When Do Piercings Close or Shrink

I think we’ve all been there. Just casually going about our day, maybe showering, out running errands, just sitting around at home. And you hear that horrible, bone-chilling little ‘tnk tnk tnk….’ Of something small and metallic hitting the floor and disappearing. Maybe you don’t even hear it, you just wake up or look in the mirror and notice you are missing something essential. Your jewelry! Despite all our best efforts, losing jewelry sometimes happens. In fact, I’ve even written about how to handle it when it does. But when something falls out, or even when we take something out for work or school, or an event. How long does it take that piercing to close? When does it start shrinking? How long can I have it out for? Today, let’s talk about all of that, and what to keep in mind if you’ve lost some jewelry or removed it.

How Do Piercings Stay Open

First, in order to understand when things shrink or close, we need to understand how they stay open. Piercings are created by inserting a needle through the skin, which displaces the tissue around it. Piercing needles don’t remove tissue (you can learn more about that here) but rather they create a small crescent-shaped wound and stretch it into a round shape that will accommodate jewelry. After the piercing is done, we immediately insert jewelry into the wound. If we just insert a needle and don’t put anything else in behind it, the body would simply seal that tissue back together and heal it up. In fact, as any piercer who has ever lost connection on a transfer can tell you, even if a hole is made, if jewelry doesn’t immediately go in, it can be almost impossible to get it back through sometimes. Our bodies are amazing and fast at sealing these small wounds to keep us safe. It’s how our bodies have evolved to protect us from bacteria and infection. So, the jewelry is what keeps that wound separated. As a piercing heals, our bodies grow tissue around the jewelry in a small channel. Before that tissue is fully established, if things are removed, the body is once again going to try to seal that tissue back together; that’s what our bodies are designed to do to protect us. Once that tissue is established, in many cases the jewelry is still responsible for keeping the channel in that round shape. Remove the jewelry, and the skin and tissue will relax and shrink that little channel up. Different types of tissue do this faster than others. So our piercings are really being held open and in place by our jewelry. Now, the longer we wear jewelry and the longer we have our piercings, the more established that channel becomes and the more stable it is without jewelry. A piercing someone has had for only a year is going to be much less established than one that’s 20 years old. This is often why our first lobe piercings done as young children stay open the best for many folks.

So now that we understand how piercings stay open…how do they close and shrink? And more importantly- when.

Healing Piercings

If a piercing is still healing, the body is going to want to close that wound very quickly if given the opportunity to. See, a piercing is a wound with a foreign object trapped inside it. Our bodies? Not the biggest fan. So the moment that foreign object is removed, our bodies are very excited to finally have this thing gone and are ready to heal and seal the wound. The more recent a piercing, the faster it’s going to want to close. Within the first few weeks or months of having a piercing, if the jewelry is removed or comes out, it’s going to close up fairly quickly. Sometimes just a few minutes is long enough for jewelry to not be able to be reinserted easily.

Now, our bodies aren’t miracle workers. We haven’t magically healed this entire piercing closed in a matter of minutes. If we could heal that fast, piercings wouldn’t take so damn long to heal! But they will shrink that fast. Remember- it’s the jewelry holding the piercing open into that round shape. When the jewelry is removed, that tissue no longer has something holding it separate, so it’s just going to collapse in on itself, and then begin to shrink up. Imagine sitting on the beach and putting your hand into the sand. When you remove your hand, the sand falls back in on itself right away. That hole you made with your hand doesn’t remain perfectly open. It’s similar to your piercing. So if you remove the jewelry and try to reinsert it just a few minutes or hours later, it’s not going to go back in easily, as that channel has shrunken.

The good news it it’s often shrunken, not closed. Meaning with special tools and the right technique, we can often gently guide jewelry back in. The piercing is still there, but it’s very small and thin now, too small for the jewelry you were wearing to go back in easily. But if you can make it to a piercer, we can usually use tools like insertion pins to gently reinsert jewelry and get the channel back up to size. These are a type of taper designed for reinserting jewelry, and they allow us to gently reopen that shrunken piercing at a smaller size and then stretch it back to the size of the jewelry and guide the jewelry back into the piercing channel. Now, hypothetically could you just shove the old jewelry back into the hole and force it back to size? Yes, you could. But you often risk tearing the healing tissue in the piercing and causing a lot of damage that can lead to irritation bumps, migration, and even rejection. When we use proper tools and gentle techniques to reinsert jewelry, we can minimize these risks, although not eliminate them. If jewelry is removed at all during the healing process, be it accidentally or intentionally, we risk damage and irritation to the piercing.

Generally, if a piercing is still healing it’s ideal to get to a piercer within 24-48 hours after jewelry has come out to get something back in. The sooner the better for most folks. However, if it’s within one week, I would say it’s still worth it to get in to see a piercer and see if it’s possible to be reopened. It may not be, but it’s still worth it to check. You’d be surprised at how many piercings I’ve been able to still salvage that have been out for a few days and the client was positive it was fully closed. Most piercings take between 6 and 9 months to fully heal, but I would say for any piercing under a year old, it should be a top priority to get into your studio and get something back in as soon as you can, ideally within a day or two.

Healed Piercings

What about once your piercing has fully healed? Surely those are going to stay open very well now that they are healed? Well as I mentioned above, a piercing being considered healed means there is healthy tissue formed entirely around the interior channel of the piercing. But often the jewelry is still what keeps that channel open and in its shape. If jewelry is removed, often that channel won’t stay open as a perfect hole very long and will start to collapse in and shrink sometimes fairly quickly. If I were to remove jewelry from my cheek piercings, which are almost 13 years old, and a 10g, it’s a bit tricky to get jewelry back in after just 2 or 3 minutes of it being out. Conversely, I could leave jewelry out of my labret piercings and put it back in over 72 hours later with little effort. Now my cheeks aren’t closing that quickly- they are shrinking. Meaning the channel is still there, but it’s quickly getting smaller without the jewelry actively keeping it open.

Most piercings, if jewelry is removed, are going to shrink over time. If you’ve ever left your earlobe piercings out for a few weeks, and found it tricky to get jewelry back in that first time, you know exactly what I’m talking about. Some piercings shrink more quickly than others. Nostrils, eyebrows, bridges, most ear cartilage, and nipple piercings are all notorious for shrinking fairly quickly once jewelry is removed. Some folks get lucky and can leave jewelry out for ages and have things barely shrink at all, but these folks are in the minority.

Now when it comes to fully healing shut, that is a different matter entirely. Septum piercings are probably my favorite example of this. Septums usually shrink at about the same rate as other piercings, maybe a little slower. But in terms of fully closing? I very often reopen septum piercings that haven’t had jewelry in them for months and even years. The channel is still very much there, just shrunken down to a smaller size. Conversely, nostrils close fairly easily and sometimes folks come in who have only had their nostril out for a day or two, and it’s already healed closed. Everybody is different, and some folks’ bodies are going to shrink and close their piercings much faster than other people’s bodies.

As a general guideline, if a piercing is fully healed and jewelry has come out or been removed, it’s best to come in as soon as possible to see about getting something put back in because there is the risk of things closing. But if it’s been within a month of jewelry coming out, I would say it’s still worth going in to see a piercer. You’d be shocked at how many times we can actually reopen things and save the piercing! And even if we can’t, it’s still worth it to try if you enjoy the piercing and want to keep it.

Piercings can shrink much faster than most people realize, but take longer to fully close than folks realize, too. It’s always worth getting in touch with your piercer or taking a trip to the studio to see if we can get things back in for you. With specialized tools and training, we are often able to save more piercings than you might expect! Hopefully, this blog helps you feel prepared next time your jewelry comes out. Happy healing!