Is it normal for cartilage piercings to hurt

Rook piercings can be pretty painful. Cartilage piercings can have major differences in pain level and healing time.

Your piercer will use a needle to puncture the rook. During and after the puncture, you can expect to feel sharp pain and pressure. After an hour or two, the sharp pain will transition into a more general throbbing. This intense throbbing pain will last for at least a few days before easing up. You can expect to have some difficulty sleeping the first few nights. The pain may wake you up when you roll over onto the affected side. If you have had other cartilage piercings, you can expect the rook piercing to be on par with those.

The rook is a bit thicker than other places, so it might take a bit longer to heal. Your earlobes are made up of soft vascular tissue, which means they have normal blood flow to help with healing.

Rook piercings are particularly slow to heal. It will take between 3 and 10 months for it to heal completely.

It may remain tender throughout this time, especially if it gets infected. According to research, about 32 percent of cartilage piercings get infected at some point. An infected ear can be extremely painful and may require antibiotics. The rook piercing procedure starts with finding a reputable piercer who maintains a sterile piercing environment. Ear size and shape varies from person to person. She discourages rotating or wiggling the jewelry as the only thing that excess movement accomplishes is tearing the fragile tissue.

So as long as you take heed of Ashley's advice and look after your new cartilage piercing , it should be healed and pain-free in no time! By Phoebe Avison. As the bead screws off, I can replace it with another bead of a different colour if necessary, though I would wait a while to do that as it would irritate the area. While the piercing is fresh, I am clipping my hair back on one side with hair pins behind the ear, to keep the hair out of the way and show it off.

A Helix will take a long time to heal, and you will not want sleep on it for some time. Personally, I like the asymmetrical look, but if you intend to get both ears done to match, I recommend doing one at a time and not doing the other side until the first one is as healed as possible. Multiple piercings up one ear can look great, but again I would personally recommend playing it safe by doing one at a time, and letting each heal before getting another, so you can get a handle on any swelling or other issues that may arise for you.

Keep your piercing clean, always clean your hands before touching it, use only clean pillows and bed linen, and do not use any cosmetics or makeup on the area of your piercings under any circumstances. Expect some redness and localised swelling. This will pass. Cleanliness is key, and as with everything else, clean living will also help your healing time and general health. Salt or saline baths are generally agreed to be the best tried and tested technique for keeping piercings clean.

Most piercers will recommend soaking your piercing in this way every day while it heals. It is not recommended that you use drying or harsh cleaners like peroxide, alcohol, etc. To make a salt bath: boil water and pour it into a small bowl or wide mouthed mug, and stir in one tablespoon of salt. I have been using pure rock salt. I test with my finger, or even my other ear to make sure it is comfortable enough. Once it is a good temperature, dip your piercing into the water and keep it there for 2 minutes.

For me that involves resting my right ear into the water and waiting patiently for the 2 minutes to pass. You may feel it sting very gently in the piercing after about a minute. Have a towel on hand as the hair around your ear will be soaking wet. I bought a saline spray for piercings as a back up because of my frequent travel for work, and though it was probably better than nothing I found that it did little.

Have 2 salt baths a day for the first month if at all possible. If your piercing takes a turn and starts to swell again and feel hot some of which is to be expected initially salt baths will likely again help. Here is an image of my piercing looking a bit red, and swelling up across the outer ear around day 4. Some piercers swear by it The Piercing Bible , among others, calls it a miracle product for healing new or troubled piercings.

It should not have a smell. The oil will soak into the skin and lubricate the piercing wound, helping the healing process. I use a small amount twice a day. It is not appropriate for vegetarians. If you know of a safe vegetarian alternative, please let me know in the comments.

Avoid tight necklines that will pull on your ear. Avoid swimming in pools. Avoid submerging your piercing in a bath as baths can harbour bacteria Showers are preferred. Avoid sleeping on top of your new piercing. Avoid playing with it or touching it except when cleaning. Protect your new piercing from being bumped against because trust me, it hurts.

Cartilage ear piercings may take up to a year to fully heal, but generally take months as opposed to the ear lobe, that takes just weeks. They heal from the outside in, so even if it looks fine on the outside, you should not assume it is fully healed. I am thrilled with my piercing so far, and it is healing extremely well. Wish me luck with the ongoing healing process. I hope this info was helpful for those of you who are considering a new piercing or are having troubles with old ones.

Always speak with a professional about your piercings. Check your local listings and ask around. I went to K at Pierced Off and found her to be very professional. Vintage lovers, my vintage dedicated web digs are now live at victorylamour. How long does it take for a helix piercing not to be sore to touch?

Dear Laura Rose, I highly recommend that you wait until after your ski trip to get your piercing, as it will be sore for a six weeks or more when you put pressure on it, like a helmet.

It takes about 6 months to really heal or up to a year for some. For that first of those weeks, and months, sleeping directly on it, or wearing a helmet tightly over it will aggravate the healing and will make it feel sore. Good luck with your piercing! I love mine. Best wishes, Tara. I have been wanting to get a helix piercing for the past few months but I have heard that they are really hard on your ears. I had no idea that there were other methods besides the piercing gun!

That is what they have used on my other three piercings so I will have to look into the sterile needle that you talked about. Hopefully I can do the right research and find a great professional to do the job for me. Thanks for sharing this information! Great article. I have a double forward helix and whilst I love it has given me trouble since I had it done…3 years ago! As I have small ears the first piercing which sits in the fold of skin, that joins the top of my ear to my head, refuses to heal fully.

I always go back to the salt baths which does calm it down. My little bit of Middle aged rebellion! If the pain is very bad you may wish to have it examined by your doctor. Cartilage piercings have been extremely popular for many years, and they give the option to customize your look depending on how many piercings you get and where you place them.

They can be symmetrical with the same number on each ear, or you can just get one ear decorated and still look great. However, cartilage is thick and tough tissue so there will be some pain and discomfort. There are also two different types of cartilage piercings. The piercing most often referred to as a cartilage piercing is situated on the upper ear.

You can get many different areas of the ear pierced, and almost all of them, with the exception of the lobes, contain cartilage. However, the nose also contains cartilage, so you can get a cartilage piercing through the nose septum, or through the tip of the nose as well.

The thing to remember about any piercing is that the initial pain is over fairly quickly. The pain will likely feel sharp and intense, but only for a tiny second or two.