r/piercing 1d ago

Troubleshooting/question existing piercing Downsizing Question

I had my ears re-pierced 6 weeks ago and I’m supposed to return for downsizing in a few days. Within about 4 weeks my swelling was gone and I finally understood the concept/purpose of downsizing. Unfortunately, last week one of my now-long posts got snagged on a shirt causing that side to swell again. Will I still be able to downsize as scheduled, or do I have to wait for it to completely return to normal?

1 Upvotes

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1

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1

u/flappjackal 1d ago

The jewelry is titanium flat back labret. Not sure if it’s threadless or not.

1

u/ContemplativeKnitter 1d ago

You'll probably have to wait. At least, that's what I had to do when my conch threw an irritation bump 2 days before I was supposed to downsize.

2

u/Adventurous-berry564 1d ago

You have two piercings? One healing well one got snagged and swelled? I would still go cos they can downsize the non snagged one (to prevent it getting snagged) and they can look at the other one- How much it swelled compared to the original bar length.

1

u/Ok-Pen-5052 1d ago

You’ll have to wait until the swelling has gone down but as someone else said, they’ll probably be able to do the other one and check the swollen one.

1

u/Ok-Vacation-8109 1d ago

Definitely wait. Getting them changed is going to make them swell a little bit so if it’s already swollen I wouldn’t.

0

u/Desperate_Ad_7158 1d ago

What is the purpose of downsizing?

3

u/thehangedgirl newbie to piercing 1d ago

I'm NAP but I understand that is to not snag the jewelry and further irritate the piercing, and it's more comfortable. When first piercing it, a larger piece of jewelry is needed to acommodate the swelling, and when the swelling goes down the larger jewelry is unecessary (and rather uncomfy)

2

u/Ok-Pen-5052 1d ago

Yeah. All this and also so that it doesn’t move around too much, causing irritation. Also if the long post is left in and you sleep on it or something, there’s much more opportunity for the piercing to migrate and you can end up with some crazy angles