My story begins the day after 8th grade (June 14th 2002), I was hanging out at the mall when I came across a 14ga banana barbell with a skull imprinted on one of the balls. I had to have it. I had been accumulating ear piercings since the prior December, at that time I was sporting four piercings in each ear. I was getting sick of those cute little girly piercings and I wanted something that expressed my anger. Hence the skull banana. I purchased the banana from one of the freestanding stands in the mall for $14. I thought it was a little steep, but I had to have it. I collected my change and headed straight to the bathroom to insert my new treasure. After about a half-hour of battling against my tiny (22ga) holes, the pain (which was minimal), and the sweaty hand factor I finally got it in. I walked out of the bathroom with my head held high, and my left ear throbbing gently. I ran into some friends and they were all amazed at my new earring. High on the compliments of my friends I immediately headed over to Claire's to buy another banana, this one had a zipper pull on one of the ends. In the following weeks I stretched my lobes to a 10ga, using both barbells and nails. The nails were "sterilized" of course by using fire and alcohol. During this whole ordeal I had no idea that such sites as BMEzine.com existed.
At A Glance Author Sam Contact ondeathrow@comcast.net When It just happened Artist Me, Myself, and I Studio My house Location Abington, PA Fast forward a few months, I was just browsing the magazine section and I stumbled across XtremeBodyModification magazine. I was hooked. I started collecting any and every magazine on body modification that I could. Not only did I collect them, but also I started cutting out the pictures and hanging them up in my room. That's when I saw it, the piercing I knew I had to have. The caption called it a scaffold piercing, I later found out that more common name was an industrial piercing. I asked my parents if I could get it done. Very simply they told me that there was no way in hell that was I going to get it, or any other piercing for that matter. I was so pissed off. I immediately went online to Amber-Moon.com, a site that I had discovered earlier. It had pretty good prices, and tapers. I ordered a set of tapers going from 8ga-0ga. I never expected to go down to a 0. But I figured that while I was ordering tapers, I might as well "go all the way."
A few weeks pass, and my order still hadn't come. Not surprising considering the site was based out of Australia. At some point I had found out that one of the local shops was selling piercing guns, and I just had to have one. Keep in mind that I still hadn't found BMEzine, and had no idea what the dangers of using a piercing gun were. On a day off, I took a friend and went to the store to buy the piercing gun. On the box it strictly said, "not for sale to minors" so I wasn't really expecting to be able to buy it. The sales clerk didn't look twice at what she was ringing up, I paid my $50 and was on my way. We got back to my place, read the directions on the box and got down to "piercing." My friend pierced my ears three times each, yes I know shudder. She wasn't happy with that and begged me to let her do my navel. Me being the weak willed person allowed her to carry on. It took her three tries too finally get it right. Yes, I know double and triple shudder.
Two weeks later (November 15th 2002) I was hit by a car call it karma. My leg was broken in three places and I had an abrasion on my spleen. I was in the hospital for five days and on the last day my shipment came in. There in the hospital room around 4am I stretched my left lobe up to an 8ga. It was the sweetest pain I had felt in a long time.
After I got out of the hospital I continued to stretch my left lobe. I never skipped a gauge and was at a 0 by Christmas. The most painful stretch that I can remember was definitely from 2ga to 0ga. On new years eve, I went from a 10ga to a 6ga in my right ear. There was no pain what so ever, and I was thoroughly disappointed. I got my right ear up to a 0 by February. I was planning on staying at that until I saw a pen cap that my friend had. The widest part of the cap looked to be about a 00ga. I kept imagining what it would be like to shove it through my ear. I couldn't get the idea out of my head. I finally paid my friend $3 for the cap (pretty cheap for a taper). This is where I made the worst mistake, I didn't even attempt to sterilize or even clean off the cap. I just shoved it in, not thinking about infection. Needless to say, my ear got infected. It was a pretty plumb color, pretty for a plumb, not so good for an ear. Just my luck one of our family friends happened to work in the school nurse's office and had called home and report on my badly swollen and infected ear. I convinced my parents that it was just an allergic reaction and they took me to "The Ink Well" in South Hampton, PA. I bought an acrylic plug and put it in. Miraculously the color returned to normal and the swelling went way down. Some how I managed to get my right lobe up to a 00ga with out my parents noticing. Both of my lobes were at 00s by late April-May 2003. They stayed at 00s for quite some time.
My next stretch wasn't until January of 2004. One of my plugs had gotten knocked out at a concert, so I headed back to "The Ink Well" to replace it. I had been getting antsy with just the 00s, so instead of getting another plug I bought two tapers, 7/16th and ½ inch; I also bought two clear blue ½ inch plugs. As soon as I got home I stretched my left ear up to 7/16th with no trouble or pain. Another disappointment. I left both lobes alone for two weeks and stretched my left lobe up to a ½ inch on the Sunday before Valentines Day. This was an incredibly painful stretch, (worse than 2-0 but not as bad as 0-00). The next day I stretched my right lobe to 7/16th inch. It was about another two weeks before I was able to switch the ½ inch taper with a plug. The night I switched to a plug in my left lobe, I tried to go to ½ inch in my right ear. I had no luck with my right ear. Not only was it really painful, but I wasn't physically able to shove it all the way through. A friend of mine with ¾ inch holes, suggested that I use medical tape to slowly stretch the hole until it was big enough to get the taper through. It took me about a week to get the hole big enough. Even with the subtle stretching of the medical tape it still hurt like a bitch when I put the taper through. Unfortunately I ripped my lobe and it bled more than it had with any other stretch except for maybe the jump from 0-00. It was just tonight (3/17/04) that I was able to switch to a plug.
As of now both of my lobes are at a healthy ½ inch. I don't plan on stretching in the near future. However, I am scheduled to get my septum pierced on Saturday, and once that's healed I'm going to get vertical piercings in both of my lobes. So look for more experiences and pictures.
I would have to say that the most annoying thing about having my lobes stretched is that random people, more specifically stupid 7th graders are under the impression that it is ok for them to walk up and just start tapping on my plugs. It was especially annoying when the holes were still healing. If they had gotten infected because of that little boy I would have been so pissed.
**Warning, just because these things worked for me doesn't mean that they will work for every one. There were a few times that my ear got infected and I was very lucky that the infection didn't do any permanent damage. Also, In now way shape or form, do I condone the use of piercing guns. In fact I am against them 100%. When I purchased mine, I had no idea that there were adverse effects to using them. As soon as I realized that they were causing more harm than good, I quickly disposed of it. **