Today, 30% of Americans have at least one tattoo.
Are you thinking of adding to this statistic? Then you need to know how to take good care of your new body art.
Of course, your artist will give you tattoo aftercare instructions but it always helps to be prepared.
Your tattoo is essentially an open wound, so treat it as such. You’ll want to wash it several times a day with antimicrobial soap to prevent it from getting infected.
When drying it, don’t rub your towel across. Not only will that irritate your skin (and hurt!) but it’ll also compromise the integrity of your tattoo. Instead, gently pat the area dry.
While you’re healing, the area around your skin may start becoming very dry. This can cause it to feel itchy and may even cause excess skin to flake off.
Help your body retain as much ink as possible by keeping your tattoo moisturized throughout the day.
You might think it’s a good idea to keep bandaging your ink to protect it from outside elements. After all, it’s an open wound, and you keep those under Band-Aids, right?
Wrong.
Your tattoo artist will tell you how long to leave the initial bandage on for; this is usually a few hours. Once you remove this bandage, you need to keep as much air circulating as possible for the rest of the time.
Refrain from wearing tight clothing as well. Loose clothing means fewer changes of the fabric irritating your skin and causing the ink to flake out.
As you progress further in healing, you’ll start developing scabs. This is completely normal, but you should leave them alone.
At some point, they may become unbearably itchy. No matter what, you shouldn’t scratch! If you do, you might cause the scabs to fall off, which will likely take some of the ink with them.
A great way to relieve the itchiness is to slap the tattoo. You can also put a spoon the freezer and after, place it across your ink. Both methods will help immensely to control scratching.
If reading about tattoo aftercare instructions has made you interested in being on the other side of the needle, you just may have an exciting new career on the horizon. Learn how to become a tattoo artist to see if that career choice is right for you.
If you’ve got new ink or are planning on getting some soon, make sure you follow our tattoo aftercare tips.
It may be difficult, especially as it becomes super-itchy during the scabbing phase but if you persevere and take good care of your tattoo, it’ll look amazing for years to come.
Did you like reading this article on proper tattoo aftercare? Then keep learning about ink by checking out our other blog posts.
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