What age for ears pierced?

[Gottastopspendingmoney]

Almost 8 year old is asking more and more to get her ears pierced.

I am not going to let her yet. I say she can get them done when she is 18.

But just wondering what age parents have allowed them to get done.

I am thinking 10 / 11 at the very youngest but I will happily push it longer than that.

She did tell me the other day that it would have been easier if I had got them done as a baby

Dd (10) has just had a second hole pierced, she does all her own self care and is sensible. Her ears, fine by me. She had the first holes pierced a few years ago. Dd (8) has had hers pierced recently too.

11 when they finish primary and start secondary.

navy "its just ear piercing its no big deal"

This is what you said, and this is why you are wrong.

It IS a big deal because it is carries the potential for both physical and psychological harm.

Physical harm is possible through infection - the kind of infection we will have to take far more seriously in this dawning era of super-bugs. Even before super-bugs there has been the potential for serious harm as I can personally evidence as someone who spent 6 weeks in hospital, much of it in intensive care, because of an ear piercing gone wrong.

Psychological harm comes in two main categories. Firstly there is the reinforcement of gender stereotypes. Girls have pierced ears by default and boys don't by default. What is that telling girls about their relative value in society and the increased importance of physical beauty to them? Secondly the reinforcement that fitting in, giving into peer pressure and avoiding bullying are big drivers for behaviour of children. This things will ALWAYS be big drivers, but it is up to us as parents to help our children make the right choices for them, not simply the same choices everyone else has made.

I think one of the most important things we can do for our kids is to build their self-confidence and self-esteem. Telling them its fine to stick metal through their ears as long as everyone else thinks it will make them look prettier, is a massive massive step in the wrong direction.

auntie why do you think there is no relationship between piercings and cosmetic surgery? Apart from anything, ear piercing IS cosmetic surgery. The most minor going but it still is.

Has anyone died from a piercing infection, well yes. Its rare, about 1 a year type rare, but there are a larger number of people having significant hospital stays, and for what?

It will become more common that infections can lead to death as the antibiotic bacteria become more prevalent on peoples skin.

I didn't die aged 15, but I spent 6 weeks in hospital and I was incredibly lucky. The bacteria that had spread from my ear piercing to my heart responded to the very first antibiotic they pumped me full of. My kidneys still went into failure but they pulled me back from the brink.

These days you would be lucky indeed if it was one of the first 3 or 4 antibiotics that actually worked. This will get worse and worse as time goes on.

Ear piercing has been a practice (for both men and women) for over 5000 years. Which makes total nonsense of everything you're saying. Societal pressure is a thing that needs attention, but the ancient practice of body piercing has absolutely nothing to do with that.

You know that human society existed 5000 years ago too?

You know peer pressure was a thing then as well?

Its a hang over from our evolution as social animals.

its literally monkey see, monkey do.

I should actually pay attention to the scientific evidence more....its been proven multiple times that not only is peer pressure the single greatest force in people's decision making, but it is the one they absolutely refuse to acknowledge or even accept the existence of.

Science says the majority of people you meet can't understand the nature or extent of peer pressure in their lives, so why bother explaining it?

Search me!

There's plenty of boys, of primary age too, wandering around with pierced ears. I know plenty of men with pierced ears, noses, etc. Look at old portraits with their depictions of men with earrings. One of the reasons given for sailors wearing earrings was so that there was money to bury them properly if their body washed ashore; at sea is one place that you never wear any other sort of jewellery. Maybe more girls than boys have pierced ears but it isn't so clearly gender biased.

Incidentally, my first piercings were done by a doctor, in a hospital. Frankly, failing something like that, I definitely prefer my piercings to be done by a qualified and licensed piercer in a hygienic situation than by an untrained shop assistant in a cluttered shop, just as I have my tattoos done by a licensed and experienced tattoo artist rather than by a drunken idiot with a machine off eBay in a mate's kitchen.

hmm back in the day boys wore pink and girls wore blue...

does that mean that there is no gender bias in the wearing of blue and pink now? because it was different in the past?

I mean it sounds like logic...but...no wait it really doesn't.

M3lon, the entire thread could talk logic to you and you'd still be drowning the thread in your version of reality.

Blue/pink isn't an equivalent as there is a clear gender split at present whereas there isn't either piercing, just a bias. I would say 'try harder' but please don't bother.

M3lon

With respect you cannot tell someone else why they’re wrong on something that is subjective.

Ear piercing may be your Big Cause but to me (and I assume the other poster who said the same) is is absolutely no big deal.

The child after my dd having their ears pierced was a boy. My dd is, I suppose, quite gender neutral with short hair and prefers shorts/t shirts. She just likes piercings (and wants her nose pierced but that can wait til she's older!).
A lot of what we do is probably socially conditioning but that's human isn't it?
The risk is low, as parents we make these choices to agree or not to requests.

Peer pressure or just social constructs and culture?

People exist within socities and cultures which all have their own fashions/costumes, diet/food, jewellery, make up, hairstyles, dance, music, customs etc. Vast majority of women in the UK have their ears pierced...it's a societal norm.

Any age you deem them to have capacity to make that decision for themselves. If they can sensibly talk it through then you’re half way there. You can deny them until 18 though! LOL!

I think people that have their baby’s ears pierced are irresponsible. Making a permanent marking/modification on another person’s body when they can’t consent is pretty sick! Lots of parents sadly think they own their child’s body which is obviously not true!

16, anything else is assault.

There is no legally tested basis for a parent consenting for a non-medical / non-beneficial invasive procedure on a child.

I had always said I would never force my children to get their ears pierced and I would till they suggested. While walking past someone getting theirs done my daughter said to me I am not having that done till I'm 10. I said that's fine, you have them when your ready.
At Easter my daughter asked if she could have them, shes 6. So we talked about it. Explained that it will be a sharp scratch and that you will feel a little discomfort for a couple of days. She was still adamant she wanted them done. That weekend we went down and she had them done. But while sitting in the chair I asked if she was definitely sure and she was. Not had any issue with them at all.

I think as long as the child knows the truth about when will happen and that it will cause a little pain and they are old enough to understand this and they give consent then it's fine.

😀

8th birthday for 1st set. 10/11 for 2nd set had had her nose done for her 12th birthday.

Minimum age will be 13 for my DD. I had to wait until 16 with my parents.

I wanted to wait until my DD was 10/11 but she had them when she was 8. She was mature enough to look after them, take them in and out herself and no problems at school. She doesn’t wear earrings too often now, I know girls who are told they can’t get them done who are literally obsessed with earrings, wearing fake ones til their ears hurt. I think it’s best to have a moderate approach as having an overbearing one will just cause your kids to rebel

I'm wondering why it is that some girls ask for pierced ears at a young age and others don't

My daughter asked when she was about 14. I have never had my ears pierced. It seems a bit of a strange thing to me, to have somebody make a hole in your ear.

My daughter asked for it because her friends had it done and she wanted to be the same. I asked her if she would want it done if none of her friends had and she thought about it and said probably not.

So convinced her to wait a bit. If she really wants it done then fair enough. I personally find piercings and tattoos very ugly and actually quite limiting in the sense of personal progression. Who wants to be 60, yet indelibly marked by the uninformed and careless 'statements' they wanted to make in their 20s.

I'll get an earful here, I know that for sure, but I think people who have tattoos are lacking basic intelligence. Not because their tattoos are shocking. They're mostly not. But they are really nothing to admire.

You get a rose tattooed on your arm when you're 20, and it's cool.
When you are 60 you will be fed up to the back teeth of it. It will be all wrinkly and it will look daft. You will look like somebody who tried to be cool in the 80s. And if you are now 20, you'll still look knob in the 2030s.

Having said all that, I'm a person who hates tattoos and piercings because they make me feel a bit nauseous. But that's my problem.

Reading these posts, I'm completely shocked that some posters think their 8 year old child has the capacity to make such monumental decisions.

I might have an excuse for this. My opposite over the road neighbour gave birth to a daughter. I went across several times, a country road, a matter of only 30 or so steps. She would not let me see the child.
We are a small village. This was a new child.

Each time I went, the child was asleep and I was not allowed to go into the room and look. She was a close friend and my nearest neighbour. Why would she not let me see her newborn?

Well, it was because she'd had the child's ears pierced at a week old, and it had gone gunky, and she was trying to bathe it in TCP, and she didn't want anybody to see her 2 week old baby with earrings in.

I knew nothing about it until afterwards, but she eventually had to call a doctor and get some antibiotics.

She was and is a devout Catholic lady. Goes to Mass twice every Sunday, Yet still. . . .has no qualms whatever about putting a newborn child at risk of infection and hiding the child away from anyone who might raise an alarm

This topic is very polarising. I don’t care when it happens. I was 5. I met a mum from Colombia the other day that had a 9mth old with pierced ears 🤷🏽‍♀️. Over here Pediatricians will do them for you.

Earrings aren't a monumental decision. If you don't like them, you can take them out. Really not the end of the world.

16, anything else is assault “@FixTheBone” how is this even remotely similar to assault? You have lived quite the charmed life, haven’t you?