For four years now I have had mixed feeling about getting mt tongue pierced. I've always liked the look of tongue rings on many of my friends and would occasionally run across some particular piece of jewelry that I thought was attractive, but on the other hand I was very scared of chipping my teeth, not being able to talk normally, or my tongue swelling up to the size of a beach ball.
At A Glance Author Colette Contact Colette@bme.anon When A week ago Artist Scoot Hughes Studio Mystic Tattoo Co. Location Lebanon, Va
I work in the same building as a tattoo shop and have had the pleasure to become friends with the two artist that work at Mystic Tattoo and last week I ran into the wife of one of them and mentioned that I would like to get my nostril pierced. She thought that was a wonderful idea and started talking about how she would like to get some facial piercings but her job prevents her from doing it. Then she started talking to her husband (the tattoo and piercing artist) and told him that I was ready for another piercing. He wasn't very shocked since it had been almost a year since a new piercing and I had gotten two tattoos since then.
After we got to the shop I expressed to him that I would like a 16gg CBR put in my nostril. As my luck went he had no 16gg CBR's and the smallest he had was a 14gg and we both agreed that it would be to large for my nose. So then I mentioned how I had wanted a tongue ring but was scared of chipping my teeth. He admitted that it did occasionally happen but it's not as common as I thought it was and that if I was concerned he could use a plastic barbell with acrylic balls (which he keeps at the shop for people who have allergic reactions to the metal). I told him to use his own judgment since he hadn't steered me wrong in the past so we used the usual surgical steel.
As he was setting up I started to worry about the pain involved with the tongue it was the one question that I seemed to have forgotten to ask. I was glancing around when he noticed that I seemed extremely nervous and asked me about it, afterall he's done my lip piercing and his partner has done two of my tattoos and I didn't get nervous with those. So when I was asked what was wrong I told him I was nervous about the pain and how much blood might be involved. He admitted that he has never had his tongue pierced but after watching hundreds if not thousands of peoples reactions that it doesn't seem "that bad". He finished setting up and then got me to use some mouth wash, while I was using the mouth wash he opened the piercing equipment and the needle that was bagged up with the jewelry. When I finished swishing the mouth wash, he got me to stick out my tongue and put the forceps on it, next was the part I was fearing the needle then dropping the jewelry in and screwing the ball on.
The piercing did not hurt nearly as bad as I expected it would and there was very little blood involved by the time I got done swashing the mouth wash it had stopped bleeding. That afternoon I took some ibuprofen to keep down the swelling as well as eating lots of ice. Thankfully, my tongue swelled an absolute minimum I couldn't tell that much myself but the piercing artist asked to see it before I left work that night and said he noticed some. By the next day I was able to eat normal food as long as I kept it to small bites. My speech was effected that afternoon but by the next day it was improving, which thrilled my because I got worried that it would take me quite some time to learn how to talk with a piece of metal shoved through my tongue.
It's been 10 days now and things are great. I've been changing jewelry with the approval of the piercing artist. He didn't even seem to mind me stopping by the shop on a nearly daily basis to see if it was healed enough to change yet. Now that I have the shorter bar in my speech is back to normal, and I was even able to put a clear acrylic on the top and visit the family without any of the usual complaints about a new piercing (not sure if that is due to the lack of being seen or that they are finally getting used to the idea that I'm my own person).
So far I haven't bitten my tongue ring a single time and I'm no longer worried about chipping my teeth. Now I just wish I would have got it done sooner.