Before I begin telling the story of my tragus piercing, I thought I'd let you know a little about myself. I'm an 18-year-old girl and I like trying new things and taking risks. Before yesterday, I had nine piercings; 3 lobe piercings in each ear, 1 cartilage piercing, 1 rook piercing, and 1 naval piercing. Yesterday, I was really in the mood for a piercing; if you're someone that has a few yourself, you understand that feeling. I don't necessarily enjoy pain, but I really enjoy the rush I get when going to get a new piercing.
At A Glance Author Lindsay Contact Lindsay@bme.anon When It just happened Artist Unknown Studio Fusion Tattoo Studio Location Dallastown Since I had an extra $40 in my wallet, I called up my best friend yesterday morning to see if she was up for going down to the tattoo shop to get a piercing with me; she agreed and decided to get her naval pierced while she was there. When we got to the tattoo shop, Bob was finishing drawing up a tattoo for another "customer", it was only him working since his partner hadn't come into work yet, so he told us it would be a bit of a wait. While we waited, Bob let us look around at some pictures and jewelry.
After he finished drawing up the other "customer's" tattoo, he said he was ready for us. I let my best friend go first since at the time I was still unsure of what I wanted to get pierced. There were 3 piercings I was thinking of getting; either a monroe/madonna piercing, a nipple piercing, or a tragus piercing. Since I wouldn't be allowed to wear jewelry in a monroe/madonna piercing while at work, and since I didn't feel like taking my clothes off for Bob yesterday, I decided to settle on getting my left tragus pierced.
After my friend was done with her piercing, I told Bob I decided on a tragus piercing; he showed me the jewelry I could pick from, and I choose a small 16 gauge hoop with a silver ball. He cleaned up a table, sterilized the jewelry, and got out a new clamp, needle, a cork, and also a new doctors mask and gloves. I had never been to this tattoo shop before, and I was very impressed by their cleanliness. Bob asked me to sit down in the chair, he checked out my ear for a little while to see if my tragus was big enough to be pierced, and then he dotted my ear with a black marker where he was going to pierce. He told me to go look in the mirror to make sure I liked the placing, and explained to me that he made the dot in that location so that my hoop would have room to lay flat down instead of sticking out sideways. I told him I liked where he dotted my ear and sat back down.
He explained to me exactly what he was going to do and told me it was important that I remain calm, keep breathing, and not jerk my head away from him. He put the clamp on tragus, slid a cork behind my tragus, and positioned the needle on the dot in which he marked. He asked if I was ready, I said yes, took a deep breath and concentrated on staring at the picture on his wall of a beautiful blonde girl with amazing abs. The needle went into my tragus, and at first it felt just the same as my rook piercing- no big deal; but as the needle was about halfway through I could feel this popping, it was unlike anything I've ever felt. Bob had to push the needle pretty hard; it was very painful and uncomfortable. After the needle was all the way through my tragus, Bob let me take a quick breather before he inserted the jewelry. I couldn't feel a thing when he put the jewelry through the new hole, although it felt uncomfortable when he tried getting the little ball on the hoop to clos e it; by that time I was just ready for him to leave my poor ear alone and get away from me. Finally, he got the ball on and said I was all done.
I got up and walked over to the counter, where he began explaining what I can use to clean it and how often I should do so. After a few sentences his voice just started to trail off, my vision was getting blurred, and my head felt really hot. Bob asked if I was all right, and I told him my head felt funny. He led me to a chair and told me to sit down and to keep breathing. He kept making conversation with me because he thought I was going to pass out. I'm usually pretty tough when it comes to piercings, but this one must have hit me pretty hard, after all I was pretty nervous. After a few minutes my head started to clear up and I felt good enough to stand up a walk around. I walked back to the counter where he explained the cleaning process again. I thanked him and gave him the money for the piercing, and told him I'd probably be back for more piercings soon.
I think the tragus is a very attractive piercing; I really love the way it looks on me. Unfortunately all the comments online that say, "it didn't hurt a bit" didn't apply to me. Maybe I just have hard ears, who knows. I would recommend this piercing to anyone thinking of getting it done, just make sure you are calm and collected on the day you decide to get pierced, and do expect a bit of pain. After the actual piercing part, there is little to no pain, just an uncomfortable feeling when you move the jewelry around. Although I absolutely adore my new piercing, if it gets infected and I have to take it out, I'm don't think I'd be able to tolerate getting it re-done.