I have had my scaffold for about 8 days now and i think it is healing okay. I have heard that you shouldn't twist it or pull it through the hole in the healing process. But whenever i clean it with a cotton bud it moves freely anyway; is this okay? And also it is quite swollen, how long will this take to go down?
If the healing is ok then definitely twist it.You don't want it to heal around the piercing.The swollen and redness is normal.If you don't have sea salt with water formula thingy then use warm water on your ear to reduce the redness and so it could b less swollen.It takes time for a scaffold piercing to stop producing redness and swolleness.Don't move it in the healing process either.It hurts and it will bleed and it will due something to your tissues so I've heard.Like they say never touch a new piercing.But if you are pretty sure that the healing is ok then start moving it.And don't sleep on it either cause that also makes it red and swollen.
You should definitely twist it. If you don't, the hole could heal around it... so when you eventually go to twist or change it, it's going to break the scab that has formed onto the jewelry and then you'll be going through the healing process all over again. You wanna make sure the hole is healing, but not around the jewelry. It shouldn't stay swollen for too long. Just keep cleaning it. If it stays swollen, it might be irritated. Try to not sleep on it, not touch it without washing hands first, etc. If you're worried you could use a warm sea salt compress in addition to your normal cleaning. 8oz water + 1/4tsp salt. Works wonders for infections/irritation, and supposedly helps with with the healing process even if you're not having problems. It can't hurt. But make sure you use sea salt or kosher salt, not table salt.
