I've just recently gotten into body modification and am amazed at how beautiful peircings can be! For my 20th birthday back in October, I wanted to celebrate by adding an 8th hole to my body. I decided an inverse navel it was! My piercer, Eric, was totally excited about doing my inverse. He said I had a perfect hood for a traditional navel piercing, but agreed that an inverse would look just loverly. I signed all my release papers, paid my dues, and off we went! For support, I had about 6 of my friends with me but for safety reasons they had to stay out in the main lobby of the studio. :(
At A Glance Author PuckrUpNkissMoi Contact PuckrUpNkissMoi@bme.anon When A week ago Artist Brian (pierced by Eric) Studio Mind Altering Tattoos Location La Crosse, WI I headed back to the piercing room and stripped. Eric cleaned me up and took out a special "Mind Altering Tattoo's" pen to mark me for the piercing. I was really excited at this point. I think the fact that even he thought it was going to look beautiful got me going even more. After careful inspection to make sure the markings were at the right spot and lined up straight, I layed down to take the pain! He had a hellofa time clamping my navel since there isn't much skin to grab onto down there. Since the clamp was on so tight, I was almost dreading the needle as I added up the sum of pain I was about to feel. Once he got it in the right spot, I actually had to hold onto the clamp while he grabbed the needle and poked. Surprise surprise, it didn't hurt one bit! The clamp was on so tight that i had little red circles around my new steel balls (later that week scabs appeared to join the party). My inverse navel took that piercing like a champ! Beyond a little soreness here and there and being fussy when I ran, I had zero problems. It even put up with a night of partying without anything so much as a twinge of pain. Happy Birthday to ME! :)
The trouble started about 2 months after the initial piercing. My cross country season had officially ended, so now was my chance to heal this baby up before I started training hardcore again. The top hole had one big mother of a boil on it. After weeks on end of salt soaks, hot compresses, and no improvement, I decided my barbell was too short. I messed around trying to get the barbell to stay in the correct position higher up so the top ball wouldn't rest on the boil, but then appeared a smaller boil on the bottom hole. UGH. Here follows countless weeks of twice daily salt soaks.
About the end of January I decided to start up my weight training, and oh did little inverse navel hate that - especially the ab work! I quit training my abs and decided that I should wait until I could get a flexible barbell in. The end of February rolls around and I notice that the barbell of my piercing is a lot shorter than it used to be. I got a lil nervous but made myself feel better by convincing myself it was because both boils were now gone. Spring break rolls around and I'm off to South Carolina to enjoy the sun and surf! I did remember to bring my nalgene filled with salt solution, but actually remembering to soak my inverse during this fun filled trip was another story. Along with all the dancing and other fun activities I participated in, my inverse navel got very pissed off. While on the road trip back home, I just about cried when I realized that I could no longer deny that my navel was rejecting. BUMMER!!!!!
Tuesday March 22, 2005 is the official date of my inverse's retirement (5 months after initial piercing). It was a necessary thing to be done, but the hole left in my heart and the scar left behind are constant reminders of how much I loved that inverse navel. I held onto that baby as long as I could but it just wasn't meant to be this time around. I plan to get it redone in a few weeks, but with a flexible material and lots of TLC! Eric is such a nice guy that he's even redoing it for free (remind me to kiss his ass lots).
I go back to the studio practically every week to see how everything is healing and how soon I can get it redone. I'm continuing with salt soaks with a few hot compresses just for good measure. I've also added some Mederma into the mix so that when I do finally get it redone, I don't have a nasty, red scar over the top of my new, beautiful redone piercing.
It's amazing how attached a person can get to a simple piece of surgical stainless steel. Let this be a lesson to all to take good care of your piercings!