Question about stretching/gauging ear lobes?

I'm thinking about stretching my ear lobes... I've wanted to do it for a while, although I'm still deciding. I have a question about it... If I do decide to stretch them, I don't plan on stretching them very large. A small size, maybe 16g or 14g. Later on, after they're stretched to one of those sizes, if I took the jewelry out, would they eventually heal, or "shrink" back to the normal size? I'm sure it would take a while if they did. About how long would it take them to start to be normal again?