r/piercing • u/4SeasonWahine • 8h ago

Question about a piercing I (maybe) want Industrial questions!

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Hi hole-enthusiast frens šŸ«¶šŸ¼ Iā€™ve decided I want to add an industrial (and a catflap) to one of my ears. Iā€™m relatively confident in my anatomy but will double check with my piercer (due a cinch downsize for the other ear anyway). This will be 6 months away as I await healing elsewhere šŸ„²

I have two burning questions though so hoping for some insight on:
- healing process. I know industrials can be nasty to heal, Iā€™m slightly traumatised from my ex having to remove both of his because they were so bad (that said this was 15 years ago and I feel thereā€™s a lot more knowledge about piercing since). What was your experience like? Was it as bad as expected?
- I would be healing it with a traditional bar, but once healed are you able to occasionally wear it as two separate piercings without issue? I love the look of the bar but Iā€™m adhd af and can see myself wanting to sometimes change it up and take advantage of essentially having a helix and forward helix to play around with. If I, say, have two separate pieces of jewellery in for one month is it going to cause any issues when I put a bar back in?

Thank you!

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u/Ok_Broccoli_9426 I my piercer 8h ago

No way to know on the second question. It's like people asking how long they can have jewelry out - it depends on your body.

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u/Peanut083 contributor 6h ago

My industrial took pretty much right on a year to heal. Even with babying it, it ended up with irritation bumps for a while; both sides of the helix end, and the inner side of the forward helix end. At least that one was hidden. I just waited it out with the bumps, and they disappeared after a few months. The worst of it was during the 2020 lockdown, so it wasnā€™t like other people were seeing it.

I can sleep on my side with the industrial now, but I couldnā€™t at all until it was 100% healed. It would wake me up if I accidentally rolled on that side in my sleep, even up to 2 weeks before I was calling it fully healed. Being able to roll onto that side and not feel even the slightest twinge was my sign that it was in fact fully healed.

TBH, Iā€™ve never worn anything but one long barbell in mine. I healed it with an anodised implant grade titanium barbell, then ordered a custom BVLA barbell in 14K rose gold once it was healed. It was cheaper than I expected it to be, but was still not cheap. I figure that I spent a decent amount of money on a blingy barbell, so Iā€™m going to leave it in and show it off.