to not want my 15 year old DD to have the top of her ear (helix?) pierced?

[mustbemad71]

She is badgering me about it - really not keen but it's her body? Will the hole close up completely if she changes her mind in a few years? Worried it will catch on something as she does a lot of sport and dance - ear rips? AIBU?

Mrs., you're so caught up in the popular trend of tattoos and piercing and you think you'd like to be tattooed and pierced all over your body? Think about it. Truly? OK. Just as you don't appreciate my viewpoint, I don't appreciate yours. We have different opinions. That's not a crime. I'm not attacking you for having a different viewpoint. It's actually something that looks uglydispleasingto the artist in me. Most tattoos and piercings are not pleasing to my eye. To you they are, to me they're not. And that's ok with me, but you are upset because I don't have the same opinion as you.

Imagine an 80 year old with stretched out and wrinkly tattoos. I have a friend who had a large tattoo on her stomach and she regretted it later when she had a baby and the tattoo got stretched out and looked awful.

I know good people with tattoos and piercings, I just don't think they're flattering, that is the point I'm making.

We just very much disagree on this one issue.

I have no issue with you disliking tattoos, I have an issue with you suggesting anyone who likes more than a few on themselves being somehow psychologically damaged. Can you not see the difference?

As for being 80 with tattoos, I've also said this on other threads. Some people (like myself) will be far more grateful to reach that age, hopefully in good physical and mental health, to be much bothered about some art in my wrinkles. By that time, many a person will have them anyway, so this nonsense argument will hopefully have disappeared once and for all. Who the heck cares what they look like at 80, for goodness sake.....

She'll soon be 16 and you won't have much choice.

My DD has loads of piercings in her ears Helix etc etc and has had her nose done too. All I could do was say I would prefer her not to - but at the end of the day I may have grown her body, I don't own it, it's hers - however much I might dislike it.

Mrs., yes I see the difference. I don't think they're flattering, that is my main point. I also have the opinion that tattooing your entire body, covering it almost entirely in permanent ink, is extreme and in my opinion, shows that the person has issues with him or herself. Why ruin their beautiful skin? It doesn't even look good! (In my opinion)

It's really any extreme, such as gluttony taken to an extreme, or a bodybuilder, misers who stockpile their money and never use it for anything, for themselves or for others, it could be anything in almost any area of life, I'm just giving you some examples. These bodybuilders for instance can reach extreme measures and look grotesque (to me). People who do these extreme things to their bodies perhaps should ask themselves why? Why go that far? These are outward signs of inward distress, not in all cases, I'm not saying that! but in some at least.

Reading a PP about needing legal consent from a parent - that's a very grey area. Piercings considered 'sexual' would more likely fall under that category like tongue or nipple. Ears do not. A reputable piercer would generally ask for parental consent for any piercings. But they aren't required to by law on teenagers aged 15

Christ almighty some of you are just a tad melodramatic

I think your compromise of waiting until she's 16 is a good one, OP. Most reputable piercers (certainly round here) won't pierce someone before 16 anyway.

It's a tricky one because DH and I both had/have piercings (him more than me) but we've said we'd want DD to wait until she's old enough to (in theory) take herself at 16. I had my ears pierced three times with a piercing gun before the age of 10 (first lot taken out, then redone and then a second set). Knowing what I know about piercing guns I would never let my DD near them (and I doubt my mum would either tbh, and I don't judge her for taking me to have mine done, as I just don't think she knew how shit they are).

LittleBeautyBelle I have a friend who had a large tattoo on her stomach and she regretted it later when she had a baby and the tattoo got stretched out and looked awful.

Mine didn't, mine stretched and went back and looks fine. Not everyone's bodies react in the same way to things.

I find your suggestion that heavily tattooed people must have psychological issues pretty offensive tbh.

RochelleGoyle my piercings there actually never closed up and i'd had them out for a few years!

Op i took my nose stud out for about 6 six years and it didn't look like a black head.

LittleBeautyBelle my god some of your posts are downtight ignorant and offensive.
I certainly do not have tattoos and piercings to be cool or fit in most of my friends i spend time with have no piercings bar an earlobe, and one or two tattoos or none at all! Along with several tattoos i have a few piercings, including several lip piercings because i love the way they look.
I think piercings and tattoos are beautiful.
I am the odd one out of my group!
I do not have psychological issues with my body either, i have tattoos because i like them. I have some as a tribute to a parent i lost suddenly!
Yes for me it is artistic expression.
Just because you don't think so doesn't mean you know me!
Only person here with issues is you in that you are unable to understand that people simply like tattoos and piercings and are not in some way damaged.

I don't see any real difference between piercing your lobe or the top of your ear. I wasn't keen on either for either of my children, but dd was very keen so I relented and she had her lobes pierced at 12 as a first period present.

She didn't really look after them and they closed up within a couple of months. There are tiny dents there now (she is 15). On the other hand my piercings (again just the lobes) got infected and have never properly healed, thirty years later I still get puss in them every now and then. Probably because I seem to have a very strong allergic relation to metal, but only in my ears for some odd reason, so no way to tell in advance.

By the age of 15 dd had her helix pierced, a scaffold piercing, eye brow, nose, and various other parts of her ear.

At 17 she is bored of them they have all closed up apart from the scaffold which she loves and her normal earnings. She also had a small ear stretcher which thankfully was small enough that it healed as well.

I would let her but make sure she cleans it well.

Nooka, in physical terms, it's going through cartilage rather than flesh, so takes longer to heal. One of my lobe piercings was like that, never took, and still gives a little now and again.😊
Op, take her to a tattoo/piercing place, ours was fab, very professional. They use needles for a start and wouldn't give dd hers without my consent (just shy of 16) And her dad didn't even clock it for almost a year!

Sorry I really meant in terms of acceptability, I can see the pain/healing issues for a child is something to consider.

My mother is 80 and cares deeply about both her health and her appearance. I hope to be as youthful, well groomed and well dressed as she is when I reach 80. I hope to care as much about my appearance at 80 as I do now. I think your comments wondering about who cares about their appearance when they are 80 are quite revealing actually.

Beaufort I care how I look. I probably will when I'm 80. I have tattoos/piercings. These are not things that are mutually exclusive.

I think your comments wondering about who cares about their appearance when they are 80 are quite revealing actually.

Revealing how? The fact that I hope to be happy, healthy and active over being worried about my appearance at 80? Fair enough that's how your mother choses to be, but I feel I will have different priorities at that age. I don't know any 80 year old who's that worried about their appearance actually, beyond the usual clean and tidy.

I want to be happy, active, healthy, working if I can and well groomed and well dressed. Why should one's standards about anything fall due to age? I want always to look and be the best I can and I think part of that is thinking about the impact of what I do to my body now, be it: Sun exposure, tobacco, alcohol, diet, posture, and it does reasonably extend to how a tattoo I were to have at 25 would look at 80.

Might as well just hid indoors and hope for the best then. A tattoo/piercing won't have a negative effect as diet and pollution will. They're just there, like a mole or blemish (and by that age, wrinkles whether you've lived a healthy life or not). You can be perfectly 'well groomed', even with tattoos you know, again I feel like your own personal views are leading you to make assumtions.

Luckily, most of the world seems to be moving forward from these snobbish views about 'standards', since many people have piercings and tattoos. Even those who chose not to have them, care little for other's choices. Of course, there will be a certain type of person who thinks differently, but there we go, can't win them all.

Beaufort

You actively hope to still be working at 80 years old?

But even if I'm as wrinkled as an old rose at 80 I wouldn't want to be reminded more by a droopy misshapen rose as out of shape as my aged breast. And yes, I would like to be working at 80. My mother is still involved in running a business and my grandad farmed until he was 89.

I had two on my upper ear as teen. I have not worn piercings at all for almost 15 years now. Only holes you can now see are in my lobes which were done before I was 5. I don't know if I still have the holes in my top ear.

Just make sure she goes to a recommended piercer - check out the online forums and warn her it will take many months to heal. It's not like a lobe piercing. If school will ask her to take it out then it's not worth pursuing till she leaves as they can close very quickly and the jewellery can be fiddly to work with.

BeaufortBelle amazingly i am in my 30's with both tattoos and piercings yet i care a great deal about my appearance.
People with them do manage to take care of themselves you know?

MrsGentlyBenevolent yes thankgod the world is changing and that there are less snobs with these views in charge now!
Somehow i have managed to work a number of customer service and banking jobs with my awful appearance!! never scared any customers away, they usually chatted to me about them!
I definitely know which type of person i would rather be when i am 80!

Op def fet them done at a piercing salon or a tattooist.
Although the gun hurt me a lot less, i had more trouble (bar my first lobes) with the gun piercings than the needle.