During the 6 months just before and after my 17th birthday I went through what you could call an addiction to piercings. A new piercing shop had opened up in my city and offered $30 piercings every wednesday; thus, I ended up with a new piercing nearly every week. I became fairly close friends with the former piercer Ryan and his apprentice (now current piercer) Billy over this period of time and in fact was the guinea pig in most of Billy's early piercing experiences. In knowing this history, I entrusted my nape to him.
At A Glance Author Jill Smith Contact xperfectly_x_flawedx@hotmail.com When It just happened Artist Billy Janes Studio Hardcore Tattoo Location St. Thomas, Ontario, Canada I had not gone to get any piercings in nearly a year to allow my body to heal after the shock of so many piercings in such a short time (I ended up losing a lot of my piercings). I had been researching surface piercings out of curiousity and fell in love with the nape piercing instantly. I decided a trip to see Billy was needed.
I called up a close friend of mine and told her what I was planning. She was excited for me and decided she would come along and have her eyebrow redone. We showed up at Hardcore around 1pm, Billy greeted me at the front desk commenting that he hadn't seen me in a while. He asked what he could do for me today and I asked about a nape piercing. The day was a wednesday and he had been piercing belly buttons and tongues all day and was in drastic need of a change, thus he became excited about doing a surface piercing. I signed the waiver form and payed for the piercing up front while Billy cleaned off his bed. And then he called me to come back.
My friend came with me and Billy explained the whole procedure to us and said that the most tedious part was aligning the markings properly on my neck. He cleaned my neck all up and then I had to stand as straight and as still as I could while he placed the dots on my neck. At first the markings were too far to the right, so he decided to start all over. He told me he would not do anything until they were perfect. Finally, after about 10 minutes he was happy with the placement of the dots.
After that was all over he showed me the jewellery he would be using, a 1/2" surface bar and told me all about what the piercing would feel like.. then he stopped in mid-sentence and asked me why he was telling me, it wasn't like I would be feeling any pain anyways. That boy knows me far too well.
Next he had me get up onto his table lying face down. He manipulated the tissues in my neck for a few minutes and then the clamp went on. He told me the piercing should go through extremely smoothly with the help of the surgical lube, had me take a deep breath in and let it out. The needle was through and I hardly felt a thing. The jewellery came next, I felt him put it in but there was no real pain. He told me that was the worst of it, but not to move because the needle had fallen onto my arm. He screwed on the ball to my barbell, cleaned it and threw out the wayward needle. He asked me how I felt and I said great. He told me to get up if I felt fine and I hopped off the table.
After the piercing was done Billy gave me a mirror so I could look behind me and see it, it was beautiful. He looked it over himself and was very satisfied with his work. We talked a bit more about the after care and every so often he would have me turn around so he could study his work again. As me and my friend were leaving he gave us each one of his fancy business cards and told us to call if either of us had any questions about our piercings. He practically walked us to the door making sure to show off his beautiful work to everyone on our way out.
The piercing is 3 days old now and healing quite nicely, I have found a new love. I have found myself staring at it for long periods of time just being mesmerized. The reactions from people around me who see the piercing are interesting. I always love to see reactions, I get everything from "wow that is so cool" to "how could you do that to yourself?". The best reaction was from my 10 year old sister, "Jilly, do you know you have 2 metal balls sticking out of your neck?" ..now to save up for my sternum piercing...