WARNING: The following piercing experience includes bad aftercare that should not be copied by any means. Please follow the directions of your piercer and research the piercing you want before getting it done (ideally speak to multiple licensed piercers to find the one that is most knowledgeable on the specific piercing you wish to get). It is CRUCIAL that you take care of your piercing.
At A Glance Author ZeroGrace Contact ZeroGrace@bme.anon When A month ago Studio Cold Steel Location San Francisco, CA I got my nose pierced in San Francisco at Cold Steel (located in the Castro district) a little over a month ago. It was my first piercing other than my ten earlobe piercings and single cartilage piercing. I have been told that I have a relatively high threshold of pain (due to the fact that I think tattoos tickle) yet I was slightly worried about how much my nose piercing would hurt. For those of you that have gotten your eyebrows waxed before, the amount of pain experienced in the nostril piercing process is surprisingly comparable (if not less). My eyes watered due to the area being pierced (and the proximity of the piercing to my eyes), however, it did not hurt as much as I originally expected going into it. About an hour after I got my piercing, it started stinging just a bit, but that was the only pain I experienced throughout the entire process.
As the piercer at Cold Steel made CLEAR that I understood, it is apparently VERY important that you do not let anyone lick your piercing in the healing process. Who would have thought? As far as cleanliness and hygiene goes, though, it is necessary that you keep your piercing as clean as possible. He (the piercer) recommended that I clean the inside and outside of my nostril with an antiseptic liquid and soak my nose for five minutes in a salt water solution (one fourth teaspoon salt mixed with one cup warm water) twice a day. He said that when I cleaned the piercing, I should check to make sure that either end of the stud does not have any crusty build up on it. He also said that my piercing would be completely healed within six to eight weeks (which turned out to be a happy thought, but not the case for me).
I learned the hard way that during the healing process, it is extremely important to keep the piercing clean. Finding time and motivation to actually soak my piercing for the full five minutes twice a day was slightly difficult. Because I did not do as I was recommended to do, my nostril piercing has started to collect a noticeable bit of scar tissue on the exterior. The scar tissue on the interior is only noticeable when the piercing is out. On the inside there is a slight protrusion.
At first it was difficult to recognize the tissue build up on the exterior. After two weeks of having my piercing, I was supposed to change the longer stud (which is used initially to compensate for swelling) for a shorter stud. I tried replacing the long stud with a shorter one, and the new one would not fit all the way through my piercing (i.e. I put the piercing through and could not see the end of it poke out the other side of the hole) due to the amount of swelling and/or tissue build up. That was the first indication that my piercing was not going as well as planned.
I was hoping there would be an easy solution that would help to get rid of the scar tissue, but I am pretty much SOL. After visiting Pierced Out (in San Jose, California) and talking to a very friendly and helpful piercer, I have new directions that will hopefully get rid of some of the scar tissue if I am lucky. He said that plain glycerine soap would work much better than the antiseptic solution previously recommended. Soaking in salt water solution is always the best way to care for most piercings, but it is highly prudent to soak as directed. A lot of the advice I got from the piercer at Cold Steel was denied by the piercer at Pierced Out. At Pierced Out, for example, the piercer told me that I should not clean off the crusty buildup on either side of my piercing. He said that due to the current condition of my piercing, I should not touch it, period. He also said that soaking the piercing in salt water before cleaning it with the plain glycerine soap would loosen up any buildup on the metal/surrounding the piercing so that the soap would clean it off and act as a sanitizer.
The best case scenario for my nose piercing is that within the next eight months, the scar tissue could disappear. I was told that it is likely to be just swelling due to infection, however, if I do not take care of it from here on out (i.e. like I should have been taking care of the piercing from the beginning), I risk permanent scarring on the exterior (that happens to look like a pale mole/wart) and the interior of my nostril.
The moral of the story is, take care of your piercings and they will turn out pretty. If you don't, however, you risk infection and/or scarring (neither of which are any fun).