I got my upper ear pierced&it's really swollen& painful after i took it !

I got my upper ear pierced&it's really swollen& painful after i took it off and put it back.what shld i do?

agot my upper ear pierced and after 4 days it's doing ok..not much pain only when it got bumped or sumthing..but on the 5th day i took it off and cleaned my ear and the earring with alcohol and then it got so painful and swollen now..it's been like this for 2 days now but it's not that painful bow but is still swollen. there's also NO pus coming out. should i leave the earring in my ear or take it off and let it heal first then have it re-peirced some other time?....i take Advil to relieve the pain and put on some hot compress 2x a day to minimize the sweeling...

Piercings through cartlidge often develop small lumps on them. I believe they're called Keloids. I had the same problem with the industrial piercing in my upper ear and 2 out of the 3 times I got my nose pierced. Taking the earring out so soon probably didn't help as you aggravated it while it was healing. You shouldn't have to take the jewellry out to clean the piercing, you can do it with the jewellry still in. Put some hot water on a cotton wool ball and use it as a compress on the affected area, that should help.

Cartlidge piercings can take a long time to heal. My industrial in the top of my ear took at least 6 months. I go to a very reputable piercing studio and the guy that did it said it's perfectly normal. Just clean it at least twice a day and try not to knock ot around too much or sleep on that side.

It's unlikely that it's an infection. Piercings often leak a clear-ish fluid known as lymph that dries as a transparent yellow-ish crust. This is normal and is part of the healing process. It cleans off easily. Just make sure it's not leaking pus or anything like that. That would be a sign of an infection.

On another note, alcohol probably isn't the best thing to clean it with and probably didn't help the situation. I've always been told to use salt water. Use sea salt not table salt, too. Be gentle when you're cleaning it too. If it's a ring you have in, rotate it so you get the whole thing clean.

If you'r still not sure you could always go back and see your piercer, they should be able to help you out.

Hope that helps.

PS You should check out this link too. It tells you pretty much everything you need to know about piercing aftercare: http://www.safepiercing.org/bodyaftercar...