> Tattoo After Care – Clark North Tattoo

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baby and dad client 2013
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Tattoo After Care

    A lot of people message me with healing questions, So i think a few things here might help.  People are telling me that they are keeping there tattoos wet with lotion or ointment while healing.  I personally have my Clients heal dry and naturally.  
 (Every tattooer has a different hand, other healing methods do work for other tattooers and it’s very important that you do what your tattooer tells you, each experienced tattooer/tattooist does know what their technique needs.  Doing something different than you are told can result in some “not so fun” arguing between you two, so…….. If you sit with an experienced tattooer, then do what you are told.)
• Fact #1: If you are healthy, your skin knows how to heal.
 • Fact #2: When you heal skin from a doctors procedure, you are always told to keep it absolutely dry for 2 weeks.  if you have ever seen some of the beautifully colorful and crisp tattoo works of Bert Grimm, Paul Rogers, Sailor Jerry or Bob Shaw etc… after it was 30 to 60 years old, then you know how good the natural and dry healing of fresh tattooing can look as it ages.
• Fact #3: skin needs to breathe air to heal.    
• Fact #4: skin scabs when it heals… the bottom of a scab is your body creating new skin.

• Fact #5: Wet scabs get “deeper” into the skin, which will pull out “more” of the tattoo minerals when they fall off, possibly 5%-20% more. Rubbing skin that is healing takes the scabbing off prematurely at a cellular level, and just because you see a scab, does not mean it is a deep scab, the key to a good heal is to keep the scab shallow.
 
(ointment & lotions began being used for the comfort of the client, as it does feel much better while it heals when using them, it is also a much prettier heal because it appears the tattoo is scabless, even flaking skin is eliminated with lotions, making the tattoo appear to not be an injury.  In my opinion, the long term of the tattoo is more important than the 2 weeks that it is uncomfortable and ugly, sacrifice 2 weeks of healing a tattoo so it is a crisper more vibrant tattoo for the rest of your life.)
    I also like my clients to lightly spray, spritz or splash 91% rubbing alcohol daily during the Natural heal and Scabbing in order to insure that it stays dry, and it helps prevent it from getting “deep”….. as well as killing possible bacterial pick-up through the clients daily life.
also: The more skin that is tattooed the harder the heal will be. Different minerals used (different colors) do have different PH values*, human PH level at time of healing can be slightly different than the mineral, all colors will heal different due to this “mild” irritation…  so be patient.  Lotion and such can be used by some tattooists to keep the skin soft and flexible, but I’m pretty sure they are “not” intending a lot of it…You have 7 layers of skin, the tattoo is 4 skin layers deep out of the 7 that you have, the scabbing is the top 2 layers of the tattoo’d skin…too much moisture and suffocation while it heals MAKES THE SCAB DEEPER, if the scab gets deep enough it can pull out the third layer, it will permanently pull out too much tattoo mineral, leaving a duller, weaker looking tattoo.  Peeling and scabbing are natural & normal healing symptoms of all animals, some people scab much more than others & some people don’t scab at all.  Getting a scab too wet makes a deeper scab…don’t make your scab deeper, it will ruin what your design could have looked like by leaving less mineral in the skin than was possible…I cant say it enough…Don’t irritate, suffocate or over moisten the healing skin…use common sense…Things that can irritate healing skin are….. chemicals, dyes, fragrances, the sun, rubbing, scratching and so on, please use common sense.
*Minerals used in tattooing are between 6.8 & 7.5 pH, the natural “average” human ph is the same.
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