2nd Tongue Piercing

At A Glance Author Tanya Contact breathless@envy.nu Artist Stu Studio Visual Change Location Belfast, Northern Ireland

I had my tongue pierced for the first time last year, and I LOVED it! In my humble opinion, it looks totally excellent and it feels really nice - I sucked and chewed on the barbell constantly. Anyway, a couple of months ago I was having a bored, need-to-get-stuff-pierced moment, and decided to get my tongue pierced again. It was a totally spur-of-the-moment thing and to be honest, I didn't give it a lot of thought. I just figured it'd look kewl and as I'd had it done before I sorta knew what to expect. So before my spontaneous mood had a chance to subside, I went to Visual Change in my lunch hour to get pierced (I've since been told by everyone at work that I'm not allowed to go out for lunch anymore cause I keep coming back with new stuff pierced).

Stu (the piercer) checked the top and bottom of my tongue to make sure there was enough room for another piercing, and when he decided that it would be alright, he took out the barbell I already had in my tongue for the duration of the procedure so it would be as obstruction-free as possible. He clamped my tongue and marked the placement for the piercing - slightly behind the one I already had - and sprayed me with the anasthetic.

I was expecting the second piercing experience to be as icky as the first one. I hate to use the word icky cause it sounds so dizzy-girlie but that's the best way to described how it felt to me. I was totally grossed out the first time I had my tongue pierced because I heard the needle going through my tongue, and it sounded like a hole-punch going through paper. I found the whole experience a bit unpleasant. It didn't hurt, but I hated having someone working at my mouth like that and I found it kinda difficult to keep my tongue stuck out for that long - I only just managed not to drool. The only good thing about my first tongue piercing procedure was that I didn't bleed at all, so I figured that however else it went this time, at least I wouldn't end up with a mouth full of blood!

The second piercing was a really pleasant surprise - no pain, less ickiness than before (I knew to expect the hole-punch noise this time!)and only a very tiny bit of blood. The best thing ever was how fast it healed up. The first time I had my tongue pierced I was in eating-nurofen-like-m&m's mode for about a week, and it took another week after that before I could eat normally again. But this time, it hardly hurt at all for the first couple of days, and all pain was gone after that. My tongue was very slightly swollen for about a week but I could eat and talk just fine, and I was chewing away happily on the barbell after about two weeks.

I'm not sure WHY the second piercing was so much easier to deal with and faster-healing than the first. Maybe the muscle loosens up (or whatever the medical term for muscles loosening up is!) after the first piercing, so it didn't 'object' as much to being pierced the second time round. But that's just a guess...I don't really know.

Anyway, I adore my double-pierced tongue. It's a bit unusual - well, not THAT unusual, but not as mainstream as a single piercing - and it looks SO great. Also, I love how it feels when the pieces of metal click together in my mouth - and that clicky-metal noise...heh heh! People always seem a bit shocked when they see two piercings in my tongue instead of one. I'm used to "What's that shiny thing in your mouth...oooohhh, stick out your tongue and let me see!" but it's really amusing now when I get that "You've got it pierced TWICE?!" reaction, and people expect me to sit there in public with my tongue out so they can look at it!

I know that having a secind tongue piercing might seem a little bit 'pointless', but then again, most piercings could be viewed that way. I know no-one sees my double tongue piercing unless I show them, and I know that it doesn't serve any sensible function, but I love how it looks and how it feels, and that's what matters. I feel like that about all my piercings and tattoos - I don't get them done to impress people or to 'be' a certain way, I just have them cause I like them, and it's as simple as that!

So that's about it for my second tongue piercing experience. There's nothing more to report! The whole experience was completely positive in every way and I'd definitely recomment Visual Change to anyone in Northern Ireland who's thinking of getting a piercing.