Size two gauges infected and bleeding?

Ok so I have been gauging my ears for a while now and I've been a two for about a year and a half now. I switched from plastic plugs to metal tunnels around December (so about 6 and a half months) lately my right ear has been sore and red on the inside so I gauged down to give them a rest and then gauged back up a few weeks later gushing back up hurt after a couple of days so I took them out to repeat the process and try again. As soon as I took the tunnel out my ear swelled up and was very sore it had almost a ring around the hole. Now the back has closed up and when I tried to put a small piercing in it it bled pretty bad. What's going on? What can I do to get my eats back to stretching condition? I really want to get up to a zero.