What is normal?
Some bleeding, scabbing, and localized bruising for the first few days.
After a few weeks, drainage in small amounts, such as a whitish-yellow fluid (not pus) that will form crust on the jewelry when it dries.
Red, tender, achy, itchy, crusty, drainage, swelling, soreness, and occasional piercing bumps are all possible side effects while you are healing, and are not unusual in moderation. If you are experiencing any of these side effects for a duration exceeding a week at a time, or any of them seem extreme for any amount of time, please come by for an evaluation.
Your piercing will feel healed far before it is truly finished. A healed piercing has fully matured scar tissue throughout the entire piercing channel. Keep up on daily cleanings for the full recommended healing time to prevent backsliding in your healing.
Even after fully healing, body oils and skin cells can accumulate into a normal but smelly white secretion that should be cleaned regularly. Tissues may tighten around jewelry, limiting movement.
Don’t hang charms, chains, or wear heavy/large jewelry in your piercing until it is fully healed. It can cause excess scar tissue build up, migration, and rejection in your piercing. If you would like to wear heavy or large jewelry after your piercing is fully healed, ensure the gauge is thick enough to support the weight in a healthy way.
Avoid submerging your healing piercing in bodies of water like lakes, oceans, pools, rivers, hot tubs, baths, ect for the first 3 months. Showers are just fine though!
Swelling management for all piercings:
Ice is a wonderful way to help your piercing heal its best! An ice compress used for 10 minutes on and 50 minutes off can help with initial swelling for the first 1-2 weeks. Please always use clean hands when making and using ice.
Soak Q-tips, cotton balls, and cotton cosmetic pads in water, shake em out a little bit, and store them in a plastic bag in the freezer. Snap a few off to ice your piercing, then dispose of them.
Be gentle! Don’t distort your jewelry or put too much pressure on the fresh piercing.
To get the benefits of icing your piercing without ever touching it, ice the area around your jewelry. This can be helpful if your piercing is grumpy or tender.
Ice as often as you’d like, always keeping at least 50 min between each icing sessions.
If you are medically able, an over the counter NSAID medicine (Advil/ibuprofin) taken according to package directions helps alleviate swelling and discomfort.
Avoid putting pressure on your piercing site for the first half of your healing period, at least. If you can avoid it for the full healing period, even better! This includes sleeping on it and wearing constrictive clothing/headbands.
Stay hydrated, get good rest, and eat a nutritious diet to keep your body at it’s maximum healing potential.
Piercing Bumps
Piercing bumps, commonly misidentified as keloids, are the most common troubleshooting issue we help people with. They typically come up in response to damage, pressure, cleaning too aggressively or with a harsh product, or being pierced at the wrong angle. They can vary in appearance, but typically present as a raised area looking almost like a pimple that is off white or pinkish in color. They can be to the side of a piercing, or around the whole site itself.
If you have a memory of something snagging or hitting your piercing site, you know you sleep with pressure on it, or you know something that could cause your piercing site aggravation, that is quite possibly what set off the bump. Sometimes there is no memory of what could have caused the aggravation. When a piercing site is damaged, the body floods the area with fluid and soft tissues to try and protect the delicate healing tissues. You may want to scrub at them, use harsh cleaners, or try to pop them to get them to go away more quickly, but you’ll find that just makes the problem worse. The more a piercing bump is touched and aggravated, the longer it takes to heal.
The best route of aftercare for a piercing bump is generally to touch your piercing site as little as possible. Concentrate on using warm water flushes daily to clean your piercing, and avoid touching your piercing with anything, including Q-tips. Avoid any further injuries to the area. Do not scrub at it, or use anything more harsh than sterile saline to clean it. Give it time, patience, and some loving care.
Bumps can be frustrating because it seems like they come up overnight, and can take weeks or months to go away entirely. Like most things in life, the earlier a problem gets dealt with, the easier it is to solve. Bumps can grow and shrink as they heal, but the general trajectory should always be that they are tending to get smaller over time. If that is not the case, please come by for an evaluation.
If the bump persists longer than a week, it continues to get bigger, or you are concerned at all, please come by for an evaluation. We will be happy to give you more personalized aftercare.