Annoyed and disappointed (temporary setback)

[CliftonGK1]

I've been wearing 3/4 for a while, and it's time to gauge up again so I got myself some 20.5mm silicone teardrops. They're nice and simple, and I figured that I could wear them for a little bit at a time each day until things were fully comfortable with them, right?
Sadly, not so much. My own dumb fault, though.

I put them in and they were very comfortable. I could tell it was a size up, but I've been weighting my tunnels for a few weeks and there's some spare room to fill. My mistake was popping them in over the weekend and going out for a bike ride which took more time that I had expected. The combination of some extra time and maybe the helmet straps moving things around irritated my ear at the narrow end of the teardrop. For being silicone, it's pointier than I would have expected.
I didn't tear anything, but I did develop an uncomfortable "hotspot" at that peak, so I took them out and went back down to my 3/4 teardrops for another few days until the irritation is gone. I was really hoping to just be able to swap over to them immediately. They are nice looking, and I really dig the shape the elongated teardrop gives my ear.

(Plus, I've got a pair in hot pink to match my team's racing kit!)

[KAISERROLLS]

I know how that is, but not personally, a guy I work with struggles all the time when he goes out biking he thinks its the helmet, I get the same thing in the winter when i ski and board. I would say that the teardrops dont help the case very much sense there not even pressure.

[corazon_de_oro]

Sorry if I'm misunderstanding, but did you stretch with the silicone? Silicone isn't really meant to be stretched with, for a couple reasons... it expands in your ear all at once so if you realize your lobes aren't ready to stretch you can't stop it. Also, the material is very porous and can dry out your ears/trap bacteria. Teardrops shouldn't be in fresh stretches either... they're really meant to be temporary jewelry in stretches that have been settled for a long time. The best thing to do is get yourself a pair of round, single-flare plugs or tunnels in glass or titanium and let that be your fresh stretch/long term jewelry. Silicone, acrylic, and other materials can look really cool but it's best to just leave them in for short periods of time and keep the glass or titanium in most of the time to keep your lobes happy.

[CliftonGK1]

No, the stretch (which I thought was far enough done) was done via hanging weight on my 3/4" tunnels for a gradually increasing amount of time each night. Over the course of about a month I could see that with the weight in place there was a significant amount of daylight showing above the top of the jewelry. My plan was to put in the silicone and see if things were comfortable, and if that were the case, to leave it for a few hours a day to assure things were fully at the correct gauge.

Being from a background in clinical microbiology, I've got a handle on watching for infection, but thank you for the consideration (I know that a lot of people might not be as aware of the issues related to silicone plugs, so it's always good to restate it.) Even if I'm wearing my silicone plugs, I'm a stickler for cleanliness, and I make sure to always sanitize my plugs at the end of the day. (A good soak in H2O2 or EtOH does the trick.)

I do need to find something round in that size, as I think that was a big part of the irritation; that peak on the teardrop shape created a concentration of pressure which led to the "hotspot". If you've ever had a pair of shoes that didn't fit quite right across the top of your foot, and you get that annoying pressure point that won't go away until you take them off... It was like that in my ear. Bah.
Fine now that I've taken them out and put a pair of my 3/4" back in, but dang it was mildly annoying for a couple hours.

[apollo726]

Sounds like you have a pretty good grasp on things. Maybe it was just sweat and excessive movement on the tunnels that caused a mild irratiton? Then add the shape of a teardrop tunnel and the majority of friction may of been centered at a specific point giving you a "hot spot". Downsize a bit add a little TLC (cleaning/oil) then sport those pink babies for the next ride and hope it doesn't happen again

[bradykay90]

Sorry if I'm misunderstanding, but did you stretch with the silicone? Silicone isn't really meant to be stretched with, for a couple reasons... it expands in your ear all at once so if you realize your lobes aren't ready to stretch you can't stop it. Also, the material is very porous and can dry out your ears/trap bacteria. Teardrops shouldn't be in fresh stretches either... they're really meant to be temporary jewelry in stretches that have been settled for a long time. The best thing to do is get yourself a pair of round, single-flare plugs or tunnels in glass or titanium and let that be your fresh stretch/long term jewelry. Silicone, acrylic, and other materials can look really cool but it's best to just leave them in for short periods of time and keep the glass or titanium in most of the time to keep your lobes happy.

Thank u i told another person that n got told other wise so i left it at that