At A Glance
Author	Zahra
Contact	dreamqueen41@hotmail.com
When	It just happened
Artist	some guy with a leopard skin head
Studio	The Studio
Location	Affleck's Palace, Manchester

Hey my name's Zahra, I'm a mad impulsive 16 year old gal from Manchester, UK and here's my stretching story.

Okay, I'd always wanted my ears pierced twice but my mum's always been against the idea of multiple piercings etc. So one day I just figured hey why not just do it....I'm 16 I can do what I want so I got them done again each lobe and a cartilage at the top right ear. I can stand pain because I have been through a lot of it in the past so it was nothing. I even went one step further and pierced my tongue myself (yes I am the stupidest person ever) but it turned out cool and didn't go infected but then my mother dearest saw and out it came.

Now I had seen a lot of stretched ears in the media and just on random piercing sites and always thought it looked cool. I wasn't really into the whole big ass holes through ears I just liked the small-medium plugs and since I had two holes in each ear I figured why not get one set done and leave the others? My aim was to eventually get to about 10mm.

So yesterday I went into town with my friends and my original intention was to buy some plugs and do the whole shit myself but I got there and the nice girl at the counter gave me some more insight into it all. Then she told me all about the tapers etc and as my current holes were 1.6 mm she said the highest I should go for now was 3mm. So I bought the tapers and got some metal plugs free which was pretty sweet and they stretched for free so I made my friends wait which they weren't too pleased about!

Then the nice girl told me to wait while the piercer got ready and she warned me it would hurt cos she just recently had hers done and I stupidly said 'oh I can stand the pain trust me' and she kind of smirked. WHAT AN ASSHOLE I WAS. I should have listened to her.

Then this guy with like 15 mm flesh tunnels and a leopard skin head called me in and I motioned to my friends to come in with me. Then I sit on the bed and he has the dreaded latex gloves on and he's dipping the tapers in some antiseptic lubricant cream and I am kind of nervous cos of this whole atmosphere (which is why I wanted to do it at home in the first place). Then he says 'grit your teeth' and I look at my friends who are like 'crazy bitch' and he slides the right taper in NO PROBLEM kind of ached slightly but it was all good.

Then he comes to the left ear and I know this hole had been kind of achey the past few days so I prepared myself and he goes 'you ready?' I reply 'yeah'. Then he shoves it in but it gets stuck and won't go and FUCK did this hurt I was in agony. Considering I had pierced my own tongue myself this should have been nothing but BOY was that girl right. This was nasty. The piercer was shoving this taper in cursing at it and I was like squeezing my eyes shut, blaspheming sliently with my friend grimacing at me.

Then with a 'pop' it slides in and the piercer laughs at me swearing at it then he says 'don't worry one ear sometimes does that and has more friction-all done now!' So I get up, shaking and grab my bag etc and check this out in the mirror. Nice work! I couldn't believe how small it looked though considering all that pain I went through!

Afterwards, the pain kind of got worse and worse but I put on a brave face and took it beacuse my friends were already pissed off at me. They couldn't believe I wanted to do it then actually did but that's just me! I am impulsive and when I want something I fucking well get it despite what anyone thinks!

This was definitely an unexpected pain-you can call me a coward but I guess I thought it wouldn't hurt at all. Maybe I should have done more research! I am really not sure if I wanna gauge them thicker now...the after pain is too much. But then again I never really know what I am going to do next!

I wouldn't advise stretching to anybody who 'thinks it looks cool cos their favorite rock star has it.' I think it's quite a serious thing for somebody who has done their research and explored the history behind it! I am glad I got my lobes stretched but I would seriously take the pain thing into consideration if I was to go thicker.

I am planning to put the plugs in in about 20 days or so. Hopefully the pain will have reduced somewhat by then. Maybe I was too obsessed with how it looked rather how it might feel...my advice...DO YOU'RE RESEARCH KIDS!

peace out