Piercings. Painful, painful piercings.

[Aimi Kaguya]

So I didn't know where else to put this so it's going here, in the OOC section. Alright, so here's the deal:

I want piercings. I want a lot of piercings. I want a very specific configuration of piercings, and it just so happens that it has to do with this forum's theme a bit. Okay, so you ready for it? Here's the piercings that I want to get:

Holy shit, shocker right? Probably should have been obvious, especially for the especially clever who saw the moderate pun in the title. I'm not sorry.

Now before you jump to conclusions or anything like that, know this: Yes I realize this is a lot of piercings, 19 in fact (Or possibly 22, discussed below) in just the face alone and that this amount of piercings is not exactly going to do me favors in getting a job in certain places. My retort is simple: I am a freak, bite me. (No please don't, I just got out of the hospital and I don't want to go back! DX)

But it doesn't stop there. Oh no. I want the whole fucking package if I'm going to go through with this. I don't mean just the facial piercings - I want the dermals as well. That means the 6 (Three on top and bottom) on each forearm, four on the upper arms, two on the shoulders, four along the collar bone and possibly on the back across the shoulder blades (idk if he has them there or not, need confirmation), 7 across the front under the ribs (and possibly in the back following the same pattern, again not sure if they're actually there or not on the character), six on the thighs and six on the calves.

So now that we've clarified just how much of a freak I want to become, let's talk some technical stuff. I am not entirely sure what all piercings I need to get, nor am I sure about the jewelry that will need to come with it in order to actually make this look both accurate and good. I'm not sure on what type of gauges I'll need for each piercing and in some cases, I'm not entirely sure what kind of jewelry I'll need in the first place. Here's what I do know:

In the face alone, Pain has 19, possibly 22, piercings: 6 rings in each ear for a total of 12 that hug the side of his ear rather than hang down, 2 bars, 1 in each ear, that go from top to bottom. This is called an industrial piercing, less commonly refereed to as a vertical scaffold. He has 2 vampire bites, not snake bites. Snake bites are loops that go around the lip as far as I'm aware, his just hang down against the chin. Finally, he may have 3 bars through his nose, or 6 studs, 3 on each side. I'm not entirely sure which and depending on the answer the number of piercings changes from 19 to 22. As for the rest of the piercings, they're all dermals - 22 in the arms, 11 in the torso, 24 in the legs. That's what I know for sure. As previously stated, I'm unsure if the reverse version of his piercings are present on his back or not.

That's a lot of piercings, but there's still a lot of information missing about it all. Such as! What gauge are the piercings in his ears, bars and rings separately? His nose? The gauge of the vampire bites don't matter as much so long as they hang down low enough, but what about the dermals? How are those even measured? In fact, I know very little about dermals except that they're supposed to hurt, they only go through the skin, and they're as permanent as a tattoo will ever be, needing minor surgery to get them removed.

Another question I have about all of this is this: Where would I actually get the jewelry from? I've been to a couple of shops that sell piercings and briefly looked around online, but nothing I've found has really come close to this as far as style and such. In particular, I've not found any sort of ear rings that actually huge your ears but are still as large as the characters' actually is. I'm also fairly certain that on a few of these I'll need to gauge the piercings in order to make it work, a prime example being the industrial bars in the ears (oh yeah, did I mention they have to be 2 and a half inches long? I actually had my ears measured after purchasing a couple of 1 and a half inch bars to figure out the right length. I returned the bars after discovering they were an inch short.), which I'm sure can't be done as thick as to be visible from the front without seriously hurting my ears.

And that's another thing to think about! Medical junk involving these piercings. How do you even clean a dermal piercing? Exactly how much risk is there in putting 3 bars through my nose? (I'm aware that it could fuck up my sinuses if I'm not careful as well as my tear ducts, but then again if they're studs the point is moot) Exactly how many of these piercings could I get at once without putting my body through shock? What's the risk of getting vampire bite style piercings infected just from eating, or can you even eat when you get those piercings?

All these questions and more I need to get answered/think about before going through with this. As of right now I have only 1 piercing which I got recently just to see if I could handle the pain of getting one. I really, really would like to get more but not before finding out all the proper information first. So! To summarize and to put things into a neat little bullet point format:

• Exactly how many piercings would I need to get in total, both facial and dermal?
• What gauge would I need to get these piercings in order to make it look right? (facial piercings are the main concern right now)
• What information, if any, am I missing about dermal piercings?
• What are the risks of getting all of these piercings to my health and person?
• What are the names of all the piercings I'm getting? (if I messed up any or havn't mentioned some I'd need to know to tell the person piercing me)
• Where would I get the stylized piercings at? (I.E. Would I need to order them online to be custom made or not?)
• How bad is it going to hurt? (Keeping in mind that certain piercings in certain places hurt more than others and depending on what kind of piercings I get, it may affect the amount of pain. I'm fairly certain studs will hurt less than bars)
• Just how crazy am I for wanting to get all this done?
• Why aren't you mimicking a character's jewelry that you enjoy?
• Shut up I'm having fun.
• That was not a question. I should probably stop right now shouldn't I?

Here's hoping for some quick answers soon. Thanks for reading all of this (If you did) and uh oh yeah, calling all members of NFRP who know anything about piercings.

Probably should have put that last sentence up first...

[Nameless]

I don't know exactly how many piercings you'd need to emulate this look, but from the looks of those piercings on the nose I'd say there's only three there. Problem with that is I'm pretty sure there's a bit of anime anatomy going on. In other words, I don't know that your skin could stretch enough to actually gauge your nose to that thickness three times and I'm pretty sure you can't actually pierce the cartilage in your nose. The ears, bites, and dermals are all very possible though. As far as pain, yeah, it's gonna hurt. I also know people that have had dermals catch on things and get ripped out, and from what I understand that's pretty fucking painful.

My best advice is to find a professional piercer who specializes in dermals and bring all of these questions to them. They are there to help, and most of them love modding people and thus love letting people know what they can and can't do. Also, don't be worried about them judging you or anything. In my experience no matter how strange a piercing or tattoo you want the piercer/artist has always seen stranger.

[Aimi Kaguya]

Well you're not wrong as far as anime anatomy goes... sort of. You are correct though, you can't gauge your nose. Fortunately though, I'm fairly certain that the actual size of the bars in that picture are mainly just an artist rendition of the real thing. In reality, you might be able to get a 14 gauge or maybe 16 gauge bar through the nose (Yes you can go through the cartilage. You basically have to hammer and chisel your way through in a single stroke, but yeah you can)which is a pretty small bar as far as thickness goes.

But! Three times over done this way, the small space plus the point of focus makes the bars in your nose look at least a little bigger than they are. Thus while it's not all that big, it sure looks that way. Mind tricks and all that.

I am going to go to a professional at some point very soon with all of these questions, but in the mean time I figured I'd narrow things down as much as I possibly could so that I have a much clearer and more realistic image of what I want in my head so that the piercer/artist can get it done right and properly to my specifications. This is why I'd like to know the general size of each piercing/gauge I'd need to get before hand so that I can basically point and be like "Do that here," and the artist would be like "kay" and we'd be all good to go. Also still don't know how the sizes for dermals work, are they measured in gauges like any other piercing or are they just a one size kind of thing?

[|Ayame Unbound|]

How many you can do in one sitting really depends on you and your body. I've got triple piercings in my ears and to be honest a piercing is worse than a tattoo for me. Its worse than getting punched in the face.

For the love of every god you know do not go to some shitty mall kiosk, or walmart, or something like that. Many tattoo shops offer other services for body mods such as piercings and they'll do them right which will help avoid blow out effects.

For the outside of the ear what you're looking for is a 'huggie' earring. Those are the small little cuffs that wrap it.

Most dermal piercings are anchored which means you cannot change/remove them without having it done professionally.

You could probably avoid gauging by just finding a very large earring/nose ring etc.

[Yahiko]

If at all possible, find a place that exclusively does piercings.

[JiMmIyZ - Hel]

I had 10 piercings at one point. Now only 5. I did most of them myself with a needle.

[Aimi Kaguya]

Well, I actually went to that professional a few days ago and it's, much to my surprise, entirely possible for me to get this entire set of piercings! Worry not Ayame, for this wasn't some mall piercer who was talking with me about this sort of thing. I was invited to his house by him personally so that we could sit down and talk about all of it in as much detail as possible because of the sheer amount of piercings I want. he was very up front and very courteous and I can't wait to start. He also had a lot of cool shit in his house, so I get the feeling by the end of this project he and I are going to be pretty good friends.

Surprisingly, his biggest concern about the set were the nose piercings - specifically the center one because that would have gone through bone for me, which you simply can't do. Fortunately though I apparently have a deceptively spongy nose, so the plan now is to get two bars, one at the top and one at the bottom, and then get two dermal piercings in the middle to make it look like a bar, although I may just get 6 dermals in my nose if it's possible as well and if it'll hurt less. I'm most certainly not looking forward to more or less having to break the end of my nose for that piercing after all...

And Ayame I completely agree, piercings hurt way more than tattoos, or at least that was my experience with the one piercing I got. Obviously it wasn't traumatizingly painful though otherwise I wouldn't want to get even more! (Although some of these are probably really going to hurt...) The way he described the six piercings along the ear was "helix" piercings though. I shall bring up the term huggie next time I see/text him and find out if he's familiar with the term.

We did talk about gauging a bit, and he didn't think I'd need to undergo that process at all for any of the piercings. He talked about using a dermal punch on my ears for the two bars which sounds painful, but should get the job done right on the first try. Aside from the nose piercings, those would basically be the most permanent thing I got since a dermal anchor can be removed with minor surgery. I think that if years and years down the rode I decided I didn't want these piercings anymore, I could live with two non visible holes in my ears a piece.

Jimmy that did not sound safe at all. If you get any more piercings, please go see a professional... unless you are a professional, in which case my guy apparently did a few of his piercings himself as well.

I'm also probably going to learn how to do piercings from this man as well. He said something along the lines of with the sheer amount I was getting I'd have to learn for one reason or another, so that's something if I ever felt the need to pierce myself in the future or someone else. Also my jewelry is apparently going to have to largely be custom made (he also makes custom jewelry. Go figure), which makes me glad really. It means I will have an entirely unique set of piercings designed for me, around me and exactly how I want them to be.

So all in all, the piercing situation is looking good. Now the only thing I need to do is find the time and funds to go through with it all.

Oh and apparently he won't do anymore than 3 piercings in any given area in a day Ayame, but I could potentially get 3 in each ear and 3 dermals on each part of my body if I so chose. So I basically have the option of making it a bit of a slower, drawn out process or a much quicker one.