It all began when I was 16, a little teenage rebel into heavy metal and all the things that go along with it. I decided to go with my long hair and regulation black clothing I should have my ear pierced. I set my mind on two done in the cartilage on my left ear.
At A Glance Author Ashapola IAM ashapola When Ten years ago or more Artist Unknown Studio Horrible little hairdressers Location Bath, UK I found out where to get it done, hairdressers near a friend's house. Thinking back I don't know how I could have been so stupid, but in I went thinking this was going to be the start of something special. Well it was.
The guy that greeted me had been in the year above me at school, he now had rancid looking piercing studs through a vast amount of his ears and one that seemed to ooze in his nostril. This still didn't put me off. He sat me down and asked me how many I wanted and where then showed me a selection of "jewellery" that I could have in it. For me it was a pair of lovely little silver studs, I still cringe thinking about them. Blunt little scraps.
He then prepared me for the "piercing". All he did was draw on two dots; he didn't even wipe the area over with an alcohol wipe. I was told that should be alright not asked if I liked the placement, took the first stud out set it in the gun and shot it through the ear. I was so scared I didn't feel a thing and felt like I would wet myself. Quickly he shoved the other one through and set me off on my way. He didn't even offer me bad advice about after care, I don't think he would have even known what I was on about if I'd mentioned anything to him. He seemed to think that was it all done. And so did I not knowing any better at the time.
Well when I got home I found out he was no where near the marks he had put on which actually was to my advantage, they were nearer to where I would have wanted them. After getting the reaction I thought I would from my parents "on my, well we stand by your decision, it's your body etc" (bless them), I went about life as usual. I didn't think about doing anything to look after them.
At the time I was training to be a chef at college, a nice warm breeding ground for bacteria soon developed in my ear.
It took a few weeks before I realised something was wrong. One morning waking to find my ear tender and red. Looking at it in the mirror I pressed the back of one stud to see a nice large amount of yellow puss dribble down my ear. Bright idea time I gave them a good scrub to clean it off and set off to college thinking it would get better in time.
By lunchtime my ear was twice the size it should be, bleeding and pussing everywhere and I couldn't be aloud in the kitchens. I packed off home and as soon as my mother saw my ear she packed me off down to the doctors. Thank god she did that, the look of horror on my doctors face made me realise how stupid I had been. He provided me with a large amount of antibiotics and told me to come back in a few days to check it was clearing.
When I returned in a few days I had built up a great fear over my ears being touched, I was scared that if any one interfered with them the problems would return. Even my doctor wearing gloves. He checked them as best he could and discovered something terrible; the skin was healing over the heads of the studs. It was soon realised there was no easy way we were going to get these out. I hated having them there but went into a panic attack whenever anyone went near them.
My parents did the only thing they could and took me to a private doctors surgery. His idea was to give me a small amount of morphine to pacify me then cut my ear open to remove the studs. This was a plan I could deal with.
I don't remember much of the procedure due to the drugs I was given to control me, but I do know things didn't go to plan. The low quality of the metal meant the studs were fused together and after cutting the front open they couldn't undo them. The surgeon then cut the back of my ear open as well and pulled using a pair of pliers the whole horrid mess out of the back. I spent the rest of the day off my face on medication and quite quite calm.
This healed fine as I had decent instructions for after care and I was so glad to be free of them. I did learn a number of things from this, most importantly to do proper research into the mods I wanted. There is nothing as important as knowing everything you can about the work you want, there is such a vast amount of information at your finger tips there is no reason not to do it. It was 5 years till I got anything done and in that time I spent day in day out reading everything I could get my hands on. I was still to scared to try piercing again despite learning from BME how these things should properly be done, instead discovering my love for tattoos. I even managed to get my tongue split done but never dared be pierced until a month ago. Finally after 9 years I got my PA done, but that's another story.