Does my lip piercing sound infected?

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Tuesday August 11th, 2009 @ 7:58 PM

Filed under: Lip/Cheek

Alright, I tend to be a little bit paranoid so please bear with me. I’ve waited for my lip piercing for the past 5 years and I just don’t want anything to go wrong. Alright I got my lip peirced five days ago now and the area around the peircing was a slightly red circle and it’s been a bit sore but I figured thats normal. The area around the peircing today seemed a bit darker red and very irritated. A friend of mine and my mom (who have no knowledge of peircings) said it looks like the beginning of an infection and it isn’t normal for the area still to be enflamed five days later. It really hasn’t been hurting me much but I have been touching it a lot so now it feels even more sore.. still nothing excruciating. I’ve been washing my mouth out with H2ocean and have been rubbing the same stuff Claire’s gave me when I got my ears pierced years ago (probably not the best idea). After being told that was a bad idea I’m now using antibacterial soap (Dial I believe). I probably wouldn’t have this concern but Im starting to get a low grade fever and feel naucous and I’m worrying they could be related… If someone could just help me out and tell me what they think it would be appreciated

Sounds to me more like irritation caused by two things. Primarily the stuff you have been cleaning your piercing with (switch to twice daily seasalt soaks - how to correctly do this can be found on this site with a quick search) and also touching the piercing. This is a total no-no as the potential to introduce bacteria from dirty fingers is there (other than the fact that touching the piercing will disturb the jewellery and irritate the wound). Other symptoms of infection include pain (an infected wound is really painful), discharge that can be a yellowy-brown colour sometimes streaked with blood and often foul-smelling and swelling. I believe it is always better to err on the side of caution so if you are concerned, a quick trip to the docs won’t kill you. If they do diagnose infection and prescribe antibiotics, be sure to leave the jewellery in, at least until the infect has cleared (should you decide to retire it).

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