At A Glance
Author	Chris
Contact	Chris@bme.anon
IAM	mutedequilibrium
When	N/A
Artist	Sque3z
Studio	Anomaly Studios
Location	Pasadena, CA

Friday 10•10•08
I find myself, yet again, in Pasadena at my favourite only piercing spot: Anomaly Studios. 5 minutes beforehand, I had just gotten my labret scalpelled to 0 gauge by Steve DeToma. I'm calm and collected, feeling quite good about myself, when Sque3z steps up to the plate and get's all no-bones on me. We're punching my septum to 0 gauge this night. He tells me it's going to be a 1-2-3-BAM kind of deal. I've come to him many times for work and he knows what I'm capable of. He sets me up with the cork and the punch, and tells me it's going to be mostly a lot of pressure, so that my skin on each side of the septum doesn't slide in opposite directions to compensate, and skew the punch. He says the most important part is keeping the cork and punch level while pressing them together, "and then twisting at the end," I say. "Yup, exactly," he replies. Great. He gets everything lined u p while I breathe and find my happy place. My heart's racing as I'm admittedly nervous as hell. The most nervous I've been in I don't know how long. I've been thinking about this moment for the last several years. Every time I looked in the mirror and saw how crooked it had been, even just slightly. Even after stretching it 4 times, to 6 gauge, it was still obvious to me. I knew getting it fixed by a punch was the only path to take other than leaving out completely. And that just wasn't an option. I can feel my feet sweating, now. I breathe for a good couple of minutes, and tell him I'm ready for the 1st deep breath. We breathe together, deep, almost to the point of being dizzying, but that happy place is all around me. If it's going to happen, it's got to happen now. 2nd deep breath, and I'm in la la land asking him where we are with the breathing. We do another deep breath. And on the 4th... you know how in the movies, when the person gets knocked out, and stars sta rt flying around them? It was like that. Pressure, pressure, pressure, then fireworks. It's all over in about 5 seconds, and the endorphin rush is intoxicating. I'm floating on clouds somewhere, dressed in pink, frolicking with little children with big eyes and brightly coloured hair, saying things like "Wheee." Oh wait, not I'm not. I'm back in the shop, hearing Sque3z's voice.

"We hurt Chris today."

I'm surprised to find out I didn't tear up at all. I'm incredibly tired all of a sudden and feel like taking a 2 year nap. I eat when I get home, soaking my nose and cleaning more blood off as much as I can before passing out.

Day 1: Saturday
I wake up and the skin on my nose is all oily. This happened every time I stretched my nose, especially going to 8 gauge and 6 gauge. I don't have a headache, which I'm thankful for, but it's aching something fierce. I soak it in hot-warm sea salt water, and I get a shivering wave that goes all through the body. Damn that feels good! My nose runs during the day, and the snot is a bit bloody. I'm talking funny, and it hurts to smile. Q-tips come back pink when swabbing my nose during it's twice a day cleaning routine. I'm using the cap to some moisturizer which is about 1 1/2" in diameter, which works perfectly for dunking.

Day 2: Sunday
Sunday is basically the same, still pretty sore but only slightly better. I have a line of dried blood running up my nose and along my face when I walk into the bathroom. I do my usual soaking routine, only this time I blow my nose and it's a dried-blood-ey mess But, I can breathe! I had been worried about chunks of blood drying and getting stuck behind it, so I'm relieved when I see all of this come out.

Day 3: Monday
It's this day that I'm able to rotate my plug inside my nose, where it had been pretty much set in stone beforehand. This reveals the worst septum stink in the history of mankind. No, really. It's incredible. I put my head under the sink to let hot-warm water wash over it as I rotate it. Some water goes up my nose and I have a sharp pain in my sinuses as a result. Bad idea! The pain goes away within a few seconds. I find I'm stuffier on this day than normal. I blame this entirely on putting my nose under the faucet and remind myself not to do it again.

Day 4: Tuesday
During my [now normal] routine upon waking up, I blow my nose and the plug in my septum almost falls out. It's loosened up enough and now it's time to put the o-ring on, it seems. I soak it nice and good, and manage to get the o-ring on it without much pain. I'm careful to keep my nose pretty stationary while I brace the back of the plug with one finger, spreading the o-ring on with the other hand. It takes a good 15-20 minutes to get used to the o-ring being on, throbbing a bit in the mean time. I have it as close to the end as possible to give it plenty of breathing room. Finally it calms down. I'm more capable of smiling today than before. It's still quite sore, but I'm expecting that to be gone by the end of the next week. I've been drinking a lot of apple juice with Vitamineral Green, and vitamin C. I'm going to assume these are doing nothing less than speeding the recovery up, and quite well at that.

Week 1: Friday
Still sore, but much less. It seems as though the soreness went away drastically within just a couple of days. I still do the hot sea salt water routine twice a day. It doesn't hurt that much to blow my nose [while holding the plug in place, so as not to move it around too much].

Week 1.5: Monday
My nose isn't nearly as oily when I wake up anymore, and I can actually resume normal nose blowing position [albeit a little carefully] with no problems. I'm a pro at taking the o-ring off the plug by now [as well as preventing my nose hairs from getting caught in the o-ring, which is the cause of much more annoyance than I can describe] and I can move my nose around pretty well without it hurting. I can smile and crinkle my nose completely without it hurting anymore as well.

Today: Thursday
The pain has gone down tremendously within the now almost 2 first weeks. It's been quite dry and hot the last few days in southern California, so I've had a bit of blood when I blew my nose in the morning. I've just been trying to drink plenty of water in the mean time, and it seems to be working so far. I can feel the tissue in my nose is quite sturdy now, but not quite there yet. I'm guessing the soreness will be completely gone by next Friday.

Sque3z did a fantastic job, as per always. Since the first time I met him when he threw hooks for my 1st suspension, he's proven to me time and again how dedicated he is to the highest standards and continues to help me achieve my personal idea of perfection. I totally trust my body in this man's hands.