How getting pierced changed my life for the better

[tallandsweet]

I went home over the holidays and while is was there I decided to get a helix piercing.

Here’s the thing – I had been dying to get one for at least 7 years but my parents had always told me it would only happen once I was legally an adult (=18 where I live).

However, when I turned 18, I was close to completing school and too worried about any pain associated with the healing process which would impact my ability to think.

I was running errands in the city a few weeks ago when I saw a piercer that was open – I had checked them out online a year ago or so and had decided that this was probably my best option in the area.

I was in the middle of recording a voice message for my boyfriend when I saw it and just said „hey, I see there’s a piercing studio that’s currently open – I’ll go in there now and may get pierced right away. Just wanted to let you know.“, put my phone away, went in there and paid for it upfront, got the piercing and went home.

[Photo by Kilian Seiler on Unsplash]

I was in very good hands, they followed all rules the government had inflicted on them due to the SARS-CoV-2 pandemic.

The only thing that worried me were my parents as they tend to be a little conservative with these things, but they handled it very well, we had a good laugh at me deciding to get it „just like that“ – all I did was seize an opportunity.

I love how the piercing looks. It doesn’t hurt. I haven’t experienced any pain at all after getting it – getting it only hurt for a minute or so and after the first day, my ear was completely fine.

It’s only uncomfortable when I touch it – I was advised to steer clear of my ear and that’s what I’ve been doing.

Getting my ear pierced has given me way more confidence, it showed me that I can turn 2020 into an even better year for me than it already is and that when I want something, I’ll eventually get it.

Here’s what I took away for myself:

• Don’t listen to what others say all the time. It’s good to know what you’re getting yourself into (e.g. most people I talked to couldn’t sleep on the side they got their helix on for 6 months or longer), but don’t let other’s opinions stop you.
• Do what feels right for YOU.
• Don’t be afraid all the time – I know firsthand that parents can be a little intimidating at times, but in the end, once you’re legally an adult, they’ll have to accept your choices. Also, they may not even be soooo against the things they didn’t want you to do when you were younger (e.g. drinking) as most parents eventually realise that they should accept you’re old enough to make your own choices now.
• Love yourself!

Did any of you experience a similar epiphany when they got pierced/tattooed/changed something about themselves?

[Ozanne]

I get it.. you did something permanent to your body and it's sort of a rite of passage. I've been tattooed and pierced myself, and felt that each time I was, it was sort of empowering, being aware of my body. (Today, I forget I actually have them.)

I so badly wanted my upper lip pierced about twenty years ago. It was when the lip-piercing trend first sort of came out. That was.. until I saw a girl who had hers done and the scar it leaves behind. You never actually heal from these piercings if they stay in any length of time. So I would potentially be looking at a hole in my lip forever if I had done it. So.. I chose not to.

Anyway, these permanent things we do to ourselves is a message that says you are committed to a look or a statement you brand on yourself that tells people who you are, whether they ask about it or not. It's your own form of advertisement. You chose it, and you are living with it. I think a lot of people can relate who have been tattooed and pierced, especially for the first time. :)

[tallandsweet]

I have to agree with you. I don't like facial piercings either because the scars can look truly horrendous and I'm glad my parents always warned me about that :D

[chivesdak]

I'm not nearly as daring as most of the commenters on this post, but I still have a similar experience! This summer, I quite abruptly decided I wanted to get my ears pierced (basic lobe piercings). I've never had the desire because in general, I don't mind what people think of my appearance. I've never tried hard to look fashionable or attractive, and I always felt like earrings were a piece of jewelry solely for the purpose of looking nice. However, I've always had a very unconventional fashion sense and I think of it as a form of self-expression.

I came to realize that earrings can be fun and expressive as much as they can be used for beauty. Now I have a collection of earrings ranging from bold and dangly recycling symbols to frying pans to cockroaches. None are normal, none make me feel any less myself, and all of them bring a smile to my face when I shake my head and hear them jingle.

I'm currently wearing zipper head earrings.

[Miristheiss]

What a load of idiotic, pretentious crap.
This messed up generation... those from the last 25 years or so that are obsessed with this jungle, head hunter crap from island savages. Getting tattoos and piercings.
People lived for thousands of years without face mutilations and permanent ink pictures needled into their flesh and it wasn't until the "monkey see, monkey do" youth of last few years came along and made it to where almost everyone must get a tattoo and piercing... just because.

"Oh it is so meaningful... I have confidence... it looks so much better than a natural human being".

LOL, your life is "better"... you now have "confidence".

What a load of stupid BS.
You are just a weak follower.
Suddenly every twit between 17-25 has come along and started getting all of this horrendously ugly crap the last decade or 2 and every follower, sheep, pleb just can't help but run out and mark their bodies for life at the wise age of 21 because they think they'll be one of the cool kids.

[__inkRat]

And this idiotic "Guru" think he knows all there is to know about body arts. Phe learn something before making some statements boy. Humans have used body arts, tattoos, piercings and scaring long before common era. that includes face tattoos, face paints, piercings, bone troughts nose, face scaring, entire body tattoos and scaring, stretched necks, huge lips, stretched ears you name it, some culture have done it as body art. In fact you will be hard pressed to find any old culture that didn't have some form of body art.

Wana be natural, go and live in trees, you over grown baboon.

[Miristheiss]

@__inkRat
That was as stupid as OP's post.
The fellow sheep of the generation post 95ish that is super obsessed with tattoos and piercing... proclaiming how all the crazy tattooing and piercing that has happened in the last 20 or so years... is normal and right.

You are a sheep too. Your pro ink scar and mutilation stance is just drivel just like the OPs.

[Miristheiss]

LOL!!!
"INK RAT" with a name like that... OF COURSE you are one of the poster children of the tattoo sheep craze of the last 20 years.

Jungle, head hunter savage markings and ways are your ways.

Only the youth of the last 20 years were hip and wise enough to discover scar yourself for life is the way to go.

YAWN.
Go away sheep.

[__inkRat]

Hah that all you can say? I sugest you to try it in Japan, in most of Africa, Poynesia and to tribes in Amazon, or better at try same bull crap at north sentinel island and see if you stay alive for long. Wana be tough, be tough on people who care about body art and whos culture consist of it, else your just sick keyboard warrior.

Ps. Are you NEET?

[bamesjond0069]

Its confidence in objectifying your body. Why do you want people to see you as your body and not for you as a person?

Confidence in good things is good, confidence in bad things is bad. Like would you be proud to be confident in your ability to shoot heroin? What about being a prostitute? There are certainly ones that are more successful at it than others. Would you be proud and confident about how many johns you can please in a day? Shit you could be the best! wouldn't you feel really confident then? Shit do that and tell your parents. You would be super confident then!

What you did is not that but its a small step down that road. But ALL people who are proud losers proud evil people take that first baby step to get there.

[Boredandtired]

Wtf she’s just sharing it and just because she got a piercing doesn’t mean she’s going down that road so I’m sorry if you have some personal issues with yourself going down that path or using the girls do just fit your own personal gain but don’t take it out on her and hate to break it to you but that you can’t be a real man and accept that not all women are perfectly happy with themselves and if something helps then why not just let it be also funny how you assumed she wasn’t already confident in herself this just added to it

[bamesjond0069]

@Boredandtired ok so she's confident in being objectified. Cool. Sounds really 👍. Men will be happy to treat her like that.

[Ozanne]

Such an unnecessary, mean comment.

[tallandsweet]

@Boredandtired Yup to all points you addressed.

I have yet to meet a young woman my age that is fully content with her body. Getting this tiny piercing was a small step for me to make decisions that are good for myself.
It's also lightened my mood to a great extent and this is definitely worth mentioning.

Not every myTake you, @bamesjond0069 , read, will resonate with you. That's just how it is.
I'm confident in being objectified because I've been exploited by men your age, younger and older all throughout my teenage years.
Imagine how damaging hearing that you're a horrible person because you fell in love with one of them from your best friend can be.
Imagine how much someone you loved dearly can hurt you when you feel horrible about your body and they know your weaknesses in this sense.
Don't judge me, you don't know what I've endured. You don't know what I went through to feel good enough about my face and ears to get that piercing.

Maybe it sounds ridiculous to you, but being young nowadays in an oversexualised society where women are treated as interchangeable accessories instead of the good people most of them are is hard.

[tallandsweet]

I've written plenty of myTakes where I talked about how I feel about my body and my overall confidence.
I've had a very disturbed relationship with food for nine years now. I've had extreme lows for six years. Crawling out of these holes is hard, especially when you have people in your life that push you back into whatever hole you're in.
A teacher of mine fell in love with me. When I asked him for advice on stopping to cut myself (after I had already done it for 2 years and realised I needed help to stop (nope, this wasn't an attention thing, in fact, nobody noticed)), he told me I was fine.
He, like you, had the audacity to decide how I should feel according to his little universe.
You're correct, I'm not confident. Yet. But how do you expect someone who has scars and stretch marks all over their body to feel good about themselves if that's not what I see in my day to day?
I understand that my scars may make people feel uncomfortable, which is why I usually cover them up.
This piercing is the first time I inflicted pain on myself without it being to hurt me, but rather to fulfill a positive and non-damaging wish of mine.
If you hate piercings that much, that's fine. I never objectified myself in this post though, that was all you.

[bamesjond0069]

How are you expected to be confident in yourself from ANY of the things you mentioned? Confidence is earned through positive pursuit and experience.

Do you have any skills? Get some.
Do you take care of your body? Keep it healthy.
Do you posses valuable wisdom? Learn something.

This is how you get confident. Your body is how you lose confidence. You dont realize what you feel from that piercing is fleeting and fake and will disappear leaving you to chase that high again but how will you satisfy the urge next time? This is the path im talking about.

Do something fun and productive and get some actual self esteem.

[Kaazsz]

I have a pierced ear lol. Back in high school all the hood rats had at least one pierced ear, sometimes
Both, and we wore big fake diamonds in them like rappers do lol. This was like...18 years ago I guess god damn how time flies.


I plan to get some tattoos. I’ve held off for years because I want them done by someone who is legitimately amazing tattoo artist. Also for years I couldn’t think of what I wanted but now I have it all figured out. Hopefully when covid is over I can get started on the ones I want.


Never listen to what other people think unless you choose to hear that persons opinion because you think it’s beneficial to you. It’s your fuckin life not theirs. Only you can live your life, they can’t live it for you. And you can’t live their life for them.

[tallandsweet]

Thank you for sharing this.
I didn't expect to get as much negative backlash for this as I did, so hearing someone who understands me express their opinion is nice :)

Loving yourself is hard. It genuinely is. Society changed a lot in those 18-20 years and I didn't get my ear pierced because it is trendy. I genuinely did this because it was what I wanted.
Thanks again!

[utterlyconfused11]

I did expirience something similar. growing up I had a lot of self confidence issues but I had always wanted to get my ears pierced, I just never had the balls to do it. well one day I decided fuck it and went to the tattoo parlor and got my ears pierced. now I was super self conscious still and when I went to class the next day the best possible thing that could've happened happened, nobody cared. and when they did it was only my friends who gave me compliments. that's they day that I started to be less self conscious

[tallandsweet]

That's amazing! Congrats :)

[TsundereMatrix]

Same happened with me. For years I’ve been wanting my belly button pierced but my parents told me to wait until I was 18. So I just talked to friends at my high school who had it done and got good information and a recommendation where to go. The place I went to was very good. Not much pain or infection. My mom was okay with it and she went with me but my dad wasn’t a fan but he didn’t say much because I was 18 and free to do what I want.

[tallandsweet]

Thanks for sharing your positive experience!

[Screenwriter]

I have a tiny little tattoo on my back above my hip bone. It is a Celtic symbol with "Always a Warrior" tattooed right below the symbol. It is the only tattoo I have and the only one I'm ever going to have. It's my motto and reminds me, when I think of it being back there, that life has difficulties and you have to meet them head on regularly.

So, I like the idea of it. It's small and modest, but the words are giant in their scope.

[offendedsorbet]

Got a double helix couple weeks ago. It's not that you can't sleep on that side it's that you shouldn't for a while. Sleeping on the piercing can irritate it making it harder to heal. They were my 8th and 9th piercings.

[tallandsweet]

Thanks for sharing!
I bet it looks beautiful :)

[nodnol32]

Glad to hear about your experience. Pleased for you that it went well and you're channelling it inti something positive (confidence as you mentioned). Hope you're having a great time during the holidays :)

[tallandsweet]

Thank you!

[monkeynutts]

Cool, no pain no gain.
Its an ancient rite of passage. It’s good that people realise how important initiation is. The human drive to triumph over difficult life situations, you either get it or sadly many don’t.

[tallandsweet]

Agreed :)
It was a nice symbol of saying goodbye to a lot of bad feelings. Because I had planned it for as long as I had, it meant a lot to me and helped me let go of some bullsh*t I had been dealing with.
Not that I needed it, but it was a genuinely good experience for me.

[monkeynutts]

It’s awesome. Glad that you have had such a positive experience.

[Likes2drive]

I guess it was a big step for you doing something that you needed to be old enough to do, hopefully you will have bigger milestones in the future to give you even more confidence and accomplishment

[tallandsweet]

Thank you very much!

[douchecannoue]

The only piercing I got is my left nipple and I totally regret not doing them both at same time cus now I need to go get the other nipple done but I know how much it sux to heal that lmfao ah well I'll get round to it

[tallandsweet]

LOL :D
That's relatable. Getting them both done could technically overwhelm people with sensitive nipples though, right? I know a number of people who didn't go through with getting both of their nipples pierced after the piercer was done with the first one xD

[douchecannoue]

Well it definitely hurt... never considerd I might have sensative nips lol how do I tell?

[tallandsweet]

Agreed, it's quite difficult to know LOL :D

[douchecannoue]

But I've decided getting 1st tattoo and 2nd nipple pierced after covid... like my own painfull treat lmao

[tallandsweet]

Happy for you!

[Anonymous]

I’ve got a few piercings including my helix that I got done before I was 15 my parents weren’t strict when it came to piercings so it was no big deal for them but getting my helix pierced I was able to sleep on it the same night it was pierced did it hurt nope I still have the piercing to this day but over time that feeling you are currently feeling will eventually wear off

[tallandsweet]

Nice :)
Thanks for sharing your experience!

[Anonymous]

this is the most basic bitch thing I've ever read. What the hell does a piece of metal through your ear have to do with confidence? Real confidence comes from within, anything else is a crutch. I mean it's your body do what you want but this take is so dumb.

[Opinion Owner]

like if you love yourself, why do you need a piercing? Do you love yourself, or do you love yourself only if you have a piercing? Lol

[tallandsweet]

Thank you for expressing your opinion on this.
I don't love myself only if I have a piercing. Getting this done made me realise how cute my ears are though.
This will stay if I decide to take the piercing out later. I am covered in scars. Adding one that I consider to be beautiful helped me accept the others.
However, this is something most people probably won't understand and I am aware of this. Also, again, if I get rid of the piercing, me feeling just a little better about my body will stay.

"Real confidence".
I like that.
But I'm a teenager and being confident from within with as much acne and ugly body features as I have is hard.
I anonymously posted a picture of my body on here a while ago and was terribly insulted by users I had initially liked. This did NOT make me feel worse about my body because I was already at my very lowest with this.
by the way - I'm a healthy weight (BMI below 24), but people accused me of not exercising and following an unhealthy diet due to my skin.
You can't be beautiful to everyone at the same time and that's okay.
The older I get, the better I feel about myself.
I don't know if you have kids yourself - if you have a daughter, try telling her "Real confidence comes from within, anything else is a crutch" when she wants to wear makeup to cover up her acne.
Try telling her "this is the most basic bitch thing I've ever heard" when she's on her bed crying her eyes out because she hates her body for no apparent reason.

Things like this aren't always rational.

[Dacianam]

Im happy you felt brave enough to do it. People are so salty in the comments for no reason. My experiences with piercings are similar, my parents are kinda conservative and when I had an opportunity to get one I took it.

[tallandsweet]

I agree - I also didn't expect people to feel so personally attacked about me getting a piercing, LOL.

My parents support most of my decisions, but I don't tell them about all of them right away. I think that's the key :D

[cth96190]

Piercings are self harm, a mutilation.
Piercings scream psychiatric issues.
Seek help. Seriously.

[HungLikeAHorsefly]

Imagine thinking something as banal as a piercing is indicative of mental illness.

[cth96190]

@HungLikeAHorsefly
Imagine knowing so little of mental health and life that the person does not see the obvious.

[HungLikeAHorsefly]

I actually know quite a bit about mental health. Are you a psychologist or something? Or are you just talking shit again?

[tallandsweet]

@HungLikeAHorsefly Maybe it's what his generation genuinely believes.
I don't have psychiatric issues.
I have been getting help for more than 10 years now because I believe even people without pressing psychiatric issues should have an objective space to share their feelings.

[Avicenna]

I’ve never done anything like this, but glad to hear it worked for you

[TallAnon]

For me it's the exact opposite. The need to drink alcohol, smoke, do drugs, get piercings and get tattoo'd are all concepts that I don't need. The fact that I never touched any of that is my kind of rebelling.

[tallandsweet]

I understand this too - I also don't drink, but I will allow myself to when I want to. Just not as excessively as most people my age, I have a deep appreciation for the art that is high quality alcohol because I was lucky to have parents who taught me this.
Smoking, drugs and tattoos aren't for me, but I always liked piercings on a small scale :)
Thanks for sharing!

[Yourfriend2021]

It's not some kind of big deal to get your ears pierced, lots of people do that, good for you :)

[Jjpayne]

Sounds cool 😎 I hope you had fun doing it :)

[tallandsweet]

Yes I did!

[Jjpayne]

Good to hear! 👍

[Bananaman177]

"Getting my ear pierced gave me so much confidence!"

Women, everybody.

[TerminallyChill]

"Winning my first match in Warzone gave me so much confidence"

Men, everybody.

[coolhandroo]

Changed your life huh? I'm guessing your life has not been frought with hardship

[OddBeMe]

I just hope you don’t miss that ear lobe someday...