Alright so this morning my friend pierced my lip. I love it My problem is tomorrow I work, and I know that I can't realistically switch to a retainer until the swelling goes down. I really don't want to fuck up my piercing, is there a way I can make this work? EDIT: This is my very first piercing by the way.
well you probably should have thought of that before you pierced it... if you have a flatback stud in it, you can take the ball off to make it less visible. if its a ring, theres nothing you can do. i mean, you CAN change it if you really want to, but its gonna hurt and swell and get irritated, not to mention be more likely to reject. its should be left alone until its healed.
Yeah I know I should have. It was sort of a spur of the moment thing. I had been planning on getting it pierced for a while and she just offered this morning. I'll talk to my work, maybe I can pull it off for a while. If not I'll just put a band-aid over it, so no one sees it. They don't want it to "offend customers"... It's just more of the hypocrisy of my work. I work at Winn Dixie, a crappy grocery store. It's located in the 'black' part of town. So during my training we were told that if you're white you can't dye your hair unnatural colors, but if you're black you can because it fits 'our environment'. I'll make it work Thanks for reinforcing my thoughts about it being a very very bad idea to try to replace it. Even if it does cause me a little inconvenience I'm still glad I did it. It was the best experience since I branded myself with an Ankh.
try using a plaster to cover it up, just say your lip split or something. i used to do that at school with my ear
You shouldn't be wearing a retainer in anything but a well-healed piercing. Also, if you're using a flat stud, make very, very very sure you have plenty of space to allow for swelling. Cutting a stud out of yr lip because the back grew over in yr sleep isn't the most fun thing in the world. Do salt soaks - 1/8th tsp of sea salt in one cup of warm water, dunk yr lip in it for about ten minutes twice a day. Wash in the morning and before bed with liquid Dial soap, and just don't touch it and it'll heal up right quick. Fucking with it, trying to change out jewelry all the time, etc etc etc will all prolong the healing time. You should probably threaten to sue your work. If they mention ANYTHING about ethnicity in any reason for allowing or disallowing any employee to do something, that is INCREDIBLY illegal.
i had a lip piercing when i worked at subway- my boss didn't care so long as i was in uniform. but if you want to keep it, DON'T take it out! i did with mine after it had stopped hurting and thought it had healed- i left it out for 5 hours and it was nearly impossible to get back in. maybe you could put one of those round band-aids on it, if the piercing wasn't too big? if you only have to work for a few hours, i don't know how it would be to take it out. i got my nose pierced when i was going to a school in venezuela, and the day after the principal told me i couldn't have it in school (there was a dress code) so i took it out for the 4 or so hours every day i was in school. that would probably be a good way to get an infection though.
