I have always completely LOVED body piercings. After three sets of just standard lobes (one set retired) by the time I was eleven, I was starting to entertain thoughts of non-lobe piercings. My first ideas were tongue and lip, which were automatically shot down by mother. After countless times of arguing about it, I decided to just give it up and focus on my ears for a while.
At A Glance Author Jennifer Contact girlsgotafacelikemurder91@yahoo.com When Two years ago Artist Rod Studio Acro-Deco Location Bend, Oregon I started asking about an industrial when I was almost thirteen, but my mom said I could only get a normal cartilage piercing because the industrial looked "trashy". Instead of fighting about it, this time I just settled for the cartilage, and got it done in August of 2004.
After a few months I started hinting at the industrial again. I put it on the top of my Christmas Wish-List but I didn't end up convincing my mom in time, and ended up getting it for my birthday, which is in in May, instead.
When May finally came I was unbelievably excited. On our way to my piercing studio at the time, Acro-Deco, we stopped at my best friend's house to pick her up because she had begged for weeks to come watch. We walked in and Rod said "Hello darlin'! What can I do for ya' today?". I told him I was back for the long awaited industrial! My mom filled out all the usual paperwork and Rod gave me a bag of sea salt and an after-care pamphlet. We followed him into the piercing room and I hopped up onto the docter's office like table as my mom and my friend sat on two chairs in corners of the room. It was very clean and sterile, nothing looked dirty or dusty at all. Rod washed his hands and pulled on some gloves, started getting out all the equipment, and explained all the after-care instructions to me (how much sea salt to water, no over-washing, no touching with dirty fingers, etc). After he got everything out and poured all the liquids used to clean the area on to their q-tips he changed his gloves. When he started cleaning the area on my ear off I slid my hands under my legs (so it was like I was sitting on my hands) out of habit. He marked the top and bottom parts of my cartilage with the infamous purple pen and put numbing gel on the end of the long needle. He grabbed the cork and held to needle to the bottom part of my ear and said "take a deep breath in and blow out as hard as you can", as soon as I started to blow out I felt the needle go through the bottom part of my ear. It didn't hurt at all! For me, piercings feel more like an uncomfortable/pressure sensation. Then Rod said "perfect!" and slid the needle through the upper part of the piercing without warning me! The upper part did have quite a pinch feeling to it, but not bad pain at all. When he had put the jewelry in the upper part bled a tiny bit, he wiped it off with a q-tip and said "jeez! we barely got anything out of you! oh well, this new piercing matches that big smile of yours!" (I had THE BIGGEST smile on my face!). I immediately jumped off the table and ran over to the mirror to admire my perfect new piercing!
It has been about a year and a half since I got my industrial and it has healed perfectly. Like with every new ear piercing, it was hard to adjust to sleeping certain ways to avoid hurting the new piercing. I could only sleep on my back or on my right side (my industrial is on my left ear) which made my cartilage piercings on my right ear a bit sore, but nothing too bad. I am always getting compliments on it as well as questions about my experience with it. If you are considering getting an industrial, or any other type of upper-ear piercing I would definitely go for it! It's a great experience if it is something you really want, and it looks pretty sweet too!
If you're considering getting any piercings, my advise is to make sure the piercing studio you choose is clean and the people there make you feel comfortable, it really makes all the difference! It will make the experience a lot better. A few months after I got my industrial, Rod sold the piercing studio to move to New York, so I went searching for a new piercing studio that made my most recent piercing experiences as good as my others were at Acro-Deco.
If anyone has any questions about my experience, or the piercing itself, please feel free to e-mail me about it!