I'm just going to start off by saying I've had my lobes, upper ear cartilage, tongue, eyebrow and nose pierced. I was not new to the piercing place, the piercer, or the butterflies in the stomach.
At A Glance Author Brenda Contact starelana83@yahoo.com When N/A Artist Clint Studio Artistic Location Indianapolis, IN I was however going to find out that my tragus was a piercing unlike any other. I was going to meet my friend at the piercing place and be there to watch her get something done. What I didn't tell her was that I had wanted my tragus done and planned to do so with her there. Well, stuff happened and she couldn't make it. There I am sitting in my car giving myself a pep talk to just walk in the door. I've never gotten a piercing by myself, when I have a friend there I know I can't chicken out.
I finally get the nerve to go in and ask about the piercing, like what jewelry is offered and how much it would cost. I was told it would cost approx. $40. This is more than I intended and I knew I could get it done somewhere else cheaper. However, I knew that they did good work, were clean and very knowledgeable there. Also, I knew that if I walked out I may not enter another piercing place on my own.
I agreed and waited for the guy to get ready to pierce me. I was so nervous. The jitters subsided when I went into the actual piercing room. A guy name Clint, who I've actually met and talked to about piercings before, was going to be my piercer. He was very thorough. He said that the longest part of the piercing was going to be him talking. He walked me through what he was going to do, what it should feel like, and he was very thorough on aftercare options as well as do's/don'ts. (I actually heard some stuff that I hadn't heard before)
I was ready and he drew a dot for the positioning, I checked it out and liked it, then he asked me to lie down. I hate lying down for piercings, I think it's weird. He told me that while the tragus isn't a very involved piercing there are some steps that make it a longer one. I thought to myself, "I would pick one that takes a long time," but I only told him, "ok." He gets me taking deep breaths and in goes the needle. Now I was expecting it to hurt because that is a big chunk of cartilage to go through but in all honesty it hurt a little more than I thought it would. He did some stuff, unsure what aside from removing the needle and wiping the blood.
He starts to put the hoop through. (We decided on a silver hoop b/c the silver ones were solid and didn't require me to master the captive bead, and a post would've had to be thicker than normal b/c of swelling.) Well, Clint cannot get the hoop through. He has me sit up. Still cannot get it through. He said the piercing was straight but he can't line it up with the hoop. So, now he is pushing the hoop through. This doesn't hurt as much as you'd think, I have the adrenaline going through me through the piercing and it's just awkward to have a latex glove in your ear. This continues for like 10 minutes. Seriously. He tells me he'll try again but if it doesn't work he'll owe me a piercing. He gets the hoop almost all the way through, I winced internally a few times, but he can't get it through the front. He takes a new piercing needle and scrapes the skin out of the way so the hoop can pop through. It worked and I didn't really feel him scraping the skin.
He's done; I give a huge sigh of relief. The whole time he's asking me if it hurts and to tell him if I want to stop. I keep telling him, "I've gone this far..." It took about 15 minutes to do all this, and a lot more tugging than anticipated. He advises me to put some ice on it and to take some ibuprofen b/c it may swell more than normal b/c of the extenuating circumstances.
He ended up not charging me for the jewelry, and since I saved some money (about $20) I decided to buy a cleaning product from them. I usually just use soap but he was telling me about this new spray and how it differed from some and the benefits of it. He sold me. I've been using H2Ocean for about five days now and I really like it. I don't have to worry about pulling the jewelry, sterilizing my hands, or fiddling with q-tips. I just spray it on and that's it. I'm not selling the product but I do recommend checking it out, www.h2ocean.com . It's really convenient and portable, which was a plus with me.
All in all I'd do it again. I know the tragus piercing is growing in popularity but I don't actually know many people with it. I like it and its not something I have to take out for work. So, if you're considering it just think that it probably doesn't get much worse that what you just read. Good luck.