At A Glance
Author	anonymous
When	Three months ago

The story of my industrial begins four months ago. I already had three lobe piercings in each ear and a simple cartilage piercing in my left ear and I was thinking about doing something slightly different.

I'm generally a pretty cautious person - no tattoos, no drinking or wild partying, anally retentive about my school work and work responsibilities and I've always lived up to my parents expectations. For once I wanted to feel like I'd done *something* reckless when I was young... So I decided to get a piercing.

I knew straight away that anything like surface piercings were automatically out. I didn't really want a navel or nipple piercing in case I had complications and I wasn't too keen on having metal in my lips or tongue so that pretty much left my ears. Having already had one cartilage piercing and figuring I knew what to expect, I began to research what I wanted. From the moment I saw the industrial piercings I fell in love. They were so very different to anything I had ever seen before -and I wanted one.

So I made my decision, did my research on healing time and on a whim, went to the city with my boyfriend and a close friend to get it done. I ended up going to several piercing places to ask the piercers if my ear was suitable for an industrial (having read several horror stories about migration and rejection due to thin ears and bad placements) and when I verified that my ears would be okay, I went to Essential Beauty, a beauty salon/piercing salon.

Later on people would tell me that Essential Beauty is an awful place to go for piercings, but meh... The place seemed cleaner than the other places I'd been to and the girl was quite confident about what she was doing so I agreed to do it there.

I went into a separate room that smelled strongly of nail glue and alcohol and got told to lie down on the table. The girl took a pre packaged needle and alcohol swab and asked me which I ear I wanted done. I pointed to my right ear and she proceeded to thoroughly clean my ear and surrounding area. She told me that she would insert a large tongue barbell into my ear to begin with so the piercing would have room to swell and drain and when it was healed better I would be able to switch to a smaller one if I wanted. Then she asked me again if I was sure, and I nodded. She removed the needle and my boyfriend took my hand in his. For a moment I couldn't believe what I was doing and I wanted to back out. But it was too late. The girl said "Three, two, one..." and gently slid the needle through my ear.

I didn't hurt half as badly as I thought it would. Just a quick jabbing sensation and a slight popping noise. Then she placed the barbell through, which hurt more. The second (top) piercing also hurt a bit more, considering that it was thicker there. I didn't cry out or anything, I just shivered a little when the second one was pushed through. Luckily it hardly bled.

I was quite shocked when I saw the piercing for the first time though. Suddenly I had this huge bar through my once delicate ear and I instantly regretted it. I paid, thanked the people there and then left in tears while my boyfriend tried to console me.

On second glance though, I realised that it actually looked really good and that it was only shocking the first time you see it. I went home and my mother nearly died when she saw it. After calming down with a cup of tea and a few minutes of looking at it in horror she eventually decided that if she pretended it didn't exist it wouldn't be a problem.

That was back in late August. It's now early December and my industrial is doing all right and I'm quite fond of it. People always stop to comment on it or look at it curiously and they usually ask me if it hurt to get it done or tell me that it looks really cool.

I followed the instructions the parlour gave me and cleaned it with peroxide for the first five days, then listerine for the next five days and then hot salt water soaks for two weeks after that. I don't know if that was what I should have done but it seemed to be okay.

When I see it getting a bit infected or crusty I gently clean it with warm salty water and a dab of listerine or give it a squeeze and a soak. I've developed a large bump on the top piercing which reduces in size if I don't scratch at it (which I do when I forget sometimes) and it hurts to sleep on it still, but because my other cartilage piercing took a whole year to reduce its swelling I'm not too concerned.

Overall, I'd say it's worth it. Someday I may regret it, but for now I won't. I wouldn't be able to look in the mirror now without the familiar bar gleaming back at me.