This is the story of how I went from thinking nipple piercings were vaguely gross to being head over heels in love with my newly pierced nipples.
At A Glance Author Dean Contact Dean@bme.anon IAM sevendaze When It just happened Artist Ryan C. Studio Strange City Location Edmonton, AB I have nice boobs. No, really. They're pretty much exactly what I like on a girl -- right size, good firmness, perky. The only problem with them is that I'm genderqueer, and while half the time I think they're great, the other half of the time I think taking a knife to them would be an awesome idea. I've had pretty shitty self-image for a while, but one of the things that's really helped me out is body modification. No matter how crappy I feel, I always love my piercings. I thought about it, and decided that piercing my nipples would be a great way to make me like my breasts.
This was back in October, and I decided that I would do the nipple piercing in January. I almost put it off past then, making excuses for why I should wait.
On a Wednesday at work, I finally got my act together. I took a break, stopped in at Strange City and made an appointment for that Friday, then went and got myself dinner and headed back to my store. I made the appointment with Ryan, because as much as I love everyone at Strange City, he's the one most able to set me at ease when I'm freaked out about a piercing. By Friday, I was a nervous wreck. I left the apartment about 30 minutes before my appointment at 6, and spent the bus-ride jittering and bouncing in place, listening to loud music so that I couldn't think clearly enough to really panic.
Ryan, per usual, was running about 30 minutes behind schedule. I'd pretty much expected that, so it wasn't a big deal. I spent my time playing bubble-breaker on my cellphone and quietly panicking. When Ryan finished the surface piercing he was doing, he came out and announced that he was going to get set up and then we'd get started. I made a face to let him know just how not-thrilled I was by what we were going to be doing, and he made a brief attempt to reassure me before vanishing around the corner to do his thing.
Ryan's hyperactive, silly dorkiness is honestly a huge part of the reason he's one of my favourite piercist. He talked pretty much non-stop as he got everything set up, asking about work, my Christmas. While I was still nervous, it was harder to focus on it during a conversation. When stuff was mostly set up, he went over aftercare with me, with which Ryan is always a pretty hysterical experience. He explained that due to the fact that one's nipples are generally covered by clean clothing and bras, nipples are pretty easy to heal -- he did, however, warn me against rubbing my new piercings on door knobs, complete with acting out exactly what I shouldn't be doing.
With everything set up, I took my shirt and bra off and he went about disinfecting the area around my nipples, apologizing for harassing me with a Q-tip. With that done, he apologized for harassing me with a marker, as he was about to try to mark the dots where the piercings would go. Here, he had me stand on this little stool-like thing that slid out of the bottom of the piercing table, the purpose of which was, I guess, to put me at a convenient height so he wouldn't have to bend down to see what he was doing. Ryan always spends a long time making sure everything's perfect. I spent probably about ten minutes being shuffled about the room while he had me stand on the stool and at various locations in the small room so he could try and make sure everything was even and right. He spent a lot of this time swearing at my left nipple, the dots on which he couldn't get to line up the way he wanted. Eventually, we both agreed that the positioning looked good.
I'd actually started to calm down by this point, but when he got me to lie down on the table, I promptly started to freak out again. He told me to relax and take deep breaths, and promised we'd do it on an exhale and that he wouldn't surprise me, which I appreciated. I breathed in, breathed out, with him talking me through it. The clamp was uncomfortable, but not unbearable -- I grumbled at him, but didn't swear until the needle went through. It hurt. I'm normally pretty quiet, generally just make "nngh" sounds during piercings. This time, though, I'm pretty sure I swore at him -- something along the lines of, "OW, FUCK, THAT HURTS." Then the first one was done and I got the supreme joy of going through it again on the other side, paired with more swearing. The whole thing took less than a minute.
Putting the jewelry in was painless. My left nipple continued to be annoying, and Ryan mumbled at the bead that didn't want to go on. He got it, then, and cleaned me off. Cool water on my very sore nipples felt pretty awesome. With all the "blood and guts" cleaned off (when he said that, I immediately craned my head to see if my chest was a gory mess -- it wasn't.) he invited me to check it out in the mirror.
I still can't find words. Maybe they'll come later. All I can tell you is that I know I was smiling, but I couldn't see that because I was too busy looking at the perfect barbells through my nipples. They were lined up exactly right, shiny against my skin. It was everything I hoped it would be, exactly the way I wanted it to look, and so unbelievably gorgeous. When I got my ears pierced when I was eight, I cried when I looked in the mirror because I thought they were so pretty -- this was beyond that. I was honestly speechless for a second I was so happy.
I got dressed again and Ryan gave me the usual handful of Jolly Ranchers. I paid and went home, absolutely buzzing. It was really the greatest feeling in the world -- walking around with this great secret under my shirt, knowing that my nipples were fucking gorgeous, with this amazing jewelry, that I was utterly and completely and 100% happy with the fact that I have boobs because it means I can have pierced nipples that look exactly the way mine do, and nobody but me and Ryan knew about it. Even now that a whole host of people know about the piercing, and pictures have been posted, it's still really awesome passing people on the street and thinking to myself, hey random hot girl I just passed, I bet you don't know I have pierced nipples and they're really fucking beautiful. They're still sore, but it's a great kind of soreness, where the reminder itself is actually really awesome.
I'm really, really thrilled with them. The pain was nowhere near as bad as I thought it would be, and absolutely worth it. I'm so glad I didn't let myself chicken out.