with the needle in my skin for a while because R.J needed to clean up the little knick he caused on my skin after pushing the needle through and because he needed to prepare for jewelry insertion. This is about the time where wearing the white clothes was not a good idea.
It was interesting to lay there for a bit because I felt no pain with the needle in like that. Actually, it was a neat site to look down at my chest with a sharp piece of metal in it.
I think he had some trouble putting the jewelry in because I remember thinking that it was done, but upon opening my eyes, I felt a yank and knew he was having complications. Either way, eventually he got it through, screwed the ball on and I was ready to go.
I felt so excited with how sexy it looked that I just wanted to walk around with my shirt unbuttoned. I felt a bit stiff, because I did not want to cause myself pain by moving too much, but eventually I got use to it and realized that your cleavage really does not get hit enough to worry about it being in danger of contact.
I was told to do sea salt soaks a few times a day, so I would just throw a palm full of it into my bathtub every time I bathed. I also poured saline solution on it a few times a day, to rinse it out. I did not stick with the proper cleaning procedures for long as it felt pretty healed after a week or two, and I figured taking straight baths was good enough.
Where I went wrong with this piercing, was not at the fact that I stopped cleaning it properly. It was the day I went to Daytona Beach for 13 days, in August. That was the beginning of my journey through rejection.
I was staying with a friend and her family, and since we would either spend most of our time in the ocean or the pool, we would not shower in the condo everyday, as doing it by the pool seemed good enough. I also figured that because I was swimming in the ocean, and it having an excess of salt, I was more then sufficient in the sea salt cleaning part. Trust me, I now know, how big of a mistake that kind of mentality was.
First of all, the ocean has bacteria, which inevitably got into my piercing, and by not rinsing it with clean salt water, I was asking for an infection. Second, by being out in the sun for as long as I was, provided an irritable condition for the piercing. It dried out the skin, and the excess ocean salt in the piercing only festered up the rejection.
It started with the lower hole rejecting upwards, but both holes seemed pretty infected with lots of crustiness everyday.
The crustiness eventually went away, and I was so occupied with my first year of university, that I figured the piercing was fine until I could get some time to head to a piercer.
In November, I went into Way Cool Tattoos Uptown, to get a nape piercing from Gary. I showed him my cleavage, and he told me that the bar was way too long, and that I had to either get a shorter one, or take it out. Since it was my first surface piercing and I could not part with it right then and there, I asked him how I could take it out myself. He suggested I do it after soaking my skin in warm water for while, to relax it, and then to pinch the skin together, and slip the bar out, after having unscrewed the top ball of course.
So, on December 6th, 2002, I decided to part with it because the amount of exposed bar was hitting my bra, and irritating the rest of the piercing. I did as he said, soaked in the bathtub, unscrewed the ball, and slipped the bar out.
It was a weird sensation not to have the bar there anymore. A bit of an empty feeling in fact. I also had to flatten the skin down and push the excess lymph out to make sure things were drained properly.
I knew it would leave scars, but the thought of it never bothered me. It has been a year and half since I took it out and the scars are same colour as the rest of my skin. Compared to the one chicken pox scar I have in that area, they look rather nice and ordered.
Since then, I have had my nape reject as well, and currently have a wrist surface piercing which I have been told has hope, but I can see the symptoms of rejection. I plan to get my other wrist pierced, and have two surface bars placed diagonally on the top inner parts of my breasts.
The lesson I have learned from the three surface piercings I have had is that they can go wrong in so many ways. Some of these ways depend on the area pierced, the time of year you have it done and how active you are when you have them. With the cleavage, my biggest mistake was misinformation, so I would suggest in the case of going on vacation, talk to your piercer about the potential problems you may face in an unfamiliar environment. It never hurts to be prepared and that applies to any healing piercing.