Swimming & Piercing Truths
Summer is always just around the corner and that brings concerns about swimming and new body piercings. This brief guide will help you to make the safest decisions you can with this fun, but potentially risky, activity.
To begin, new piercings DO NOT need to be kept dry. This is a prominent misinformed recommendation that comes from care for skin sutures, which DO need to be kept dry. In suture healing, the skin is being held together (from a cut or a surgery) to assist in it sealing back together. If the skin gets too wet it will soften and the sutures will not hold.
Not so for body piercings, which are punctures (tunnels). The body seals the surface openings (that part we can see) within the first hour after being done. This seal is what protects the interior of the “wound” from tiny particles sneaking their way inside. (And is also why you never want to move your piercing jewelry and disrupt this protective seal…) The new skin that is growing, starting at the surfaces and moving inward, does not knit together rather it forms the walls of the inner piercing “tunnel”. Good daily rinsing is a needed part of care for this type of healing!
Swimming, bath and hot tubs are submerging of the body into the water. So that is why piercings can be at risk. Pool swimming is considered generally safe as long as the water is not cloudy.
NOT SAFE:
Water parks, unfortunately are not just swimming pools - they are notoriously contaminated. (Pee, mostly… Sorry, 🤢 but true.) Also the slides and other rides can cause some damage to piercings, especially when they’re new.
Lakes, creeks, oceans, etc. are just polluted with tiny, floating particles that can get into the healing piercing, and other healing wounds, too. Best to avoid or not submerge the piercing at all until fully healed.
Bathtubs are also generally full of floating particles of dead skin, bacteria and other debris from the surface of human skin. I call it People Soup. And it’s totally fine for bathing but can cause issues with healing body piercings. (Think how soft a healing scab can become! Literally that protective seal is visibly degrading from the water soaking. And that’s a lot more visible than the similar thing happening to the openings of the new piercings. Just different scale - aka SOOOOOOO tiny!!!) A single dunk is not anything to worry about, though. 😀
Hot tubs… Two basic things create potentially major healing issues for new piercings here:
First, the water is consistently warmer than a regular bathtub so the softening discussed above is even quicker
Second, there are usually multiple people in that hot tub… So everyone donates tiny particles into that “Soup”… Enough said? 🤢
So staying safe when swimming or participating in other fun water activities is all about being informed and making informed choices! Be patient and your healed and trouble-free piercing will be grateful!!
Note: Some piercings can be safely covered by waterproof skin protectors, like navel piercings. But nothing can protect as well as clean swimming pools and avoiding the rest until fully healed! ☀️