I have an identical twin sister that is a facial piercing fiend [she has her labret, medusa, bridge, and septum pierced], and everyone always joked that I was the "innocent" twin. I had no piercings, I had even taken out my ear piercings. Of course, my twin had so much fun with piercing that she wanted me to get pierced, too. I toyed with the idea for awhile. I wanted something pierced that I could hide easily, and one that NO one would EVER expect me to have. A navel piercing seemed too...easy. Nipples would be WAY too painful [and just not my personal thing]. What in the world could I get pierced?
At A Glance Author anonymous Artist Crazy Dave Studio Allien Tattooing and Piercing Location Sioux Falls, SD And suddenly it hit me- A tongue piercing.
My sister was so excited when I informed her of my idea. She even called the piercing place for me, and set up the appointment. I was a bit nervous, since this was going to be my first piercings [besides the ear piercing and what not.]
It was a Friday night, and the studio was strangely empty. Which was good, because by the time I had got there, I was pretty darn nervous. An audience would have been torture. The studio was very clean and well lit, and he even had a lovely fish aquarium set up along the wall with exotic fishies. That calmed me a bit. My sister had gotten a few of her piercings done there before, and the piercer [Dave] always went to great lengths to make sure everything was sanitary. And of course, he took my ID, photocopied it, and had me sign all of the lovely forms.
Dave sat me down and explained the procedure to me AND after care instructions extremely well. He handed me a pamphlet, told me how to care for the piercing using different solutions, and what I could and could not do with the piercing until it healed. I had heard the speech a few good times before due to my twin's many piercings, but it was nice that he repeated himself again.
He then looked at me, squinted, and said, "Would you like to hold onto your sister's hand?"
I must have looked extremely nervous. And no, I didn't want to hold onto my sister's hand, that would have been too weird [don't ask, it's a twin thing]. He then handed me a porcupine beanie baby.
Oh yes.
In true wimpy style, I clenched my eyes shut and clutched onto the porcupine.
"Will she be all right?" I heard someone else in the studio ask. My twin laughed nervously.
I had my eyes held shut tightly, and waited. The clamp felt the worst- it was awkward, with my tongue sticking out. I then felt a sharp poke, followed with a bit of a dulling pain as he put the needle through, along with the jewelry. I had my eyes shut the entire time. He then said, "Okay! All done!" and handed me a mirror.
Niiice.
I admired my new piercing. It hurt, I won't lie. It wasn't like an intense pain; more like an "I-just-bit-my-tongue-really-hard-and-now-it-hurts" type of pain. Dave then asked me a series of questions to make sure I could talk okay. And it was HARD, talking with this thing. It felt bizarre having a huge piece of metal in my mouth. It felt like it was weighing my entire tongue down.
I laughed weakly and paid. He handed me an orange popsicle, and out the door we went.
My twin was still extremely excited by all of this. Her innocent sister was suddenly not so innocent. "Don't tell mom!" I warned her.
Haha, yeah right. My parents wouldn't wonder why I randomly had an orange popsicle on a Friday night. And why my sister and me were so gung-ho to hang out with each other.
I walked through the door, and they knew right away. And my mom actually got mad! Not extremely mad, but more like disgusted. I guess it was all right for one of her daughters to be all pierced up, but not the other one? Ah, who knows.
Anyway, I then sat in the mirror and admired the new piercing. It still felt pretty funny, almost like I could choke on it. He had to pierce it with a longer barbell to help with the swelling, and by that time [three hours after the piercing], I was starting to swell a bit.
Healing went very well. I didn't have to live off applesauce, or Cherry slushies. The only thing I had an extremely hard time with was NOT biting down on the barbell. The piercer had failed to mention that since the barbell was long, it'd be easy to chomp down on. And of course, my common sense fails to kick in sometimes. I was eating a bowl of Cheerios and WHOMP! I bit down on the top of the barbell. Extremely painful. I actually chipped part of a tooth off. It was easy for my dentist to fix, but pretty darn painful all the same. Until I could get a shorter barbell, I had to get used to pushing my tongue up to the roof of my mouth while I ate.
All in all, I had a pretty darn nice experience. My friends were all so surprised when they found out, and it was a fun piercing to have. I did, however, take it out about two weeks ago because it WAS making it a bit harder for me to talk. I could talk fine most of the time, except for certain days. However, I did have it for almost 9 months, and I'm considering getting it done again sometime. I only wish I had known how easy it was to bite down on those dang barbells. It would have saved lots of pain...[Yes, I can handle piercing pain...but tooth pain? Crikey!]
Ta da, the end. :)