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All About My Septum

amberwallace0520
Mar 27, 2018
10 min read

All You Need to Know About My Septum Piercing

In recent years, septum piercings (and the jewelry) have really gone from the realm of Emo/Punk/ rebel without a cause to a more mainstream hipster bohemian trend. Although they are still not particularly common. If you are a college student, your perception of their prevalence in the world is probably slightly skewed. Two semesters ago there were about 7 girls in a class of about 12 students that had a septum piercing, including myself. But if you venture into the real world the prevalence steadily decreases as you get further and further from population centers until you get to a pretty rural small town like where I grew up. The place where I get looks, like I grew a second head and if I could read minds I know they would all be thinking, “Yer not from aroun’ here are ya?” Unfortunately not everyone in the world has moved passed the perceptions based solely on appearance.

So, first things first, if you are under the age of 18 and you are hoping that you will find answered here, “How do I convince the rents to let me get my septum pierced?” I cannot help you. I was very much an adult when I made the choice to have a professional stick a piece of metal through my nose. Or any needles in my body for that matter. Any “permanent” body mods that I asked for when I was a teen I was denied. With the exception of my two cartilage piercings I had done at Claire’s. I guess mom thought it was mainstream, and safe, although when we learned better later, she felt guilty for letting me. But I have no idea why she would let me do that in 8th grade but not let me get my tragus or an industrial piercing when I was in high school. Parent Logic.

Another question you might ask is, “ Were your parents okay with it?” Well, yes and no. The great thing about my mom was even if she didn’t like the look of something she acknowledged that she and I had differing standards of beauty and that it wasn’t her nose it was mine and if I wanted to stick metal though it I could. I was an adult and it was more important to her to have a relationship than to push me away by getting cranky about something so trivial. She was never hostile about it, I think my septum even started to grow in her when she said she liked the purple pincher she had got me for Christmas. As for my father? He doesn’t know. He’s not going to know. The fight that would ensue is not worth it. There is absolutely nothing to gain by fighting that fight. It’s easier to just flip it up while I’m around him. I guess one thing I have learned as I got older was to choose my battles.

Why? Why did I decided to get it done? Well… I guess it started with me seeing all of these beautiful people on campus at OSU and on tumblr and Instagram and pinterest and I was like wow that jewelry is beautiful I want to put that in my face. My septum piercing is my one and only facial piercing because I was kind of nervous about scarring and there was never really a facial piercing that I kept obsessing over. I knew it was easy to hide. I bounced back and forth when I was trying to decided for a couple of weeks. But in reality it really was a spur of the moment thing. It wasn’t something I was longing for, for a while. I just wanted it and I thought if not now, when?

How did I prepare? I watched A LOT of youtube videos including The Modified World: Septum Piercing Essentials .Which is very informative and helpful. I watched other videos from those who had their septums pierced and the tales of how they were the most painful piercing or the least painful. So I walked in assuming it was going to be quite painful. So I recommend doing your research even if it is a more spur of the moment sort of a thing.

So, not all piercing shops and piercers are created equal. You need to know the hacks from the well trained professionals, to find one in your area check out the Association of Professional Pierces website . You can also creep facebook pages of the place you are considering read the reviews and look that the albums of the pierces and not just for fresh piercings they should have photos of their healed work that tells you a lot.

Number one rule with all body modifications from tattoos to boob jobs you get what you pay for. If you go to Mexico for it know that there are risks with going to an unqualified piercer for any piercing but I think it is extra true with septum piercings. First of all placement is so important with this. I feel like everyone says, “ Your septum should be pierced though sweet spot.” The sweet spot being the thin bit of skin NOT cartilage in the front of you nose. But it seems all too often that you hear about people who have these awful experience about have a needle shoved through their cartilage. Which I don’t understand because if you can learn that’s wrong by just watching youtube videos how do hack pierces not know that’s wrong and know to look for the skin? It’s also important to have the piercing oriented correctly, it needs to be level on 3 different axes: left to right front to back and up and down, so there are a lot of things that could go wrong. And If you are like me my septum is deviated and he had to pierce it to compensate for that. So do yourself a favor got to a legit place, don’t go to the place where its 25 bucks with a mystery metal piece of jewelry. And that’s not even going into proper sanitation and sterilization. If you go to a place and they don’t open new tools ect. do NOT get pierced there. If there is anything that makes you question their cleanliness don’t get pierced there. If you ask a question and they don’t answer in way that satisfies you or seem shady or in any way cause your spidey senses to tingle leave and do not get pierced there. Don’t let them bully you into it. If they are an upstanding establishment, they should should be happy to answer questions and make you feel 100% comfortable.

When? September 2015. The specific day I do not recall but I know it was a Thursday because that’s the buy one get one at the place I go. I however did not get a second free piercing.

Where? Evolved Body Art, Columbus, Ohio. It was at their old location on N. High Street right across from The Ohio State University. I have subsequently been to one of their new locations, the one on Summit Street. It’s much larger but still super nice and the staff is fantastic and friendly. I would recommend them to anyone. My piercer was Jared Anderson . and he was fantastic. He’s done my septum, my second set of lobe piercings and my conch.

Price? I believe that it was $60 without a jewelry upgrade. I think they have changed how they price things out now. I think now they have a lower set price for the piercing then you buy the jewelry separate.

Experience? After having done my due diligence I made plans to go to a place from what I gathered was the best place in the area. What made me come to this conclusion? Their basic jewelry was titanium which is lighter than steel but it also won’t cause irritation or reaction from what might be in the alloy of another metal like. The Jewelry is also internally threaded which is another attribute of quality jewelry. The threading on externally threaded jewelry has to go through the piecing and may cause damage.

It was a Thursday and on Thursday they have bogo piercing so being across from one of the biggest university’s in the country it was going to be kind of busy. As soon as I walked in the door the young woman working the counter who was with another customer at the time looked up and said, “ Hi, welcome to Evolved. I’ll be with you in a moment until then feel free to look around.” So right off the bat there was great customer service. I felt welcomed in and not intimidated. To me that’s kind of a big deal I’ve been to places where those who don’t have a large number of body mods kind of felt out of the club, the boyfriend who has no tattoos or piercings agreed with me on this.

So I filled out my paper work they copied my id. The girl at the counter showed me my jewelry options told me prices for up grading the jewelry. Their basic jewelry is the circular barbell or “horseshoe” just watch this. They also had retainers which are simple ben pieces that do not have ends to keep it in your face they depend in the bent shape of the metal to prevent it falling out. I chose the basic titanium circular barbell. After all the “I”s were dotted we sat down and waited to be called kind of like you do at the doctors office including the anxiety. It was busy but my wait was only about a half hour my piercer introduced him self. On the way back to his cubical he asked if I would need to flip it up and I said, “Eventually,” and he said that he would bed it to make sure I would be able to do that.

We get to his cubical I sit down on the table again not unlike what would be found in a doctors office. We chatted about me attending OSU and this and that while he cleaned my nose and opened the needles and that jazz. He had me lay down when my head kind of hanging off the end. He felt around to find my sweet spot and told me that I had a deviated septum but it shouldn’t be an issue. I don’t think I remember him make any marks on my nose but he might have. But he lined up without using a clamp he had me do the breathing thing to prepare me to stick the needle through. I was expecting it to be pretty painful but it wasn’t but it did feel like it was tough getting through my nose Adam said it didn’t look like that from his angle. My right eye did water a little that’s just a natural reaction by your body I didn’t wear mascara for that reason. He pushed the jewelry through and screwed on the ball. My nose felt tight but not painful. He asked me if I felt alright and if I felt light headed or anything and he said if I didn’t I could go ahead a sit up and he would clean me up and that was that. I went out a paid got my after care info and all that. And Remember to always tip your piercer!

Initial Jewelry? 14 gage 5/16 titanium internally threaded circular barbell

Pain? This is the most asked question but also the hardest to answer. Everyone experiences things differently. I expected it to hurt worse than it did. There are a million and one things that hurt worse than getting a piercing like a paper cut. If you go to a good reputable piercer who is piercing in the right place the pain is something you can deal with. Don’t let the fear of pain stop you from getting a piercing that you want. But do you know what does hurt on a septum piercing? Crusties getting pushed in to the hole. It is literally like glass shards being pushed into it. I had cried from it and wished I was dead! Do you know what else hurts? When you punch yourself in the nose trying to pull your blanket at night, or when your pulling on a hoodie. I guess I never knew how much I accidently hit my face until I got my septum pierced.

Healing? I make a sea salt solution. Mix a bit of sea salt, with no additives. That’s important you don’t want table salt because that has iodine and anti-clumping agents in it. Make the solution about as salty as a tear. ¼ Teaspoon for 1 cup of water. Since it was my nose I didn’t want to sit with my nose in a cup of water so with clean hands I soaked cotton balls and stuck them up my nose for 5 min twice a day. More frequent clean can do harm to the new piercing. But I did carry spray solution with me and some q-tips. I did this if I hit my piercing or accidentally touched it with unwashed hands. A few days after I got the piercing I went to the county fair and I gave my nose a spritz after we walked through the animal barns. My after care paper work told me it should take 6 to 8 weeks that’s similar to ear lobe piercings since it is just going through skin not cartilage. I think mine took a bit longer to heal.

Can you still blow your nose? Yes, but when its still fresh it awkward since you need to be gentle with it. But once it’s healed it find.

Can you still pick your nose? Again once it’s healed its easier. But since the salt was drying my sinuses I would get boogers stuck to the side of my nose so I had use tweezers to get them off. Sorry, just trying to be as honest a possible.

Cold weather? So my nose always gets cold but my septum has made it worse so when I know I will be out ide for a while I flip it up so the metal doesnt get cold and exacerbate the nose freezing issue.

Rude People? No one has been rude to me to my face about it, like I have heard many people complain about. I kind of embraced the bull thing though. I’m a Taurus and I went as Ferdinand the bull the Halloween after I got my septum pierced. I haven’t had anyone come up to me and say something along the lines of, “ Why would you do that to your face?” but if they did I would respond with something like, “ To piss people like you off.” Seriously, if someone makes a disparaging comment to you about it especially if they are a stranger look them in the eye and tell them to fuck off. It’s your body you can do what you want.

Smell? So you hear a lot about septum funk. Yes they can smell but each person's body is different so it can vary a lot. The smell is dread skin cells that have become trapped in the fistula. But when I wear my rose gold Maria Tash clicker for a few days my nose smells like road kill, so even the metal has something to do with it. But no one else can smell and as long as you practice good hygiene its not really a big deal.