Just a heads up, with already having issues, Neosporin is ok to help the area heal with minimal scarring, but I don’t recommend anyone use it for the regular healing process. Neosporin is dsigned to help your body fight infection while healing fast with minimal scarring. Your body treats the ink as an infection, and will therefore help your body fight the ink. In your current situation, go ahead and use it, but when using just for tattoo aftercare, I wouldn’t recommend Neosporin at all. Use another ointment. your artist should have a few to recommend. I personally love aquaphor.
The guy who did it said aquaphor also. Thats what I used until I was told to use neosporin, and I only used on the bad spots. otherwise i used aqua. and bag balm, which was much lighter than aquaphor and has lanolin in it. bonus. I posted some pics if you click on the album you can see three of them, although they look better in the picture. Do you think I will loose the ink?
I looked at your pics and I’d have to say it looks like you got lucky considering the symptoms you described. I had thoughts of MRSA,Septicemia, Acute Pigmentation Allergen to the other extremes such as use incorrect pigments such as indelible inks or ammonia based pigments going through my head at first.
I can’t say for sure what the cause was for the reaction (I hesistate to say infection because that would require a presence of virul or bacterial infestation which has not been determined) though I’ve seen this once before on a portrait tattoo performed by a friend of mine at his studio which is extremely well kept to high standards of sterile technique.
The tattoo was only black and grey, but the client suffered what he described as a severe localized sensation of heat on and slightly outside the tattoo. Skin was warm to the touch, as if it had a fever centralized instead of throughout the body. Redness, swelling, and persistant throobbing pain accompanied it.
The ointment he was using at the time was Neosporin, which at that time was the same ointment I would recommend to my own clients. I suggested he switch to Curel lotion only for the tattoo backed up with the protection of a Zpack antibiotic (Complete 1 week antibiotic treatment in a 24hr package or 3 pills, (Designed as an alternative to IV antibiotics that would requiring hospitalization to administer)
I was able to obtain the Zpack for him and his symptoms subsided within 24 hrs, finally healing with no significant damage or ink loss 3 weeks later. I’m not sure if it was the ointment switch or the meds which helped. Now that I’ve heard your story I’d like to find out more about this if possible to help ID the problem. It may help people in the future.
yeah like I said the pics make it look good. This morning I washed first thing and applied neosporin to the sore spots and bag balm to the rest of it. Right now I can touch the bule pants on “Benny” and still have blue ink come off and it is still gooey and sore. The other figure on the other side also has the blue pants and it is completely healed. I guess keeping it moist is the best thing to reduce scarring but it feels like all the ink is just weeping out and I will be left with nothing. 🙁
Hi Bennpam
To be honest you need to make sure that the tattoo is not getting swamped when you put on the neosporin because that stuff is strong enough to disolve scabs.
I would advise washing it let it dry place an ice pack on for 15-20 mins
Then let it dry again and apply a covering of anti-septic which is jut enough to cover the surface.
This should reduce the weeping but remember health first – ink can always be put back in at a later date.
Take Care
Matthew
just a brief update ;;
my arm seems to be healing fairly well. the scabs have all come off and the area underneath is progressing just as i would expect a heavily scarred tattoo to heal. the middle portion of the apple is all light pink scar tissue mottled with uneven yellows and a slightly darker pink in some spots. the outer areas are a little better off, but not by much — none of the ink healed evenly (which is pretty much what i was prepared for).
i appreciate the advice i received and the acceptance of the fact that my artist isn’t working out of a shop — i know this is frowned upon by some and i’m glad that i got friendly suggestions and warnings, rather than being reamed out for not hiring a shop artist,
my antibiotics are all finished and i think the infection was conquered — as far as i can tell from the surface, anyway — but one more question : there is a small red dot marking every hair follicle on the tattooed area. of course my arm was shaven for the tattoo, and the hair is growing in just as it should, but like i said the follicles seem to be red/pink, almost as if they were irritated by the infection (which seems to be a reasonable thing to have happen). normal? probably?
thanks again guys. 🙂
Hi
The red dot is where the base of the folicle is irritated as it has been producing excess liquid to keep the damaged skin moist.
The hairs on your body are hollow and pump a liquid to protect the skin which acts like a barrier. These can become inflamed if the body has been subjected to infection or foreign bodies.
Do not pick at them and keep them clean and they should go down within a week. Also apply plenty of ice packs if they get itchy.
If they start to blister or weep you need to see a Dr right away!
With regards to the tattoo you need to wait a min of 8 weeks (16 is better) to fully ensure that the scar tissue is healed.
Once it is fully healed and no longer pink you should speak with a pro artist and see if they can do a recolour for you.
I would also take pics of your arm and go back to the ‘artist’ and advise them to stop tattooing or you will take legal action against them for fucking up your ink so bad.
I hope it heals fast.
Take Care
Matthew
yeah .. general good advice but she’s one of my best buddies :/ sooooo eeeeehhhhhhhhhhhh ..
but yes as far as the (*extensive*) touchups go, i will most definitely be waiting a good long time. never again do i want to experience this kind of tattoo fuckup. painful, disgusting, embarassing and worrisome, and certainly not worth it to rush back into finishing up the piece.
thanks again!
Im having similar issues sadly. Thanks for the post. Sat almost 12 hours its my biggest piece on my thigh and its giving me a lot of problems. I have had other tattoos and caring for it the same as the others. I cant even walk right now. It’s been 12 days now and mine is exactly like you described. I think it was just too much ink in one sitting for me. It measure about 9″x13″ Now i have hope i wont loose my leg. This artist is good my husband uses him and never had a problem. I think i just shouldnt have sat for that long.
@Laura McGregor 142708 wrote:
Im having similar issues sadly. Thanks for the post. Sat almost 12 hours its my biggest piece on my thigh and its giving me a lot of problems. I have had other tattoos and caring for it the same as the others. I cant even walk right now. It’s been 12 days now and mine is exactly like you described. I think it was just too much ink in one sitting for me. It measure about 9″x13″ Now i have hope i wont loose my leg. This artist is good my husband uses him and never had a problem. I think i just shouldnt have sat for that long.
This thread is 5 plus years old. I’m not going to read 3 pages of text to get a clue on what may be going on wit your tattoo. Please start your own thread and describe what is going on with your tattoo and post a picture of it.
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