Autopsy Y-Incision Scarification

Posted: Mon, Aug 26, 2024

I was a few months healed from my chest tattoo at this point, and was fascinated with the idea of having a Y-incision across my torso as if I’d already been examined post-mortem. Scarification was my first encounter with the world of ‘heavier’ body modifications. Nothing I’d had done/was doing was very intense at this point. I only had experience with tattoos and piercings, and didn’t actually know anyone with ‘heavier’ (is there a better word for that?) mods that I could ask for guidance or their experiences.

I knew of the legendary BME forums, of course, but at the time it was mostly offline (and still is). I had tried to browse the media uploaded via the Wayback Machine which, as you can probably imagine, was fairly hit or miss. While I’ve mentioned it - BME is still existing in various forms, and I’m keeping an eye on their news page as well as following their Instagram. I should also probably join their Mastodon instance at some point.

To cut a longer story short, I went in cold. I’d figure it out.

preparation

I was advised to pick up some Hibiscrub – an antiseptic skin cleanser that they use in hospitals – to wash the wounds and keep it clean as it healed, as well as to have a lot of kitchen roll, masking tape, and a good amount of cling for the first couple of days. I’ll explain how all that factors in later.

the actual procedure

CONTENT WARNING for blood, raw flesh, and grotty scabs from here on out

What a variety of sensations I would experience on this day. I’m not the hairiest guy in the world, but I didn’t realise just how hairy I was until I shaved my whole torso. I just thought it would be easier for the procedure and healing in general - however I was not prepared for how… close? my clothes would feel against me. Extremely disorientating to say the least, and this was just the beginning.

I would then lay on the table after having discussed the design and marked it all out. A scalpel was used ever so gently – much softer than a papercut – to carve out the outline of the main ‘Y’. Numbing gel was rubbed in along the fresh scratches and we waited a few minutes for it to get to work.

Once numbed, they would go in with the scalpel again, but significantly deeper this time. Watching your skin being peeled off is an experience for sure. Holding strings of it as it was removed was even weirder! The skin had gone cold and turned a pale shade of purple I could only call hypothermic, within mere minutes of being removed from my body. The strands of it looked very similar to over-cooked spaghetti and/or horsehair worms.

The stitch effect along each branch was a deep slice with no removal. What was really interesting to see was when such a cut was made, the skin would split into a V shape rather than remain a hairline cut. I suppose it depends on the skin tension and area of the body; I have a whole host of various self-inflicted scars from a more difficult period in my life, albeit not made in a sterile and precise manner, and they all healed in various thicknesses in various areas of my body.

We’re done in a cool 4 hours!

Before I left, I was shown what my set-up would be for the next few days. Kitchen roll was folded and taped carefully under each branch of the Y and below my navel to act as rather affectionately-named ‘blood catchers’. I was then wrapped in cling film a couple times over as a way to pack the wound and help it heal from the inside out, as opposed to the wound closing up where the skin had been removed.

recovery

I’m writing this after I wrote up my thumb spine and tongue split entries and I feel like this was the least-bad out of the three.

the rest of day 0

Well, I was wrapped up in cling, sweating, and making a shit ton of noise whenever I moved my body. I was not best pleased. I thought I’d chill out with a spliff shortly after getting home, which was an atrocious decision. The problem was I still needed to shower and change my dressings, something I would need to do roughly every 6 hours for the first few days. My mind had blanked out and I had forgotten every sensation is heightened after a smoke, so feeling the lukewarm shower water on the wound was hell on earth. Made me wince like crazy! Still, needs must, so on I pushed making sure I was all cleaned and disinfected. New ‘blood catchers’ were added and I would wrap myself up in a good few rounds of cling.

Blood was still clinging to the centre intersection and the bottom, so I thought I’d just leave it rather than trying to agitate it.

day 1

The morning after is strange. Sleeping wrapped in cling is a bizarre, sweaty experience. The shower was a piece of piss to deal with sober! Little to no pain at all, just minor discomfort. Much more of the clotted blod washes away with ease, but I’m still very tender. Pictured on the left is just after my morning shower, and on the right are some freshly installed blood catchers in all their glory.

day 2

Really not a whole lot to say! I’d argue that’s a good thing concerning recovery-related situations. This was a chill day for me so I didn’t have to worry too much about facing the world. Pictured below is after the morning shower on the left and the evening shower on the right. Some redness around the edges of the wound was starting to show especially around the stomach, you can tell my body was sick to the back teeth of being clinged. Slight oozing of lymph but nothing unexpected.

day 3

Today was the first day of my new job. I rolled in, wrapped in plastic, making a fucking racket everywhere I walked around. My cover was blown very early – cling was poking through the top of my t-shirt and I was questioned about new ink. Now for me, it’s not that I’m a shit liar, it’s that I hate lying. It creates mess. I thought I’d just straight up admit that 3 days prior I’d had my torso carved up. People wanted to see the fresh pictures too! Didn’t exactly expect to be showing shirtless photos of myself bleeding on my first day but hey, I suppose it could be worse.

I’d bled a little under the cling, which I’m not super surprised at as I was getting on buses and walking around a fair bit, as opposed to laying around doing sweet fuck-all like I was the day before.

Nowt to worry about though. I cleaned up just fine for my last round of cling. Again, here’s some photos of morning and evening, post-shower.

day 4

My first day of no cling! These are the last photos I have, barring the ones I took recently for my 2 year update. I’d imagine it could not have been that exciting. At this point it’s starting to scab nicely.

The drawback is that my movement is so restricted! It’s extremely uncomfortable to stretch or twist too much, and hugs would be a risky endeavour. My body hair is also starting to grow back with a vengeance, and having a nice layer of scab blocking the way probably wasn’t helping much either. I rememember this awful feeling lasting a couple of weeks. The branches of the Y were the first to heal, and the last areas were directly around the navel and the intersection.

(roughly) 2 years, life pre-mortem examined

Scars are funny things where you don’t necessarily notice them change, but years on you’ll look at one on your body and realise it’s significantly changed colour when you think about it. At this stage, my scars are the same colour as my skin tone albeit slightly pinker. My body hair is all nicely grown back in too. Hair still grows through the scar, so every so often I’ll get the clippers out and run them over it to make it more visible. It’s lovely and flat with the gentlest of bumps at the intersection where the scabbing was the thickest. I have zero loss of range of motion whatsoever - I often forget this scar is even here unless I take my shirt off, or I’m wearing something where it peeks through.

You’ll know that there are many forms and methods of scarification and what I had done is just one of them. There are various recovery methods artists may recommend depending on the overall look you’re going for and how they performed the procedure. I know some people love the look of raised scars, and may use methods to irritate the wound as it heals to encourage hypertrophic scarring, but this is something I did not want to do personally, or at least not for this piece.

I would love to experience different forms of scarring but those are ideas I’ll let swill in my brain for a bit before committing to.