The upper cartilage of my ear was pierced in March of 2006. As is common with many cartilage piercings it had a rough healing period but in August of 2006 I began to stretch it. To read more about the initial piercing and healing see My Helix Piercing Experience
At A Glance Author Jordan "Kuja" W. Contact xXJordanXx@straightedgeonline.org IAM Kuja When Three months ago Artist Self Stretched
I'm not certain for sure what spawned the interest in me to start stretching my cartilage. I do get the impression that looking at pictures on BME instilled in me the impression that stretched piercings were attractive. There was a time, not a long time ago, that I thought stretched piercings were "gross" or "a ridiculous decision" before I was educated about the risks and what it really looked like when done properly.
Before I began anything I took it upon myself to research as much information as I could on BME. By that time I was already reviewing experiences for BME so I came across the tales of horror and the tales of glory associated with stretching. At some point or another I decided that I really had to do it so I took it upon myself to start.
Fourteen gauge to Twelve Gauge:
When I started stretching it happened to be at the same time I worked at the largest mall in the world so finding jewellery wasn't really hard. The first thing that I bought was a 12 gauge claw. My first attempt to put it in was trouble free and my first "stretch" was complete. I say "stretch" because it slid right in without any effort at all. I'm fairly certain that the heavy jewellery I was wearing before that had stretched the hole inadvertently. This stage lasted about a week or less.
Twelve gauge to Eight Gauge:
I figured that since the last stretch had gone so trouble free that I could likely skip ten gauge and proceed directly to eight gauge without any trouble. I was more or less right. I bought a eight gauge stainless steel pincer for the next stretch. I was intentionally buying tapered jewellery to reduce costs. Although I don't necessarily condone this method of stretching it never caused me any trouble and was probably easier than stretching with a taper and then trying to get jewellery in.
This was the point that I realized stretching cartilage hurts, quite a bit. I would suggest that it was more painful healing it from stretching than it was from piercing it initially. When I was researching stretching I actually found very few experiences about stretching cartilage. More often than not it was lobes. One of the things that actually worried me going into this was the fact that there were so few experiences and pictures of people who has stretched their cartilage. Most people with large gauge cartilage had their dermal punched, which is something I really should have considered when I had it done.
This stretch was relatively complication free compared to some of the others. For the first couple of days it was sore when I woke up from unintentionally sleeping on it. The other thing that annoyed me was not being able to wear my large headphones, the kind that go over your ear. I had to use ear buds while it was healing.
Eight Gauge to Six Gauge:
This was one of the uglier stretches for several reasons. It just plain would not heal. Sleeping and headphones had a lot to do with it. I missed my wireless headphones so much when I couldn't wear them so occasionally they found their way back onto my head. There were a few other significant events that made this a more difficult stretch.
The stretch itself was relatively easy. I had a six gauge acrylic pincer which I used to stretch. I put some, well quite a bit, of water based lubricant on the pincer and it slid right in. It hurt of course but it's very satisfying when it's done.
One of the nastiest parts was that the weekend after I did I was hospitalized with a quite severe flu. Fortunately they didn't make me take it out or anything but it definitely wasn't good. It was extra red and gross when I started to get sick. It got swollen and sore and it was tough to not downsize. Downsizing is a tough decision but I stuck with it and made it through. As I got better from the flu my ear got better too and it was back to normal pretty quick, normal being still irritated from recently stretching.
Worse, nearing what I thought was healed; I put in a single flare tunnel as the acrylic was really starting to get to me. It's generally advised against to use acrylic in a fresh piercing and now I understand why. As soon as I switched out to the steel tunnel it felt good and it was worlds better by the next day. The bad part was one morning I woke up and the flare of the tunnel was in the middle of the piercing and it had started to heal at the front. I had no choice but to force it hard back out the front. It was absolutely devastating to my healing time. It bled quite a bit when I first popped it out and instead of risking it again with the flare I put an O ring behind the flare as well just to be sure.
Six Gauge to Four gauge:
I had stretched my ear from six gauge to four gauge very successfully unfortunately the glass plug I was using slid right out of my ear at some point while I was out and by the time I got back home it had shrunk back to eight gauge, It currently resides at six gauge.
Thanks for Reading~