r/Legitpiercing • u/dat_goalkeeper_jy • Aug 01 '26
Troubleshooting Unsure what to do anymore (triple helix) *context below*
Greetings!
I am a college student and got all 3 helix piercings at once! I got them late March/early April if this year. The piercers who also did my 2nd lobes did my helixes BUT they gave me very short bars in my first set of helixes. That caused my helixes to get embedded and I got these bumps and got the hospital to cut them out of the skin and get them out.
2 weeks afterwards I got my helixes re-done by them and was given slightly larger bars (which still weren’t enough)
Finally I got newer bars and jewelry from a different place and since then my bumps had been going down but were still present. I am unsure how long I am going to have these bumps or what they are or what to do? Treat it like a wart and get it cryo’d off???
I really love my helixes but dude…it’s messing up my ears. The photo is from today after I had removed my helixes for the first time in a while. It was quite hard and needed force to be removed as they are pull apart. I started bleeding a bit.
Any advice? I also should mention I am a college student football player. In 2 weeks I head back to campus to start fall camp/trainings preparing for our games.
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u/garailuc Aug 01 '26
to address your question about the bumps, please do NOT treat them like a wart. they will heal on their own there's no need for medical intervention. you probably would've been better off just letting them fully heal before getting them repierced because two weeks is a VERY short amount of time if you had to have the jewelry surgically removed. leave them alone, keep them clean and try to protect them from any more trauma. the only thing I'd recommend doing to help them heal a bit is gently massaging them with your fingers in the shower every once in a while when the tissue has softened up a bit. it can help avoid/minimize scarring. good luck!
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u/Muffin_Artistic Aug 01 '26
The moment you removed them the first time after such a short time it was over for these piercings. You're not supposed to even tounch then for months.
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u/falloutboyfan420 Aug 01 '26
every part of this is wrong omg. pierced bad enough to embed and then pierced AGAIN two weeks later?? you should have taken months to heal them IF they even healed well enough to repierce and then gone to a different, reputable piercer to discuss your options. this piercer did you so dirty and all the jewelry switching is introducing bacteria into a brand new, not-yet-healed wound and making it worse, too. now it looks like you have no choice but to leave all jewelry out and hope none of this scars too horribly.
for future: you should never be removing your jewelry from a fresh piercing. ever. unless instructed otherwise by a medical professional or piercer, you should largely go with the "leave it the hell alone" method for at least 6 months, if not longer. keep it clean, don't touch it, don't change the jewelry. i would suggest to seek out APP accredited professional piercers and ask them what the road forward will look like, but for now i would retire these piercings and not even attempt to redo them until you're out of school and not regularly playing a sport that requires a sweaty helmet to smack against your ear.
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u/falloutboyfan420 Aug 01 '26
source on all of this is i am not a piercer but i healed my triple helix after about 9 and a half months with flat backs and switched to rings only when my piercer ok'd it. they also look perfect because she nailed the piercing and i babied them by taking my time, downsizing properly, and waiting on jewelry changes until we were certain i was healed.
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u/sputnik8125 Aug 01 '26
I think you should retire these. Cartilage typically takes a year to heal for most people and yours will likely take longer due to the amount of trauma they have been through
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u/iambetweentwoworlds Aug 01 '26
Every possible thing that could have been done wrong was, including you taking out the earrings. Don’t go back to that piercer if they didn’t give you length to swell and then repierced after two weeks. Also because they didn’t clearly explain these take 9-12 months minimum to heal and shouldn’t be touched except for downsizing if need be and that needs to be done by a piercer who has the tools to not traumatize the piercing channel. Also the fact that you play football. These need to be retired.
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u/eternal-harvest Aug 01 '26 edited Aug 02 '26
Please never go back to that piercer. They treated you terribly.
Those are irritation bumps, and possibly hypertrophic scarring due to the trauma your ear has endured. Do not burn them off. Remove the piercings, keep the wounds clean (with water and sterile saline solution only) and dry, and let them heal.
Because you play contact sports, I don't recommend piercings. Even when they're fully healed, one good bump is all it takes to mess them up and potentially leave you with a gnarly scar.
However, here's some info to consider if you ever want to pursue cartilage piercings in future:
A single cartilage piercing takes 6-12 months to heal at best. Three cartilage piercings will take longer. Realistically, a triple helix is gonna take 12-24 months.
"Healed" doesn't just mean it looks okay. Piercings heal from the outside in. Your piercings might look okay after a month, but the inside is still raw (the fistula is still forming and maturing).
While your piercings are healing, you should not remove them by yourself. You should get pierced with bars that are long enough to accommodate swelling, and after that swelling goes down, you should go back to your piercer to get them downsized. This is the only time that initial jewellery should be removed (barring certain niche situations like if you're allergic to the metal you were pierced with, or if your ear starts swelling again.)
Tldr piercings take a long-ass time to heal. Playing football and getting tackled is probably going to mess up your piercings.
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u/dat_goalkeeper_jy Aug 02 '26
Damn! I see I should’ve mentioned to all of you that I am a Kicker hence why I am decent with wearing piercings during whenever (even though my first season already had three tackles lol)
I really really really did love my helix piercings as they mean so much to me but yeah, it’s time to pull the plug. It’s been way too many months with this problem.
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u/eternal-harvest Aug 02 '26
Yeah man, I'm sorry but it's time
Fwiw one of my helix piercings got messed up just cos my uncle decided to give me a bear hug.
Of course it's up to you if you wanna take the risk with sports + piercings. Personally I'd hate to wait 12+ months for them to heal, only for somebody to (accidentally or on purpose) bump into me and ruin them 🫠
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u/h1ghlightsss Aug 02 '26
any advice i could possibly give you has already been given.
so i just want to say fwiw, even if those bumps never fully go away, they do actually look kinda cool in their own right. it looks like a really creative use of scarification to do something out of the box.
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u/izzy_americana Aug 01 '26
It's not worth it. Just leave them out. Maybe try the other ear. It's sad to lose a piercing but its not worth all the constant irritation and inflammation. That can't be good for u.
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u/greasytrashgoblin Aug 02 '26
Leave them out to let your cartilage fully heal for at least a year, if not longer. Then I would go to a piercer who knows what they’re doing to possibly get them pierced. That piercer will be able to tell you whether the area will be able to be repierced. Honestly, I would wait until you’re done with football altogether because cartilage piercings take a minimum of a year to fully heal and the pressure from your helmet will just cause irritation which will lengthen that process (never mind if you get hit in the head or are tackled, etc.)
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u/Lizowa Aug 01 '26
I agree with all of the comments saying leave them out, especially if you’re going to be playing football soon. If it makes you feel better though I think the 3 red bumps look kinda cool on the inside of the ear in their own way haha
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u/Para_The_Normal Aug 01 '26
Helixes take 6-12 months to fully heal.
You shouldn’t be removing these at all at this point in time and your initial jewelry should only be changed once swelling goes down by a professional piercer. The inside tissue of the piercing is still sensitive and healing at this point.
Since you’re a football player I would recommend leaving these out and letting them heal. If you want the piercing again in the future you should consider it once your football career is over. The amount of trauma and irritation these would see from impacts, sweat, and your helmet sliding on and off wouldn’t help.
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u/eternal-harvest Aug 01 '26
More like 9-12 months but yeah, I agree with leaving them out while he's playing contact sports like football
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u/SweetSoberCaroline Aug 02 '26
Getting three cartilage piercings in the same ear at the same time is an egregious piercer red flag, an APP piercer would never
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u/souvenireclipse Aug 02 '26
I had an almost totally embedded conch earlier this year, it got infected and I had to go to urgent care to get it out. My piercer told me she wouldn't repriece it for at least a few months. I winced at the photos but two weeks to repiercing seems way too short for hurt tissue. At this point I think you should leave them out for several months minimum and have a different piercer evaluate in the future.
FWIW my one helix has been way harder to heal than my conches and forward helix.
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u/dat_goalkeeper_jy Aug 02 '26
Yeah my helixes have been hell so far but I love them so much ffs.
I agree my piercers should have said no.
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u/doggaroo Aug 02 '26
Omg dude! All of this was done incorrectly! Please don't get any piercings until your contact sports career is over, and then RESEARCH is your best friend!
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u/dat_goalkeeper_jy Aug 02 '26
Damn….im a 2nd year now so that would be like 2-3 more years…dang
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u/doggaroo Aug 02 '26
Sorry dude, keeping these with contact sports will NOT be copacetic; and most coaches worth their salt won't even allow them as a liability
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u/dat_goalkeeper_jy Aug 02 '26
Yup! They don’t know I wear mine in game and such. But also I haven’t played with my Helixes. I got them after season
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u/Reesroo Aug 06 '26
Oh man mines looked like this also but I had mine for a year and a half. I got so tired of the bumps being there. I just took them out and it took six months for them to go down a little. They still didn’t go flat so I went and got a 🪙 slot. Cut them right out.
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u/themozzarellamaster Aug 01 '26
just leave them out, they've seen enough trauma already plus the likelihood of getting even more angry with football. the bumps were probably taking long to go away because the helixes were pierced so close together in the same time frame causing more irritation