The Problems With Being Pointy: How To Avoid Getting Mutilated By Cowboy Body Modification Artists
Body modification is not new. People have been getting tattoos and piercings for hundreds of years. The ancient Aztecs used to think that heavily tattooed women were the height of attractiveness. Other cultures think that lip plates are a sign of beauty. In the past, we’ve had all kinds of weird and painful things like foot bandages in China where women wrap their feet in strips of cloth to make them smaller. Those few living women who practiced the foot binding now have squashed and misshapen feet that would be beyond the concept of beauty for most people today.
Some see the mods as a group of people who get full body tattoos, tongue splitting, head shaving, and have more piercings than ear cartilage. The truth is, anything that changes your appearance (even semi-permanently) can be considered a modification. If you’ve dyed your hair or had your ears pierced, congratulations on practicing body modification!
If I had the guts, you know what I would have done? It would have pointed ears. That’s right; He would have the complete Vulcan. The procedure involves cutting a small wedge of cartilage from the tip of each ear and sewing the remaining parts together. Over the next few months, the ear heals and reattaches. The result is a pointed ear like that of an elf.
Do you want to know what’s stopping me? The sheer amount of things that can go wrong …
This is not a “surgical” procedure (although it involves sharp instruments, blood, and human flesh). This is not completed by a plastic surgeon in a hospital. This takes place in the same places that people go to get tattoos and piercings. By the same people who do tattoos and piercings. I am not going to lie; The people who are world famous for pulling off this mod are artists who take care of their clients the best they can. But since they are not surgeons, they cannot, for example, use any anesthetic. You will feel every moment.
If you’re a little braver than I am and the thought of pain doesn’t put you off, the prospect of an infection might.
The first thing that would put me off would be the horror of facing something completely different than what I asked for. You can remove the bandages to deal with an ear that appears to have been mangled by a lawnmower. This seems funny; We all hear the stories of people getting tattoos by ‘artists’ who cannot draw two straight lines (or spell for that matter). their lives.
There have been incidents of clients suing their body modification artists for egregious mistakes that have cost them their appearance. It sounds veiny, but it doesn’t matter if they were going to get an ear piercing or an ear reshaping; no one asks to be mutilated. Errors in this field do not count as “hospital negligence” because no one from the medical profession was involved. However, they are classified as personal injury, which is something we also deal with.
How to reduce the risk of getting wrecked in a body modification decision:
1) Make sure you really want this procedure. Never do anything under the influence of drinks or drugs. Never decide to do something on a whim. Never decide to do something because your friends have done it to you. Think about it for a long time before deciding to go ahead with something. Think about the future. Will this affect your family or work life? Will you still want this mod when you’re 60?
2) DO YOUR RESEARCH. I cannot stress this enough. If you want to have something done to your body that cannot be undone, you better make sure you know everything there is to know about the procedure and its effects. Most professionals who run operations like this will probably give you a great deal of information beforehand, but some might just assume you know what you’re getting into and start ‘chiselling’. What does the procedure entail? How do I prepare for it? How much can this hurt? How do I care for the wounds afterwards? How long will it take to heal? What are the signs that something went wrong? What do I do if I get an infection? How much is this going to cost me?
3) Never choose someone to perform your procedure based solely on price. For every person who knows what they are doing, there are three other people who will provide poor service for a fraction of the price. This is irritating when choosing someone to tile your bathroom, but if that someone approaches your face with a scalpel, it can be downright horrible. In the same way that cheaper does not mean better, more expensive does not mean better either. Talk to the person himself, ask about his experience, ask to see a portfolio, and try talking to other people who have had the same procedure done by the same person. Listen to both the bad and the good.