Piercings-has this happened to anyone else?

[LizzieWallace]

Apologies if I'm not posting in the right place, but thought I might get some answers here.
I'm in my mid 30s. I've had my ears pierced for around 25 years and my nose pierced for around 15 years. I've never had any issues with either.

I don't wear jewellery often, i wear earrings for nice occasions (I definitely wore them for a function in July and had no issues). And I normally just keep a very small nose stud in, but one fell out and I took a couple of weeks to order new ones (that's happened before and I've never had any issues).

Anyway, around November last year my new nose studs came. I ordered the same ones as usual and within an hour it felt uncomfortable. Within 12 hours my nose must have been swollen inside, it was sore and I really struggled to get the piercing out. I then found an old pack of studs, so I tried that too, and the same thing happened). I'm wondering if I've suddenly got a sensitivity so I'm going to be careful about what I'm ordering.
However when I wore earrings for the first time in a while they also hurt, and a month after trying to wear them one ear has even closed up!!! Only a little bit at the back, but I 100% can't get the earring in anymore. I've gone a few months without wearing earrings before so I don't understand how it's closed up within 3 months. I only have silver earrings.

Has this happened to anyone else?
Thank you x

Im sorry this has happened to you.

I've had all sorts of things pierced, but currently I have an assortment of ear piercings, tragus, forward helix, lobes, conch etc. I only ever use surgical grade titanium or stainless steel, the type that pro piercers use with screw in backs. As far as I'm aware silver is not a good choice as it can contain nickel and a lot of people are allergic to it, even in the tiniest quantities. Your regular (new) earrings may have changed the silver purity to cut costs?

Hi OP. This happened to me a few years ago. I stopped wearing earrings for a while because both my kids pulled them as babies and when I started again I couldn't get through a day without them feeling uncomfortable.

I found a website called solace jewellery which make earrings for sensitive ears which I can really recommend. They were the only earrings I could wear and after a while of wearing their earrings I found I could wear my old ones too. Completely sorted now. I have a helix piercing which took longer to sort out but I think that's because it had partially healed up.

If your ears starting to go sore after wearing the new ones, the holes can completely heal over. I read this somewhere when I was looking at how to get the holes to heal so it could be evened out. I think it said it takes from a couple of weeks to a couple of months to be able to have them redone…

Maybe try a very thin earring, I personally would use a sterile needle, although you may not feel comfortable doing that.

@captncrunch I had a look at Solace earrings website and everything I looked at was surgical grade stainless steel. While it doesn't sound glamorous, it really is one of the best metals for piercings along with titanium.

Yes, after 28 years of wearing a nose stud, i too suddenly had a real problem.. my nose became sore and red, i tried everything thinking maybe i'd scratched the walls of the piercing (the hole has always been a weird angle) but it became really swollen around that area and ive never been able to wear a stud since.
Then one of my ear piercings went the same way.. i think as you get older you get to a point where bits of you become sensitive and cant take anymore iyswim.

Similar in that not wore earrings for a while. Bought new sterling silver earrings and could feel my ears reacting straight away. Ears were bleeding when I took them out.

Got some titanium earrings and have been fine.

Thank you all so much, this is really interesting. I'll look for titanium x