Hey, my name is Ben and I am 16 years old, I have recently stretched my ears to 0g. I wont bore you with the details of why I wanted to stretch my lobes but I will tell you that I have had 10 piercings altogether, these are- my left lobe 3 times, my right lobe once, 3 ear cartilage on my left ear, my right nipple, my tongue web and my septum. (the only ones I have at present are my nipple, my septum and two 0g lobes). So as you can see I have had quite a bit of experience when it comes to piercing, but stretching is without doubt a different ball game. It feels totally different, don't get me wrong, I have had piercings that hurt a lot more than stretching but stretching just feels really different to piercing (and it also can be very painful at times!)
At A Glance Author Ben Contact noisy-bastard@hotmail.com When N/A Artist Me/Marcus/Kate Studio My house/Holier Than Thou Location Manchester Anyway, on with the story. I am going to split it up into different
sections. I will start with my left ear and then move on to my right ear.
Left Ear-
When I was 14 I had my ear pierced with a gun (stupid i know, but it turned out fine) and a silver stud. When that healed up I went right up to a 14g(1.6mm) which hurt a little but it wasn't too bad. I stayed at a 14g for about a year until I decided to start stretching my ear. I started off real slow and went from a 14g to a 12g(2.0mm) to a 10g(2.5mm) to an 8g(3.2) with pretty much no problem. Each stretch hurt a little but it was pretty much nothing, it mostly felt a bit tight for a few minutes then I couldn't feel anything. I waited about a week between stretches.
Anyway, about a week later I decided that I wanted to move up another size and go to a 6g(4mm). I tried for ages to get it in, I had a hot shower, I lubed it up and pushed and pushed and pushed but it just wasn't going. So me being the stubborn bastard that I am thought 'fuck it' and just put my old 14g back in and let it close up.
Then about 3 months ago I decided to try again, this time with tapers. I stupidly went from a 14g to a 8g in one go. This I do not advise as it could have caused serious damage, (it also hurt like a BITCH) I was lucky though and in a couple of weeks I was ready to try and go to a 6g again. This time the 6g went in no problem at all :S, I couldn't even feel it- seriously.
This is where the problems started. Due to my recent success I thought that I would be able to go from a 6g to a 2g(6.5mm) with no problems. How wrong was I?!?!
I got hold of a 2g taper and a 2g tunnel and got started. I lubed up the taper and tried to shove it through. It got to about half way until it started to hurt, and I mean hurt! All in all it took me about 4 hours, 3 hot showers and a hell of a lot of pain to get the taper through! I left it to settle for a day or two and then put the tunnel in. This was a HUGE mistake. One- the new stretch had not settled down so inserting something new pissed it off a lot, and two- to make matters even worse, the tunnel I put in was not long enough to allow for the swelling. This pissed my ear off even more. My ear went so swollen you would not believe, it was red and rock hard for a few days. I went to my regular piercing studio, Holier Than Thou, to see what they had to say about it. Marcus told me that the tunnel
was way to short and said that I should buy something longer to put in it. This I did and that night when I got home I put it in and I did so many salt soaks on it you would not believe. After a few days the swelling subsided and my ear looked normal again.
I left it for a couple of weeks and then I went back to Holier Than Thou to get it stretched to a, well I guess you would call it a 1g (about 7mm). This time I decided that I was going to go up 1mm at a time to avoid a repeat of the last stretch and I also decided that I would ask Marcus to put it in for me. He did and I can honestly say that I didn't feel a thing. It was over in a second and he didn't even have to use a taper. This was without doubt the easiest stretch yet.
A couple of weeks after that I went back again and got them to put in a 0g(8.2mm) plug. This time Kate did it an it hurt a little bit (I am not saying anything bad about Kate, it just hurt) but it was fine and it settled down fine. Finally my left ear was done :)
Now, on to my right ear-
Half way through stretching my left ear I decided that I needed my right ear at the same size as I wanted my face to be even. When I went to Holier Than Thou to get my 2g problem sorted out on my left ear I asked what would be the quickest way to get my right ear to the same size as my left ear (at the time it was a 2g). Kate told me that they could get it up to a 2g in one go but I decided just to get it pierced at a 6g and then stretch it up over the next few weeks.
So after Marcus gave me advice on my left lobe, Kate called me through to go and get my right lobe pierced. I was so nervous because even though I have had several other piercings, this piercing was being done at 4mm! Instead of the usual 1.6 that I was used to.
So I walked into the back and sat on the bench and OH MY GOD that needle was the biggest thing I have ever seen! Luckily, Kate was very good and got it over with quickly. It didn't actually hurt as much as I thought it would, it just stung a lot.
So anyway, after that healed up I started to use the tunnels and stuff I had left over from my left ear to start stretching my right ear. I took it pretty slow and I only went 1mm at a time. I never had any problems and I have just got my right lobe to a 0g(8mm). So im very happy, I have finally reached my goal of having two 0g ear lobes.
At the moment I am happy with my 0g's. I have always said that I will stay at 0g and at the moment I intent to. In the future I may go up to 00g but I will NEVER go any bigger than that. 00g is plenty big enough for me.
My advice to anyone who wants to start stretching their ears is to go for it, but take it slow (I know its hard to be patient- but trust me it will be better in the long run) and if you can, get a pro to do it for you. Once again, thanks Kate and Marcus.
Thank you for reading my experience- I know that it was pretty long!