My conch piercing happened on the 1st of March '05. It's now over 6 months later, and I should have written this experience earlier...but here it is anyway! This piercing has been my best behaved one so far. I was all set for the pain and difficult healing period that I kept reading about with cartilage piercings...but I was pleasantly surprised.
At A Glance Author Fairina Contact Fairina@bme.anon IAM fairina When Six months ago Studio Primitive Art Location Singapore I should mention that I initially wanted a high snug. But apparently my ear isn't suited for it. The piercer guy at Primitive Art (whose name I don't remember – forgive me) said that a conch piercing (where the bottom ball of the snug piercing would have sat) "would look good", but told me to think about it before making my decision. This was also the day that he told me that I couldn't get a centre tongue piercing because my tongue web was in the way. I wasn't too happy! But I did appreciate him telling me the truth. So that night I went home and thought about it...stared in the mirror at my ear...probably held a few ball ends up to my conch to see what it would look like...
Forward to the next day, afternoonish. I dragged a scared friend down to the studio for moral support and to take photos (although all I got was one blurred picture of the needle through my ear, and two not so great ones of my red ear afterwards). I told the piercer that I wanted my conch pierced, and went to get something to eat before coming back. Back at the shop, I was called into the piercing room and told to sit down on "the chair". The piercer prepped my ear, checked for veins with a small flashlight, and marked the spot. I okayed it, and he held the needle up and told me to breathe. The breathing helped me not focus on the feeling of the needle going through my ear, and as far as I can remember, it felt like a dull pressure, no sharp pain. Very bearable. During the actual process it probably hurt more than I can remember though. The barbell was put in and the ball screwed on without trouble, and after a drop of blood was wiped off from the back of my ear, I was done!
Before I left, I was given one of those standard aftercare leaflets, a packet of saline solution, and a tiny cup to soak my ear in, although it was wayyy too small to fit over my whole ear. I could have done both sides of my ear separately, but that would have been too much of a hassle. I bought some plastic cups to soak with (looking like an idiot at the supermarket, holding long packets of cups up to my ear I might add), although they turned out to be too big and I just ended up spilling water all over myself. I ended up finding a glass that was a good size...but because of the pressure of the glass rim on the join between my earlobe and face, I now have a permanent dent there!
For aftercare, I did 2 warm sea salt soaks a day for over a month. After that I got lazier and dropped it to 1 or 2 times a day...then to 1...then occasionally... I currently still soak it sometimes when I soak my other piercings, but usually I just run it under warm water in the shower for a few minutes.
>From the first day until five days after the piercing, there was no pain or swelling, even when bumped, which I thought was weird. But I wasn't about to complain! For the next two days after that though, it suddenly swelled the whole length of the bar, started aching a lot, and the back of my ear turned a nice shade of purple 2cm around the piercing. The next day it was still bruised and sore, but the pain was gone by the afternoon/evening, and only ached when I smiled. By day 10 and 11, the swelling and bruising had gone down, but I found a lot of greenish lymph (??) on the exit hole after my salt soak. That wasn't too pleasant, but it was a one off thing. After that day there was no pain at all. The swelling and redness disappeared and my conch has mostly been happy since then, despite getting hit a few times by careless huggers, snagged on rock climbing ropes and caught on other peoples clothing.
Because I was constantly getting the bar caught on climbing ropes, I got it changed 4 months later at another studio in Far East Plaza (Primitive Art didn't have the right sized bars in). It was changed to a shorter titanium barbell – the finish looked a bit dodgy but the piercing is still doing good. I only hope that my conch dermal punch goes this well!