At A Glance Author neetzach Contact neetzach@bme.anon When It just happened Artist Fousage Studio Hell personality tuning Location Prague, Czech Republic Although this experience is titled "Neat...", in fact it wasn't, it just ended in a neat way, despite the agony I had gone through before I got it actually done...
I suppose it is not relevant how or why, I decided to get it, since the person reading this has most likely, already made his or her own decision. I would like to focus on some facts and moments of my piercing experience which would have been very useful to me if I had only known them before. Namely, the septum piercing is a quite infamous type of piercing due to the pain and discomfort that follow it.
The first information I had on this particular piercing was that it hurt like hell. That initial information had gotten kind of stuck in my mind and since then I always wanted to find out the details what kind of pain it was and how great it actually hurt. I generally dislike to suffer unnecessarily, and I find pain not enjoyable, but on the contrary, discomforting ;) There is a certain amount of discomfort I am willing to endure in order to pursue a piece of jewelry on myself.
The first person who shared his septum experience with me was my colleague from work. Simply put, he said: "It hurts too much, and I would never do it again". Huh! That was not really encouraging, but it sure did enforce the stereotypical opinion I had on septum piercings... Then again, I felt like I needed to hear more experiences. Of course, there was bmezine.com, and I must say it was really helpful - everyone expected the piercing to hurt a lot, but yet, for some people it was painful, and for some just unplesant. Back to square one.
Finally, I decided to cheat my way through it. I realised my girlfriend actually had the "Emla" anesthetic creme, so I decided to use it. I thought even if it didn't work most effectively, at least it would minimize the pain to a bearable level. This was a significant emotional relief to me, since the fear of pain turned out being quite stressful - I'd say, the stress and fear overgrew the pain.
So, the piercing day finally came. I had met with my girlfriend one hour before so we could apply the cream, and just when we were about to do it, we realised we had only the box of the actual cream without the cream ! The tube w/ the cream was missing from its box ! Huh, at that moment I could feel my heart ponder and stress levels rising. I guessed I had to do it the common way without any painkiller...
There I was, sitting in the studio trying to talk my stress away with my girlfriend and to think about something else. At that moment I was not even sure about what I really wanted and why I was getting pierced, but I still decided to go through.
The stress culminated at the moment while I was getting prepared for the punch. The special tool that was used for this type of piercing was not really smooth on its edges so that was quite uncomfortable. Then I thought, if setting up the tool was so irritating, then I'm going to faint when I get punched by the needle. I started sweating and maybe I turned pale ( My girlfriends told me afterwards that I didnt, and that I looked like I wasnt stressed out ). And then...
It did not hurt almost at all! I felt so relieved and then after a while quite stupid. The pain is similar as when you pierce your eyebrow just that it lasts very short.
At the first glance the piercing looked kind of crooked so I had to switch from a horseshoe jewelry to a ring. Even changing the jewelry did not hurt much, even though it was on a freshly pierced wound.
Cleaning the piercing afterwards is a bit unpleasant since it makes your eyes all watery, and often makes you sneeze which is kind of problematic since aftercare demands that you do not play nor turn the ring, hence wiping your nose is not a very good thing to do.
Given all that, I cannot avoid comparison with other piercings I had, although far less "extreme". Knowing how annoying eyebrow and ear piercings are before they heal in terms of sleeping and normal day-to-day activities, septum is a real refreshment. The thing I value a lot is posibility to completely hide the piercing. Another thing is that there are no bigger complications as with the labret which causes gum recession.
The bottom line is that all the stories and other people opinions had created a completely false image of getting a nose septum pierced, which turned into a mental burden. Just too much stress over nothing.