I was looking on BME one day and I saw this piercing - the vertical tragus.
At A Glance Author piratepegleg Contact piratepegleg@bme.anon When Three months ago Artist Mump Studio The Asylum Location Ames, Iowa I was so excited because I had been looking for a new piercing to attain, and I wanted something far from the norm, but not so far [due to employment reasons] This piercing seemed perfect. It was on my ear, and not on my face, so they could not really object to it [even though they DO] and it seemed harmless enough.
When I first stumbled upon this piercing, it looked as though some people had the side of their face pierced, and I did not want this. As I continued to look into the photos though, I saw that the people who appeared to have pierced their face really just did not have a tragus that protruded enough to be pierced, or the piercer decided not to pierce the tragus for some reason beyond me.
Anyways, I trotted into the Asylum [I swear by the Asylum, because I went to Jaded Angel in Ames and they fucked up my eyebrow] and they recognized me immediately. So I signed the sheet and laid a 20 on the table and they lead me back.
Before Mump even considered what he was piercing, he had thought he was going to stick a hoop into the VT, I was about to object, because I thought that a hoop would look ridiculous, but I figured he knew what he was doing. But when he examined the piercing area more closely, he changed his mind. Thank God.
I asked if he had ever done this piercing before, and he said no, and that he hadn't even heard of it nor seen a photo of it done. But he would do it. So I figured it was either going to hurt like hell and not be done right, or hurt like hell and be done right. After I got over this, I asked him if he thought this one would hurt particularly bad. He said, "OF COURSE!"
But me, being one who has a high pain tolerance, said "screw it. lets go."
so he dotted my tragus and prepped the needle. i was getting more afraid of the pain with even this procedure.
Since you can't really use a clamp for this piercing, I was afraid that the ring would end up being really angled, but it wasn't.
He lined up the needle and started to push and I felt the most pain I have ever felt, even with a life full of surgery and other piercings. He got the needle halfway through and then there was some resistance. He started putting more pressure on the needle because he wasn't sure if it would go through. This was the most painful part of it all, up to this point.
Well, he FINALLY pushed the needle through, and then he went on and put the barbell through. When it came time to screw the ball on, however, he met some difficulty. He had to reach under my tragus into my ear to try to get it on. After about five minutes, he took a different approach and held some pliers onto either end of the piercing and screwed it on. That was pretty painful, too.
He yelled for some guy to get the camera so they could post my photo on the piercing wall, but I wanted to see it first.
My ear didn't hurt too bad, but he said that there was a lot of blood. So we cleaned it up and took the photo. My ear was burning at this point. He said that he was worried that it wouldn't heal, or that it would migrate out. I just said that I hadn't really looked into healing periods or anything, I just liked the way this one looked. [this is the only piercing i haven't done extensive research on before piercing]
That night I was on the phone with a friend when all of a sudden an IMMENSE pain just hit me. It fucking hurt, no joke. The entire left side of my face hurt and I had the biggest headache you could think of.
Now, though, it is three months later and, although the piercing migrated a bit due to its fit, it looks GORGEOUS and I love it. I would do it again in a heartbeat.
And, let me say, a lot of people have their rooks pierced or their anti-tragus' pierced. Well, I have all of these done, and your vertical tragus definitely hurts the worst. Don't let them fool you. Before I did my rooks, I was told that it would feel like a flaming hot piece of rusty barbed wire was being violently shoved into my ear. LIES.
Merry Christmas and Happy Piercing, Kiddos.