Sore Stretched Lobe

[MotherFucking_Princess]

Hi All,

I've had a stretched left lobe for a while but last year I got my right ear re-pierced as the hole was too close to the edge of my lobe to stretch safely (in my opinion). About 7 months ago, I started stretching this newly pierced lobe, going up a size a month, until I got past 6mm where I had to jump to 8mm.

Everything was going fine, until the other day I tried to change between tunnels of the same size. The hole rapidly started shrinking back down between swapping jewellery, which it hasn't done before and the threaded tunnel didn't want to fasten shut unlike the other did and my lobe became very sore and swollen. I took it back out and put the expander back (which went it ok) in until last night where I cleaned it down with warm salt water and put in a sterilised silicon plug. Even that was sore and looked like there was a little bit of loose crust this morning.

The outer edge of the hole isn't smooth but slightly resembled a cats arse so I became really worried. Both of my stretched lobes look like smooth scar tissue with a vein close to the surface on the inside but now I'm worrying that isn't normal.

I begun stretching my left lobe (which I've been stretching since I was about 13) from 8mm to 10mm and I had no problems, I considered going to 12mm when swapping my right lobe tunnel, but I soon returned back to my 10mm expander.

I'm going to leave my right lobe at 8mm for a good while now to see if that is the issue. This new stretched hole is getting very close to the healed up hole that was pierced wrong when I was young, so I don't know if that is causing any soreness.

Any advice is welcomed!

[MissMinka]

I don't know too much but it sounds like you've been stretching too quickly.
Hopefully the thread bump will get you some other answers.

[abatha]

I'm sorry if I'm misunderstanding this, but you started stretching your right lobe straight after getting it pierced? If you did, there's your problem. You need to wait six months at the very least before stretching a new lobe piercing. Also going up by one size every month is a little bit fast, the general rule is one size a month at the absolute minimum, which means you'll probably have to wait more than a month most of the time depending on how stretchy your lobes are. Jumping from 6mm to 8mm/from 8mm to 10mm is a bad idea and not necessary, you can get 7mm and 9mm plugs and tapers. Also don't leave 'expanders' (tapers) in your ears, you should only use them to stretch then put in plugs straight away.

I'd definitely downsize more than 8mm, or just not wear jewellery at all in your right lobe for a while, because it sounds like you stretched far too fast.

[MissMinka]

If I'm reading correctly, it sounds like she got it pierced a year ago and then started scratching 7 months ago so she would have waited 5 months before stretching.

[kitebunny]

Skipping sizes is probably a big part of the problem.

7mm, 9mm, 11mm, 13mm etc plugs do exist. Look on crazyfactory.

Meanwhile either stop where you are (if the lobes are happy) or downsize, and wait a few months before trying any more stretches. Use that time to do more research on stretched lobes, how to stretch safely, and how to generally look after them.