When I was 14, I was intent on getting my belly button pierced. Me being young and my parents being strict, they said no, deeming it 'trashy'. Well, one night I spent the night at my friend's house. At this point, she had her tongue, nose, belly button, and an industrial pierced. If she could do it, so could I. (Her mom doesn't care what she does.) I was very irritated with my parents at the time...so I decided to pierce my belly button anyway. Since I'd already pierced 4 holes in my ears, I figured it'd be about the same. Wrong. Very very wrong. It turned out to be absolutely nothing like it. I have no idea what I was thinking at the time. Temporary insanity? I think I was just really determined to have the piercing I wanted. I mean, come on...they're adorable! They look good on just about anyone. Off subject...anyways, so, my friend had just recently done her industrial with a 14 gauge needle, so she had it lying around. We 'sterilized' it with alcohol...bad idea. I borrowed a belly ring from her and marked out where I wanted my piercing. I thought it looked really good, and she agreed, so I decided to just go through with it.
At A Glance Author Jessums When A year ago My first big mistake: ice. I decided that I was also a wuss, so I wanted to ice my stomach. Bad idea. I found out later that ice just made it worse. Who knew? I figured it would completely numb it, because when I was younger, my friend's sister was rebelling against her mom, and icing her stomach on their couch so she could pierce her belly button herself. It was incredibly painful to put the ice on in the first place. That probably should have been a huge warning sign as to DON'T SHOVE STUFF THROUGH YOURSELF!!! The fact that the ice practically burned cause it was so cold obviously wasn't warning enough for me, so I just waited until I could pinch myself and not really feel it. So, once my stomach was iced enough to my satisfaction, I started piercing. I took it incredibly slow because it was immensely painful. My friend was just sitting next to me on her computer talking to her friends, every once in a while turning around to check on me to make sure I wasn't dead. She kept offering to push it through for me since I was taking so long, and she knew it'd be better it I just shoved it though really fast. I refused, because I like to have everything in my power all the time, so I continued myself. It took me 45 minutes to push it through. You'd think I'd take the hint when it hurt like hell to either push it through really fast or just give up...nope. I put it though at my own pace, in my own time. After it was done, my friend looked at it and critiqued me. She said it was a little bit deep, but overall a good looking piercing. Not crooked or anything. I felt accomplished, since it was my first body piercing and all. Ear piercings are nothing compared to belly piercings, so I didn't really count the ones I did myself as piercing experiences.
Mistake number 2: I played with it. A lot. All I could do was play with it. Afterwards, I couldn't even feel that it was there. But it was red, and all I did was touch it. My friend advised me against it, but I didn't care. I had it in for about a week, cleaned it out every time I took a shower, and walked around playing with it all the time. Pretty stupid looking back on it. Why didn't I listen to the person next to me who HAD her belly done by a professional when she told me to NOT touch it or play with it other then when I was cleaning it? So it ended up getting infected...I decided that I just didn't want to deal with it anymore, or risk my parents finding out and killing me, so I just took it out. Did I mention that my parents were completely against belly button piercings?
Oh well. Lesson learned, I took it out, it healed with a small 3-D scar. I'm 16 now, and I finally wore my parents down. I'm getting my second belly button piercing done tomorrow. We'll see how this turns out. All I have to say-wait for your parents. Eventually they'll come around. I had to bribe mine to take out 7 of my 10 earrings. I don't plan on taking them out at all, but they can think that. Don't attempt to pierce yourself, you'll just get infected. Just leave it alone.