To let you all know a little bit about myself. I'm a 21 year old woman who has a few other body piercings. I submitted a story about a failed navel self-piercing about a month ago. Well, I was at it again about a week ago and that piercing was done too shallow. FINALLY tonight, I have had SUCCESS!!! I want to share this story to others who are interested in self piercing, but need to know how to do it.
At A Glance Author PiErCeD hOtTiE Contact pierced_hottie@hotmail.com When It just happened Artist Myself Studio Home Location Chicago, IL Okay, about 45 minutes I pierced my navel (again). The first two attempts were unsuccessful as the first attempt was too long for my banana bell and the second was too shallow. This is how I did it. I made some !sterile! ice by using distilled water in sterilized ice cube trays. What you do is boil the ice cube tray (make sure it is made of durable plastic and won't melt) for five minutes. You then douse it with rubbing alcohol (make sure you don't leave any inside the tray--dump it all out). You then pour in your distilled or purified water and cover it with plastic wrap and place into the freezer. You can use the ice to numb your belly button nicely (if you're not one for pain :) Anyways, I put on sterile gloves and dipped my ice cube in alcohol and numbed my belly button for about three minutes. I then clamped it using sterile forceps (I recommend slotted). I took my pre-sterilized, pre-lubricated 12 gauge needle out of it's pack and pushed it right through. My first experience took over forty-five minutes to get the needle through--this time, because of the numbing properties of the ice, I was able to push it through in less than a minute. Once the needle was through, I took some Neosporin and used it as a lubricant for my banana bell. I took the needle out and slid the banana bell right through. I then used hydrogen peroxide to wash the blood off and covered the area with a sterile gauze pad, which I plan on taking off tomorrow afternoon for a salt soak and washing.
MAKE SURE IF YOU DO THIS, YOU UNDERSTAND THE IMPORTANCE OF STERILE EQUIPMENT!!! IF YOUR EQUIPMENT IS NOT STERILE, YOUR PIERCING IS AS GOOD AS GONE BECAUSE AN INFECTION WILL BE IMMINENT!!! ALSO YOU MUST PERFORM GOOD AFTERCARE PROCEDURES!!!
Aftercare is simple. No Neosporin, hydrogen peroxide, or alcohol. What you do is get some ANTIBACTERIAL Soft Soap (NO fragrance) and use that to wash the area at least twice daily for the first month. Use the soap as a lubricant and slide the ring or barbell through with the soap a few times. Then make sure you rinse ALL of the soap out of the piercing. Any leftover soap will be sure to irritate your new piercing. At least once a day, make sure you do a salt soak. You can buy some sea salt at your local pet shop or health food store. I keep it simple and use Kosher salt. Dissolve (thoroughly) a tablespoon of salt into one cup of warm water. Place the solution into a paper cup and use vacuum pressure to attach it to your navel area. If you are to be laying on a couch or bed, use a towel or old blanket in case you spill. Lie there for about 10-15 minutes per day soaking for at least the first month. After that, you can get away with soaking for 5 minutes per day u ntil the piercing is fully healed (usually 3-9 months). Take a multi-vitamin every day and eat a well-balanced diet. A piercing is a wound and should be treated as such when it comes down to diet and healing. Avoid excessive stimulation of the area and if you have to touch it WASH YOUR HANDS FIRST!!!
I definitely do not recommend the self piercing procedure over the professional piercing procedure. If you want to get a piercing and are not sure about how to do it or where the placement should be, PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE go to your local piercing shop and have it done professionally. If you're a college student and always poor like me and have a good grasp of sterile procedures and placement, by all means do it yourself but there are definitely risks to all things done by non-professionals. Like I said, the professional piercer who
does piercings for a living definitely will do a better job with any piercing and I recommend that over self-piercing.
Well I guess that's all. Good luck to everyone and if you have any questions, feel free to email me!! Remember: Professional piercers are the best. If you must do it yourself, remember to keep everything sterile, pierce fast, and perform the aftercare routine religiously. And ALWAYS WASH YOUR HANDS BEFORE YOU TOUCH YOUR PIERCING NO MATTER WHAT!! AND DON'T LET ANYONE ELSE TOUCH IT WITHOUT WASHING UP EITHER!!!!