Hide your piercings and prevent closure with body piercing retainers
The main function of body piercing retainers is to prevent the
closure of a piercing in situations that require that body jewelry
be removed. Hiding your piercing with retainers to make them far
less noticeable is sometimes necessary -- especially if your
employer doesn't permit visible piercings. If you're undergoing a
medical procedure such as an X-Ray or MRI, you may be required to
remove all metallic objects, which includes your body jewelry.
Moreover, if you want to keep your belly button piercing while
pregnant, certain retainer styles allow you do so since they can
flex and bend to your body's changing shape. Most piercing retainers
are clear acrylic pieces that you insert in the place of your
metallic piercing jewelry to prevent the hole from closing. Body
jewelry retainers are designed in variety of shapes and sizes to
hide your ear, lip, labret, nose, navel, tongue, septum or nipple
piercing comfortably and without worry.
How the retainers work
After your body is pierced with a needle, you choose the gauge,
length, diameter, and ball of the piece of body jewelry. The gauge
measures the thickness of the jewelry with the smaller the gauge
number, the thicker the jewelry. Common gauges are 14, 16 and 18
gauge. The length measures the length between the barbells. The
diameter is the distance along the inside of a circular jewelry
piece and the ball diameter measures the size of the ball on the
jewelry piece. The retainers come in the sizes of your jewelry piece
and are designed to match the area where your body is pierced. The
best piercing retainers are those that are soft and flexible.
When inserting the retainer for first time, it's a good idea to
apply KY jelly and to be sure that the retainer is a gauge smaller
than your piercing for a proper fit.
Purchasing body jewelry retainers
You can shop for these retainers over the Internet. For instance,
PainfulPleasures.com and
Tribalectic.com
have a vast assortment of retainers priced
below $20. Of course, these websites require shipping, but retainers
are inexpensive accessories. The Painful Pleasures website features
microfilament eyebrow retainers designed to make your piercing hard
to spot, while Tribalectic.com features tongue retainers in either
pink or clear.
Retainers for pregnancy
The BodyCandy.com
website directs pregnant women to the belly button piercing retainer
page where they can find a flexible barbell ring in multiple colors.
The shaft is made with hypoallergenic PTFE, which is used in the
medical industry to create heart valves, and its length adjusts as
the belly expands. The shaft also accommodates any jewelry that can
be threaded onto the shaft.
"It's very common for women who are already pierced to want to
keep them in," says Megg Mass, outreach coordinator for the
Association of Piercing Professionals and the owner of the Infinite
Body Piercings shop in Philadelphia. "No ethical shop would pierce a
woman who's already pregnant," she says. "But women who have a
piercing usually want to keep them. Doctors generally tell them they
can't, but with flexible jewelry, most women can keep their
piercings in."
More options now with easy to buy and inexpensive retainers
As dress codes become more enforced in the workplace, body
jewelry retainers are the perfect answer to keep your piercing and
your job. You can be free to show off your piercing when it's
appropriate and be able to hide it when it's not.
Also See: [
Nipple Jewelry,
Rings, Shields, and Chains ]
[
Belly Button Rings, Dangles,
and Chains ]
[
Tongue Rings and Barbells ]
Home Page: [ Body Jewelry You Seek ]
Piercing Retainers
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