Sternum piercing

[pne]

On the bus coming home from work this evening, I saw a young lady opposite me with a fair number of piercings around her face and ears, and one in a place I hadn't seen a piercing before so far: in front of her sternum, at the top of her cleavage.

It had a little silver sphere at the top (is that a "barbell"?) and a little silver cone about half an inch further down (mostly hidden by the neckline of what she was wearing), with a vertical scar in between the two, presumably from having the piercing inserted.

(Though I'll note that while Google Image searching on "sternum" to check that the sternum was where I had remembered it to be, three of the images on the front page were sternum piercings.)

Comments

[quinctia]

Ugh. As far as I know, if you must have a surface piercing, they are shying away from bars any more, and recommending dermal implants. If you could see something connecting the two bits, I'm willing to bet the piercing is being rejected.

[pne.livejournal.com]

If you could see something connecting the two bits, I'm willing to bet the piercing is being rejected.

It didn't look like metal shining through the skin to me so much as scar tissue. But that didn't look like a particularly good thing, either (and after all, they don't cut open a slit, do they? and even if they did, it shouldn't leave such a visible scar if they do it properly?)

[nyssa.livejournal.com]

If there was a scar between the top and bottom, it means she's had it before and it's already rejected - unsurprising, given how taut the skin is there and given that it sounds like she was simply wearing a barbell or curved barbell in it. The only way you could ever heal a piercing there would be if you used a surface bar (think unused staple, laid so the "back" is under the skin and the "legs" are sticking straight up through the skin) or microdermals. www.bmezine.com has lots of info on surface piercing.

[pne.livejournal.com]

how taut the skin is there

That's what I was thinking - and there isn't a whole lot of flesh there, either, to put it in! I mean, the bone is essentially right underneath the skin, there, isn't it?

[nyssa.livejournal.com]

Pretty much if you can pinch the skin between your fingers, you can pierce it... but the pressure there would make any barbell reject. Surface bars might have a better chance, but I'd still only give the piercing a max lifespan of two years before rejecting. Napes are moderately more successful, for some reason.

[damnitnicole]

Surface piercings: how we know that society has reached the level where people will do ANYTHING just to look different.

[arthur-sc-king.livejournal.com]

Riding the SkyTrain back and forth to work for 4+ years in Vancouver, I saw just about every kind of piercing* imaginable. Nose piercings on girls, for example, are now flat normal in Vancouver, even among non-South-Asians.

And yes, once I saw a sternum piercing. I remember thinking "OK, why there?"

ObFootnote: * That is, every kind that you can show in public without being arrested. I don't doubt that many of those other piercings also existed on those SkyTrain rides, but fortunately I never had to see them.

[nyssa.livejournal.com]

I had my left nostril pierced for a couple of years and I'm a girl. :/

[nik-w.livejournal.com]

I have seen many piercings in many places - there's a girl comes in the shop where I work several times a week who has a substantial amount of facial piercings (including one in each cheek) - I would imagine she's also got a lot that aren't as visible too! She also has bright blue hair, and people tend to stare at her quite a lot... some of the people in the shop think she's a bit freaky, but I speak to her on occasion, and she's one of the friendliest people I've ever met and not even slightly scary like some people think she is!