The Tongue-Web To End The Heartbreak
(First Published on BMEzine.com, Winter 2002)

Alright, background information usually starts off an experience right? Here's mine. I'm 19, I live in Toronto and I am currently going to Ryerson. I also have six other piercings (one septum and the others in my ears) and I'd been looking towards an oral piercing and some tattoos for a long time now. I also have this boy I really like, who told me that if I ever went out with him that I would have to take out my piercings, and if I ever got the venom piercings I wanted, he would never go out with me even if I got them.

So here's the story of me telling him in effect, to fuck off. I wasn't exactly mentally prepared for a double-tongue piercing yet, but I figure that a tongue-web would be something nice and close I could do to tide me over. I'd been inquiring about this piercing since I stretched my earlobes, back in January. At the same time, I also have this assignment where I need to interview someone with a profession I might want to have in the future, and do a formal business report on. So why not interview a piercer? I didn't want to interview a tattoo artist since I don't have any, but I've been pierced, so I know slightly what goes on, and I am so against being "one of everyone else" and do my report and ten minute presentation on a production manager like the other 40 students in my class. I go into Catwalk and ask Dan for the interview, which he totally is up for, and also to get my tongue-web pierced. Then later, I call asking what aftercare stuff I should buy, and so on.

Oh right, the piercing! Well, the aftercare recommended to me was 2/3 water (I used bottled water) 1/3 mouthwash (I used some generic brand from PharmaPlus because it was on sale) and some salt (table salt worked well here) and all this was in just a normal water bottle. So on Friday I planned to have all this done to me, after work of course. I'm all excited at work, bouncing around and such. I get let out early because my boss knew I was going to "poke myself" and I basically jog/walk quickly down to the studio even though I knew Dan would be there for another few hours yet. Get in, I fill out a quick form and flip through some flash tattooing designs while Dan is getting one of the cubicle areas ready. Then I'm called in.

*Insert dramatic theme music here*

I sit down, and am handed a little Dixie cup of Listerine and told to swish about half of it around until told to spit. I'm swishing, I swish and I swish some more. Dan then looks over at my swishing and laughs at me because my eyes are watering and burning from the constant swishing. Probably 30 seconds have passed, although it felt like a LOT longer, and I am told to spit. Phew, that was a great feeling, and even better because everything in my mouth had gone numb. I then get told to open wide, and keep my tongue up and as still as possible, even though that is pretty much impossible. The clamps go on. No one came to help which was odd because everywhere else I went, they said that usually you get someone else to help hold clamps or some even speak of the customer holding it. Dan just let the clamps dangle, and that didn't matter much to me! Back to the piercing, I breath in, needle goes in, I breath out, clamps come off. Jewelry? Oh right, there's just a 14g needle in my mouth so far! I keep leaning my head back and my jaw is getting really tired, so apparently I was making Dan's life very hard. My mouth kept closing by itself while I kept moving away from him, bad idea. But he finally was able to get the ring into the hole and the needle out.

Wait, there's something missing, Clamp, needle, ring, right! There was the ball! After all, this is a CBR that has been inserted into my tongue-web! So more wrestling with my ever-closing jaw and my tiring jaw muscles and my spazzing tongue, the ball is finally inserted and everything's fine. I didn't feel faint at all, or dizzy in the least, even after warning Dan that I might. I basically bounce out of the studio (I paid before the piercing started) and AGAIN forget to tip. I must really learn to do that. Anyways, I go home and am all happy until I realize I don't know how to eat with it in. It's an odd sensation because there's something under my tongue. I make myself some chicken nuggets, and it took me a good 5 minutes to eat one because I was so paranoid that I would rip out the ring. Swish with watered down salty mouthwash and brush teeth. I go to bed.

I'm at work again the next day, showing off to the Saturday manager and the pharmacist and anyone else who's at work. Then because I didn't want to risk anything, I buy a can of Ensure, which is a meal supplement/replacement formula that's kind of like Slim Fast but usually used to make people gain weight instead of lose weight. Anyways, the pharmacist made fun of me because I had "lowered myself" to drinking that and what a bother it must be to have it. Although I'd been playing with it and having a grand old time!

It's now a week later, I've put this ring through burgers, pork chops, chicken wings, chips, everything possible. Everyone at work knows I have it, and I still bug the pharmacist by clicking the ball up against my teeth (Which I worry may be bad because I'm now paranoid about gum & enamel erosion) I also showed my mom, who's totally against piercings, but she seems to take this one better than when she discovered my septum ring. Oh, and the boy that I like? He doesn't seem to care either way, probably because he's got his girlfriend, or he knows the rest of what goes on in my head. Hmm. Go figure. Oh well to that, I got my tongue-web pierced and I'm damn happy. If he's not happy for me, then he can blow himself.

Here's the last thing about all of this, I got the interview with Dan who shared a lot of information with me and he's a very nice guy. Don't hesitate to go to Catwalk (it's on Yonge St.) for a piercing, but make sure you get pierced by Dan! Dan would be the guy with lots of piercings himself, including a (I believe) ¾" tongue. The shop-owner who is really just a business guy also pierces, but he only does it to make money for the shop and he has no piercings himself. So lesson learned, only get pierced by Dan and if he's not in, go back another day when he is in!

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