***Warning folks, this is one you don't want to mimic***
At A Glance Author Smut Contact Smut@bme.anon When Two years ago Artist Self done This is one of the only piercings I have done and actually regret. It is coincidentally also the piercing that gave me the most trouble.
I'm a DIYer, for many, mostly personal reasons. In my past of sticking random shit through my body I have come across tons of complications, everything from safety pins causing blood poisoning to getting jewelry ripped out in a mosh pit, but still this one sticks out in my mind.
It began like most my piercings with me sitting around bored as fuck. I think I was actually waiting for one of my reject friends to come back on a drug run. I was sitting in this alley (sanitary...nope)and I had a piercing attack, I believe I did my left cartilage four times and my nipple before I tried the tragus. The piercing itself seemed to take a bit longer than the others because it was very tricky to set up where the piecing should go and I like to manipulate the flesh a bit before I pierce, ya know to get the feel of where the needle should go, and that seemed to take quite a bit of time.
Then came the actual needle biting through my flesh, it seemed to burn in an odd way that I have yet to experience from any other piercing. It started at the point of entry and seemed to travel to my temple area. I still don't know what this was about, but it steadily increased as the piercing got worse.
After I had put the jewelry through (small CBR) I inspected it, the placement was not quite what I had desired but it seemed fine, shows what I know right? I had got done with the piercing urge and my friend had returned, so lets move on to a few days later....
I'm in the back of the squad car. I don't quite remember what I had done. I think it was an old warrant for grand theft or an assault charge ( I know that sounds really bad, but I assure you they were severely trumped up and I did nothing like it sounds like I did). Anyways I get to the station get inked (fingerprinted not tatted), booked, etc. When my favorite part comes...removing my jewelry. This part always takes me about half an hour, cause along with the body piercings I have tons of bracelets, belts and other assorted pieces of metal attached to me. I finally have all my shit removed, except for my tragus. Sneaky me managed to hide it, more from the thought of how excruciating it would be removing it than badassery.
The piercing by this time had become incredibly infected, and I KNOW infections, this one was bad. I had been wanting to remove it but I was afraid it would just rip out cause the skin around it was putrefying. It was incredibly tender and was oozing copious amounts of pus, and the odd burning sensation increased ten fold every day I had it in. I'm no wuss, my pain thresh hold is pretty high, but THIS SHIT HURT. Jail is also not the most sanitary of places with dirty hookers and staff all over the place. Thank god I was only there for a week who knows how much worse this could of been.
On the day of my release there was only one thing I could think of...getting this ring out of my ear (well that and a cigarette). Once I had got home I began working on it's removal. I soaked it in rubbing alcohol (this was before I had learned about sea salt soaks) and began the arduous process of opening the CBR without ripping it out. Unfortunately I failed. The flesh was so rotted that it just popped out. It turns out that it had ceased to be a "piercing" while I was in jail. It was more like a scab with a ring underneath it. It has been two years since this piercing and I still have a rather visible dent on my tragus, almost half of it is gone and I have fortunately learned about proper aftercare, mainly thanks to this site.
I know in the first paragraph I said that I regretted this piercing, but now that I think about it I don't think thats exactly true. I've done some messed up piercings, but each one I learned from, and I don't think I would be able to do the trickier piercings I'm capable of now if I hadn't had this experience to remind me of the bad. I'm stubborn, I'm willful and sometimes I'm incredibly dumb, but thats me, and this piercing was part of me even if it was for a brief while. I just hope someone will learn from my experience.