December 22, 2004
At A Glance Author AXU Contact tnightmare_bc@yahoo.com IAM AXU When It just happened Artist Chris Studio The Wall Location Bartlesville, Oklahoma My goal was for my lobes to reach a 2 gauge. I finally go that done. Drew and I were getting ready to make the 3-hour trip back to Edmond, so he could work. We went to the Wall in Bartlesville before we made the trip.
We arrived a few minutes before they opened, and we watched as the girl in the store flipped the "closed" sign on the door to "open". We waited a few minutes and then went inside. We looked at jewelry until Chris came in, who was a friend of Drew's and the artist at the studio we trust the most.
We told him we wanted to stretch my ears. I gave him the jewelry I wanted put in, and then we went to the back to get the room ready. We looked at jewelry for Drew while we waited. A few minutes later Chris came back and told us that he couldn't do it, because he didn't see a 2 gauge taper. Drew was sour at Chris for turning his microphone off in the middle of his band's show in February, so he pushed him a lot to keep looking for a 2 gauge. "I'll go see if we at least have a plastic one." He said, and then disappeared a while. He told us he couldn't find one, looked in a few more places, and told us he couldn't do it. Drew told him to look in the backroom again, and a few minutes later, he came back and said he found one, that someone put the 2 gauge taper in with the 0 gauge tapers.
We headed to the back room, and I sat down in the chair. Chris raised it up to a good level for him to work and Drew stepped to the other side of me. Chris took my 6 gauge plugs out, and cleaned them off. It hurt a lot, because I only had my 6's in for a little under a month, and my sister kicked that ear the previous day, so it was also very irritated. He got everything ready and then put the taper to my ear. "Ready?" I nodded, "Okay, hold your breath," He said and I did, I felt a pinch and then he told me to breath out, and I did. My ear hurt afterward, after he had put the jewelry in. I had forgotten that my ear was that sore, and I said something about it. He had noticed that it was irritated and asked me why. I explained as he cleaned the blood off, which hurt more than anything else. I had begun shaking, partly because of the endorphins, and partly because I was hypoglycemic and hadn't yet eaten.
Chris moved to my other ear, and took the jewelry out of that ear, and that hurt a lot. It hurt so much, because I had gotten an industrial two weeks before, and that was my sleeping side, so it was kind of gross from only sleeping on that side. He noted that it didn't look irritated at all. He cleaned it off, which hurt so bad. I squirmed and he asked if it hurt. I told him it did, and then told him about my industrial. He said it probably just wasn't healed inside, then, and then he told me that my industrial did look fresh, and was migrating. That hurt my heart and insides hearing that. But Drew explained it was only the shape of my ear that made it look like that. Chris Got the taper ready and put it to my ear. "Ready?" I told him I was. He repeated telling me to hold my breath and to let it out.
I felt the taper going through on that one. I didn't realize how bad I was squirming in the chair and holding my breath. Drew was holding my hand, and telling me to breathe. The most intense pain was him wiping it off, and putting the O-rings on. Apparently he had problems with them, and it hurt so badly. Drew was talking to him about his huge gauged ears (forgot the size), and how they exploded, and that the studio was now doing tattoos, while he was struggling with the O-rings. He finally finished up, and then lowered the chair. He took his gloves off and told me the aftercare instructions. I thanked him and we went to the front of the store to pay.
Drew bought some earrings first, and then he told us to have a good day when I pulled out my money to pay the five bucks to pay him. I looked at Chris confused, I held the money out, but he didn't say anything, and I looked at Drew, who was almost out the door, and he motioned for me to follow him. I shrugged, thanked Chris again, and then held Drew's hand out the door. We laughed when we got in the freezing outdoors. We weren't sure if Chris forgot to charge me, or if he was just being cool like he sometimes is and didn't charge on purpose.
I know I probably should have waited longer to stretch, and probably should have gone to a 4 first, but the difference between my 4's and 2's were so minimal, I decided to go through a bit more pain to shorten the steps. So now I have 2's, which was size Drew and I agreed on me going to. And I love them. It was so painful, more so because of the complications. A word to the wise: You should not stretch anything that has been hurt or damaged prior to stretching; it makes the procedure worse than usual. Don't be like me and be impatient.
- AXU.