Piercing Heartbreak

Imagine that Christmas is a couple of weeks away. You’re not necessarily excited about the holiday, but more excited about the fact that it’s going to give you a chance to go home. You’ve been away for about 6 months. You got a fellowship that is going to be fantastic for your career, but it took you 1,000 miles away from your fiancé. You had both decided that this would be the right thing to do. Now, you will get to spend 3 weeks at home with her. A sigh of relief before finishing out the last 6 months away.

Imagine that you finish the 2 day drive but your fiancé is not waiting at home for you. Imagine that she’s out all night and comes home the following day, late, and doesn’t smile when she sees you. Imagine that over Christmas, when you were meant to be spending time together, you wake up alone at 3 in the morning and call her to ask why she isn’t home yet and she doesn’t answer. Imagine that she finally tells you she’s in love with someone else. Imagine when she tells you it’s been going on for months, safely, without fear of being caught, because you’ve been 1,000 miles away. Imagine when she finally ends it, she leaves a note. Before you drive 2 days back to your job in the bitter cold, you pack up every trace of yourself and get it out of the house, and you don’t know what to do anymore because the last 6 years of your life are gone and you don’t want to be alive anymore.

It was the worst Christmas of my life.

Eventually, I managed to crawl out of the drunken hole that had become my life. I had incredible friends to help me. They coaxed me out of my dreary apartment back into sunlight, back to life. Slowly, I began to find joy again. I became determined. No matter how I had been hurt, I would be happy again. I had too much life left to live for it to be lived in sadness.

However, I did dwell on broken promises and broken plans quite often. These thoughts would sneak into the brightest days and shatter them, hurting the most when I realized that I had managed to forget about my ex. I am human, after all.

For a long time, I had been wanting to get a nose piercing. I had a few ear piercings, but somehow, a nose piercing seemed much more daunting. I remember my cartilage piercing aching for days after it was done, and the flesh of my nostril was so much thicker. I was convinced the nose piercing was going to be much worse. Plus, I abhor needles. I love wearing the jewelry, but I hate the process. At one point, I had asked my ex if she would go with me and hold my hand. I’m not remotely ashamed to admit it. Now, that was out of the question.

I could have asked a friend to come with me. I can think of any number who would have said yes. But after the hell that had been my life, I wanted to show myself that I could do this without anyone. I wanted this, and I would make it happen, all on my own. I did my research, and one night on a regular Tuesday after work, I walked up to the tattoo and piercing parlor of my choice.

There I was, perfectly alone, with sweaty palms, and determined to get it done. No need to worry about the sweaty palms. No one would feel them.

I stepped out of the dark street into the warm light of the parlor. I felt instantly comforted. I was talked through everything with a smile, and told to pick my stud. All my own, exactly what I wanted, with no one else's opinion. No one else in the whole world knew I was there besides myself and the kind, happy strangers who didn't look at me with pity. They were happy for me; happy to help me take this step.

I took a breath, and just like that, it was over. I had done this one on my own, and it had hurt least of all.