Starting writing this experience feels somewhat similar to trying to think of a punchy start to a college essay, so I won't really bother with all the same old same old "african tribes people" and "discovery channel" stuff like I could, I'll jump straight into the experience.
At A Glance Author Hammy Contact Hammy@bme.anon IAM Hammy When Six months ago Artist Me Studio My room Location Nottingham, UK This is, as the title suggests, the story of my lobe stretching journey from 5mm (4g) to my current size, 16mm (5/8"). The initial procedure that lead to the starting point of this experience had, a while ago, been posted to BME, however I don't seem to be able to find it to link to, so I'll post a bare bones account of what happened.
The long and short of the experience of my leap to 5mm from no ear piercing at all is that in september 2007 I walked into a reputable piercing studio in my home town that was friendly, clean and welcoming and had a piercing done at 2.6mm then immediately stretched to 5mm by taper, on 2 separate occasions, one for each ear, as my finances allowed. No messing about, the healing was fine, aftercare easy, and thus, the experience I am here to account begins.
The guy that initially did the stretch to 5mm (who's name I've never got, despite being back several times since) during the procedure had said that I shouldn't consider stretching the piercing any further until it was completely healed, which he said would take between 10 and 16 weeks. Being the ever intelligent teenager that I was, that night I got home and ordered a stretching kit from ebay, as it was simply sooo much cheaper than purchasing the equipment from my local 'alternative' shops, and about a tenth of the price of having it done step by step at the studio.
While purchasing the kit off ebay could've gone terribly wrong, as I'm sure we've all heard the horror stories of used equipment and lack lustre service, luckily for me it went incredibly well. While I of course could've bought better equipment, the money available to me is far from infinite being in the situation of a poor student. I paid somewhere in the region of £8 (about $15) for a 6mm taper, 6mm plug, 8mm taper, 8mm plug, 10mm taper and 10mm plug. They were all acrylic (yes of course, the best material for a healing piercing....) and the tapers were roughly 2 inches in length, so all in all, not the worst I could've got, but hardly the best (great for the money though!).
So, skip forward about 5 weeks and I've started to neglect the strict aftercare regime that I'd been following of SSS (sea salt soaks) for both ears and they seemed more or less healed (I'm a very fast healer) I contemplated the first use of my fantastic kit. Thinking to myself: "how wrong can it go? It's only 1mm". Of course, everyone reading wants me to say "how wrong could I have been" but exactly the opposite occured. The day that I was thinking of stretching I went down to my local pharmacy with a mate and bought some standard water based lube, similar in almost all respects to KY jelly, just a budget version in a bigger tube and headed home with only one thing in mind, "Lets go for it". I waited until later at night after I'd eaten dinner with my folks and headed up to my room. I prepped what there was of my equipment, as in, not a lot. I washed my hands and left ear thoroughly (this was the ear I was stretching first, as it had been pierced first), lubed up the 6mm taper, and easily slipped it through. No pain, no blood, nothing, easy as pie. I followed the taper through with the plug and shoved the O-rings on, sorted. The next day there was some redness, but that faded by the afternoon, all in all, a very easy stretch.
This time, skip forward about 3 weeks. I'd been at 6mm with no problems, my right ear felt as healed as my left had when I stretched it, and I felt that my left was ready for the first big leap: 6mm to 8mm, the first 2mm jump. As I only had one plug and taper for each size I'd planned to stretch my left ear consistently one size ahead of my right ear, and then purchase another 10mm plug when I reached that size. So, same procedure as before, I lubed up the 8mm taper and proceeded to push it through my 6mm hole. Ouch. This time it hurt, figuring that by now I was half way down the taper I might as well carry on, no point backing down now. Silly me really, I did manage to get the taper all the way in, but my ear was swollen, red and sore to the touch, but still, no blood. I didn't change it to the plug that night, it was simply too painful to do so. So I go to bed with the taper in my ear, not thinking anything of it after taking a couple of painkillers to dull the pain.
I wake up the next day thinking, shit, something here isn't right, my ear still hurts. I went over to the mirror and my ear was still as irritated as it had been the night before immediately after the stretch, but never mind, this taper was bloody uncomfortable and I had to get the plug in before I went to college. I attempted to remove the taper and follow it through with the plug, but it goes wrong, and the taper falls out with no plug in the hole, and, hey presto, it bleeds. To say that it bleeds is probably an understatement, to say it bled like a bitch is probabaly more accurate. So after cleaning up my ear with paper towels and washing it I knew I had only one option, downsize back to 6mm. Since then I've realised that I suffered a tear and not a blow-out, as I never got a flap on the back of the fistula, and the hole remains slightly misshapen to this day. After this experience I figured I'd give my ear some more time to recover from the trauma, and so I did.
Forward again another 5 or so weeks, and my left ear seems completely healed, and my right ear is simply crying out to be stretched. From this point on I suffered no drama with any of my stretches, left or right ear, and they all went as simply as the very first stretch to 6mm had gone. So, after the stretches, I had both my ears at my initial goal size: 10mm. I proceeded to buy about 8 sets of plugs and tunnels for this size, thinking I would hang about here. Yes, as most people who've stretched anything will tell you, you're almost never satisfied with your initial goal size, and indeed after a couple of months at 10mm I was bored and wanted to stretch up and reach pastures-a-new.
*****The method that I used for the next few stretches I wouldn't actively recommend to anyone, as I know how horrifically wrong it can go. But it worked for me, so if you understand and are willing to take the risks involved, by no means is using this method a lost cause.*****
Stretching with silicone:
I had heard both the arguments in favour of and against the use of silicone for stretching. The argument for of course being that it was the easiest way of stretching as you simply popped in the bigger sized plug or tunnel and it was done. The argument against it is along the lines of by putting in the bigger jewellery you are obviously exerting pressure on the inside of the hole and the tacky nature of the surface of silicone adheres to the skin, and is difficult and painful to remove.
Feeling that I understood the risks and was willing to take them to get up sizes quicker, cheaper and easier I went ahead and purchased a pair of 12mm silicone tunnels. Seriously, for me, they were a revelation. When they arrived I cleaned them both thoroughly in warm soapy water to remove any of the gunk left over after manufacture and then simply folded one of them in half and popped it in my left ear. It folded itself back out, and within about 2 seconds I had stretched from 10mm to 12mm, with next to no pain. I waited a few days to see what the results were before doing the same thing with my right ear, but I found that as long as I wet my lobes every so often and tried as hard as I could to just move the tunnels around they never once stuck to my lobes.
So, with this revelation comes the next stretch. This went almost exactly the same as above, except stretching from 12mm to 14mm, and this occured probably about 2 weeks after the 10-12mm stretch. No pain or anything, this method really seems to work for me. I remained at 14mm again for about a month, after buying a couple of pairs of tunnels for 14mm, but still, I wanted to stretch more.
However, silicone tunnels don't really come that cheap, even on ebay and so I had to resort to other means to get up that next size. Simple really, I purchased a cheap 16mm PMMA taper off the internet and a pair of 16mm white PMMA plugs. This stretch worked much the same as my early ones, lube the taper, push it through followed by the plugs. This time however it was so ridiculously easy I didn't think I'd even stretched, but, after comparing my 14mm and 16mm plugs it was obvious that I had, it seems that finally my lobes have completely given up the ghost and are willing to give in to whatever I throw at them.
And so, I'd reached 16mm. I've now been at this size for the longest time I've been at any size, nearly 3 months now. I really want to stretch more, but I'm being realistic with my job prospects here. I understand I've most probably already passed 'the point of no return' but anything bigger and I wouldn't stand a chance of flogging them off as 10mm holes. I've said to myself now that I'm not stretching any further until I get myself a job, as I don't want to limit my already limited job prospects anymore as an inexperienced teenager. As strange as it sounds, as far as piercings and tattoos go in the workplace, from what I've seen on my visits to America and what I read on the internet, while it isn't always easy for a modded person to get a job in the USA, it certainly seems a hell of a lot easier than getting a job in the UK if you're at all visibly modified.
So yeah, my story is far from over, I have more piercings in the pipeline, including one I just got done (another experience coming soon) and certainly tattoos planned for when I turn 18. So far I think I've just finished the first chapter in my hopefully long life of body modification.