Hand Web Piercings:

It was shortly after I had my eyebrow piercing that I thought of the webs on my hand - I had a chat with Dr. Nik (my Piercer) on the subject, and we have been discussing it on and off for well over a year.

There aren't many bits you can't get pierced, but some are better than others - Obviously, the piercing has a greater chance of staying in place if the skin is convex where pierced, this is why 'normal' piercings are basically restricted to sticky out bits (technical term there). My madison has demonstrated to me the troubles with surface piercings, I'm on the second attempt, probably a year since it was pierced, but sometimes it can still be a real pain in the neck (excuse the pun).

Hand webs do fit this preference for a piercing point, but they complicate the process because of other factors:

• A high density of sweat glands are found on the palms of the hand, this will make the piercing 'weep' more than most others as it heals, and may well cause the piercing to sweat on a hot day even after the healing period.
• The skin on the top and bottom of the hand is very different, and in order to heal, the body must extend it's epidermal layer through the piercing. Somewhere down the piercing it will have to reconcile this difference in skin structures.
• Because of the reliance on our hands, the piercing will be constantly twisted and stretched, if it is to heal, it will have to learn to deal with this.
• The piercing will get much more grubby than most others, cleaning will be required much more frequently.

I checked the internet to see if anyone out there had documented their experiences of hand-web piercings, I found a few web pages which more-or-less confirmed the problem area's that Nik and I had discussed, but after much deliberation, I decided I would go for it. A a couple of months later I was in the right kind of mood, so armed with camera and medical macro lens, I headed for Exeter Body Piercing Studio.

I had already decided that the Web's in question were those either side of the index finger of my left hand - the eventual aim is that a single horseshoe barbell should go through both piercings. The process was no more, or less, uncomfortable that any other piercing, Nik performed the operation as per any other piercing, clamp the area, have a good squint at it with a mag-light to check for blood veins, etc. and pierce with a 'drain' needle, leaving the plastic tube in place as a guide for the jewellery. This insertion of the jewellery was more uncomfortable than the piercing itself, probably due to the tight curve radius of the 'crushed bcr's' that I wanted fitting.

Immediately after the piercing, they throbbed a little, and every-so often one of my fingers would start involuntarily twitching, but by the end of the first day, the piercings were feeling OK. Next morning, I was quite supprised to find that I had lost no mobility in my hand, and though swolen, the piercings were fairly comfortable. Towards the end of that first week, the area around the piercings became rather sensitive, but this subsided along with much of the swelling towards the end of the second week. As expected, they produced copious quantities of 'goo' in those first few weeks, and required cleaning six or seven times a day, but overall I would say that the piercings have been far less trouble than I expected, and at no point has the movement in my hand or fingers been restricted (which is pretty handy; being a programmer, I type all day long.)

Four weeks on, I am beginning to think this little experiment might just work, the two piercings are healing slightly differently, with one weeping mainly from the top, the other from the bottom, but the skin is showing signs at all four piercing points of turning inwards, and it is acting very much akin to a 'normal' piercing now. Both piercings are weeping much less now, and although I still make a point of cleaning them frequently, I think they'd get by on just two or three cleanings a day now. They are less noticable than I thought they would be, it took over two weeks before anyone at work noticed them.