I had my ears pierced when I was 9. Then when I was in college I got them done again but had more trouble with them getting infected and the holes were crooked that I let them grow shut after a year or so.
I thought about my tongue for awhile until I read a nursing article where a girl (less than 25 years old) had her tongue pierced came into the ER a couple days later and it was infected. They sent her home and a couple days after that she came BACK in with symptoms of a stroke. When they did a CAT SCAN on her they found the infection had traveled to a pocket in her brain and formed a large abscess. She ended up having to have that section of her brain removed and was living as a vegetable in a nursing home!
That cooked me right away.
Working in the hospital anyway they won't allow us to have any kind of visible tatoos or piercings other than ears.