Getting something pierced around here is actually fairly cheap. It is only $5 for piercing such as eyebrow, tongue, various ear piercing, nipple, and navel. The most a piercing costs is $20 for something exotic like bridge, some nose, monroe, or genital.
At A Glance Author Becca Seraph Contact Becca Seraph@bme.anon IAM Silhouettes When A month ago Artist Me Studio My Kitchen Location Lower Indiana Basically, it is so cheap to get pierced around here that not many people do DIY unless they are underage, reopening a old hole, or have a friend that could do it safely for free. I have helped my friend, Jake; reopen his eyebrow and his septum.
Anyways, recently I had the opportunity to pierce one of my male friends, Nate, earlobe. The reason my friend wanted me to DIY their ear was because they wanted a small 20 gauge or whatever gauge the normal earring jewelry is. All of the shops we called in town (the ones that my friend trusted anyways) could not pierce the earlobe that small and would have to pierce it at a 16 ring and once it was healed let it shrink down. My friend did not want to wait and that left only three options, one have a friend do it, two do it alone, or three go to Wal-Mart and use a piercing gun.
Thankfully, my friend came to me, he had heard from Jake that I had helped him reopen his piercing and thought it would be a better idea to ask me than try to do it himself.
At first I did not want to pierce him, I did not have any equipment, but he was persistent, he had finally talked his mom into letting him have one earlobe done (he was like 16 and lived at home). One of the other reasons he could not get a loop put in was because his mom said he had to get it as small as possible.
Anyways, I finally agreed to help him after about an hour of arguing that convincing his mom of using a larger gauge initially was safer. (He finally convinced me if he did not get it done now, he would not get another chance till he was 18, his mom changes her mind a lot.) All I had to work with was a sewing needle, a new earring stud (He bought one with the clear smooth backing, not the stupid butterfly ones), and a marker. I knew what I was about to do was stupid, please do not try this at home, it is very dangerous, even if it is only the earlobe.
Not having much to work with, I wanted to be as clean as possible, I marked his ears till he agreed they looked good, then I got the needle ready. I boiled the needle in hot water for 20 minutes and got out a clean pair of gloves and put them on, and then I was ready.
I used some of my ear solution that I got when I got my earlobes pierced and rubbed it on his earlobe to clean it, careful not to clean off the marking. After I cleaned it up, I picked the needle up and placed it in front of his ear and told him to take a deep breath. As he was breathing out, I shoved the needle through. I was amazed at how easily and fast it went in. I was relieved I did not have to put to much pressure on it. After the needle was in, I asked him how it was going. He looked surprised and said he had not felt anything.
Relieved, I got ready to do the tricky part, to pull the needle out and put the jewelry in. It was a simple trade; I had put some solution on the earring prior so I would not have any trouble pushing it through. I think that had been a good idea, because it went right in. I slipped the back on and made sure it was tight then took off my gloves and handed Nate the mirror to look at his carefully aligned new piercing.
He loved the piercing and said he had not felt a thing, I gave him my remaining ear solution since my ears have healed and I use Dial on them when I clean them now. I told him about using Sea Salt soaks and told him to take the back off and clean it off everyday, it got the crust off better; I found that out with mine.
I waited a few weeks to post this to make sure things went ok, he just came back down to town (he lives out of town) today. His ear is looking awesome; he found a cute black spike to put in it. He said there was a lot of crust at first, but he never had any problems with infections and now it was perfectly healed and doing great.
He seems really happy, they might be small studs in the earlobe, but you can make a simple piercing like that beautiful. Well, good luck if you get this piercing and remember DIY is dangerous and because it went well for us this time does not mean that it will go well for you. Good luck and happy piercing!