I have been stretching my ears for little over a year now and I stopped stretching a 7/8 s a few months ago. Healed great and no problems. A few days ago I decided to move up to 1 . I bought a stretch plug aka taper to move up to that size. Yesterday I got them in both ears with a little difficulty but not much seeing this is a big jump. Ached a little over the night and to this morning. When I got to work, I still had them in but was told by my manager to take them out. Of course I know that keeping them in and let my ears form around them would the wises choice but I cannot argue with my employer. So I took them out and a few hours past and I noticed swelling on both lobes. I got off work, came straight home and jumped into the shower to get them back in. But before I tried getting the tapers in, I massaged them lobes for a few minutes and then got them in. I am wondering, if I could have done some damage to my lobes...the pain on a scale of 1 to 10 10 being outrageously unbearable and 1 being nothing to it, I would say a 5 ina half.