Let me tell you about my foolishness first, and then please tell me what you think.
So here's the deal: I had my ears "gauged" (dermal punched) at 4g and 2g respectively (my piercer said it's OK even if wanting to stretch). I downsized the same day to 4g, thinking I will never stretch my ears. After one month, my ears felt "fully" healed. Although this was not true, because they felt a teeny bit sore. Now, it has been 4 months since I've had them punched. About 2 weeks ago, I said to myself: I'm not in America, so I might as well do some crazy shit with my ears. I already have 15 piercings total (7 on each ear + septum), let me go ahead and stretch them some.
Before all of this though, I tried to wear some "4g" (supposedly) jewelry. I gotta tell you, it felt a bit uncomfortable to put them in. It seems that this 4g (which I tried to put on 2 months after being DP'd) actually was a 2g and stung a little when putting it in. After some time, I took the 2g out (I didn't know it was 2g until a month later) and just kept the 4g in.
Now I'm in Asia and I wore the 2-gauge jewelry for probably 3 or 4 days. Foolishly enough, I tried to put in a 0g taper. I thought tapers are good. Bad stuff happened: my ear hurt quite a lot but no bleeding. I left it in for maybe... an hour and said fuck it: I'm taking this shit out. It hurt MORE to take it out than to put it in. I gave my ears rest. After that incident, I just slept without my plugs for about a week in order to try to restore the damage done.
And now, going up to date: I've been using this super slippery PTFE tape that I bought here in Asia. It's SO slippery that it requires no lube (it's also expensive, and apparently much thicker than normal PTFE tape, which is also something I wasn't aware of). I don't know what it is, but here's what I did: I wrapped up 3 layers the first day. 2 layers the second day, waited 2 days, wrapped up another 2 layers and waited a day, and that brought me up to 0g within one week. Unbelievable, isn't it?
No blood, no pain, no thinning of the ear. I have not had to force in anything, other than to "move around" a little in order to fit it in. I can say generally speaking, there has been absolutely no discomfort whatsoever. Mind you, I always massage my ears twice a day and take plugs out about 30 mins a day. So far, everything is very healthy. I plan to keep these plugs for 2 weeks before going up to the next size. At 2 weeks, I will sleep without them in order to let them heal some more and then stretch away.
I know someone will call me an idiot, but I'm just not so sure about "guidelines" on stretching too fast. Perhaps at larger sizes this is an issue, but in my experience, no problems. I listen to my body, and I'm having no complaints here. The 0g right now slides in and out with such ease, a toddler could do it. I'm noticing my ears do need a rest, but in terms of thickness, I see no difference either (before stretching, and after). I've been comparing my thickness with pictures every day and nothing is out of the ordinary. I know the ear's memory hasn't "settled" yet, but that's okay. I believe once I reach my ideal size, I will be a happy camper and be able to heal my ears to perfection at that point.
Also, I know dermal punching isn't good, but my piercer dermal punched her ears at 00g from the start, and was still able to achieve 000g within 6 months of doing so. She has been piercing for the last 10 years she said.
I do have a question for everyone though: how in the world can anyone say, "You must wait X amount of months between sizes." I think this is personally absurd. As long as you see no change in your ears, how are you damaging them? Perhaps not? Collagen tends to regenerate quite quickly from what I've read, so I don't know what "scientific" basis there is for how fast one can stretch. Ears are naturally elastic, and that makes me wonder why people say you cause your ears to tear. If that's true, then every time someone touches your ear and tugs on it even if you've never had a piercing, you're damaging your ear. Not very plausible if you ask me. And I'll say it again: I have no blood. I have no pain. I have no swelling. I have no thinning. I have nothing.
Let me know what you guys think, haha.
P.S. This tape is fucking awesome. Doesn't absorb moisture, slides as if it's ice, and has no adhesives. One roll costs about $3, with each roll being 10mm thick (I'm going to guess it's enough to stretch to 60mm). It's a custom PTFE tape that I've never seen anywhere in stores (I bought it online, locally).
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