You never leave tapers in. Ever.
Ever. They are never to be worn for any length of time,
ever. You follow the taper through the ear immediately with a single flare or no flare plug, that you leave there for at least 3 months before moving up to the next size, without skipping sizes. And the larger you go, the longer the wait time between stretches is. At around 8ga you shouldn't be using tapers anymore at all, you should be using the taping method anyway.
Also, there are at least two threads that would deal with this specifically,
The Official Tattoos, Body Piercing, and Body Modification thread and the
Official "It's STRETCHED, you sillies" thread