Guide to Tattoos and Piercings Options

[*mzkandi*]

Since I am interested in getting inked and well as get additional piercings, I want to share what I found while reseaching.

Guide to Tattoos and Piercings

Information provided by
http://www.mayoclinic.com/invoke.cfm?id=MC00020
Picture credit to About.com

Tattoos
A tattoo is a permanent mark or design made on your body with pigments inserted into your skin through pricks in the skin's top layer. A needle that's connected to a small machine with tubes containing dye pierces the skin repeatedly — an action that resembles that of a sewing machine — inserting tiny ink droplets with every puncture. The procedure, which may last up to several hours for a large tattoo, causes a small amount of bleeding and a level of pain that can vary from minor to significant.
Tattoo designs can range from small pictures of fish or flowers in inconspicuous places to large dragons or ornate designs covering the entire back or arms.

Piercings
Body piercing is traditionally done without any anesthesia to dull the pain. The practitioner pushes a hollow needle through a body part, then inserts a piece of jewelry into the hole. Some practitioners may use piercing guns, but these are difficult to sterilize and can more easily damage the skin.
The ears — both the earlobe and higher up in the cartilage — are the most commonly pierced sites; up to 90 percent of females have at least one piercing in each ear. But other sites include the eyebrows, nose, lips, tongue, nipples, navel and genitals


The risks of body decorations

+ Tattooed artwork and piercings can come at a price. Body modification involves breaching one of your body's main protective barriers — the skin. Any time the needle pokes through your skin, you face the risk of an infection. And tattoo dyes and certain jewelry metals can cause skin reactions. Specific risks include:

+ Allergic reactions. Tattoo dyes, particularly red dye, can cause allergic skin reactions, resulting in an itchy rash at the tattoo site. This may occur even years after you get the tattoo. Some piercing jewelry is made of nickel or brass, which also can cause allergic reactions.
Blood-borne diseases. If the equipment used to do your tattoo or piercing is contaminated with an infected person's blood, you can contract a number of serious blood-borne diseases. These include hepatitis C and HIV, the virus that causes AIDS — which both can be fatal — as well as hepatitis B, tetanus and tuberculosis. The risk is serious enough that the American Red Cross requires you to wait a year after getting a tattoo before you donate blood.

+ Oral complications. Jewelry worn in tongue piercings can chip and crack your teeth and cause gum damage.

At some point, you may decide you don't want your tattoo anymore, for example, if it no longer fits your image or if it affects your career choices. Tattoo artwork may also blur or fade, and you may not be happy with its appearance.
Skin disorders. Your body may form bumps called granulomas around tattoo ink, especially if your tattoo includes red ink. Tattooing can also cause areas of raised, excessive scarring (keloids), if you're prone to them. Keloids are more common in those with darker skin.

+ Skin infections. Tattoos and piercings can lead to local bacterial infections. Typical signs and symptoms of an infection include redness, warmth, swelling and a discharge containing pus.
Significant skin infections after tattooing are unusual. However, up to 30 percent of piercings result in such infections or bleeding. Navel piercings take longer to heal — sometimes up to nine months — since sweat under tight clothing can keep the area damp, increasing bacteria. Infections from piercings in the upper ear cartilage are especially serious. Because cartilage doesn't have its own blood supply, taking antibiotics is often ineffective since the drug can't travel to the infection site. Such infection can lead to cartilage damage and serious, permanent ear deformity.


Take good care of your new artwork

+ How you care for your new artwork depends on the type and extent of work done. Your tattoo artist should provide you with instructions on how to care for the body artwork afterward. These directions may require you to remove the dressing applied by the artist after a few hours; clean your tattoo regularly with soap and water, and then pat dry with a towel; and regularly apply a moisturizing product. In addition, avoid sun exposure during the first few weeks after your tattoo.

+ Tattoos may take up to several days to heal. Don't pick at scabs, which can increase the risk of infection, damage the design and cause scar formation.

+Follow-up care for piercings depends on the body part pierced:
- Oral piercings (tongue or lip). Use an antibacterial, alcohol-free mouth rinse for 30 to 60 seconds after meals while your piercing heals.
Use a new soft-bristled toothbrush after the piercing to avoid introducing bacteria into your mouth.
- Skin piercings (nose, ears, eyebrow, navel). Clean the site with warm water and a cleanser once or twice a day; if you clean it more than that you'll irritate it. Before cleaning, wash your hands with soap and water to reduce the risk of introducing bacteria to the site. Rinse the site in warm water and gently remove any crusting with a cotton swab.
Then apply a dab of a liquid medicated cleanser — the piercer might recommend an over-the-counter option — to the area. Gently turn the jewelry back and forth to work the cleanser around the opening. Avoid alcohol and peroxide, as they can dry the skin, and avoid antibiotic ointments, which keep oxygen from reaching the piercing and can leave a sticky residue on the area.

What happens if you tire of your new look?

If you decide you no longer want your piercing or tattoo, you do have some options for removing them. Piercings often heal over, sometimes quickly, once you remove the jewelry that keeps the hole open. But know that tattoos are meant to be permanent, so complete removal of them is difficult. Several removal techniques exist, but regardless of the method used, scarring and skin color variations are likely to remain. Methods include:

Laser surgery. This is the most effective way to get rid of a tattoo. Pulses of laser light break up the pigment in the tattoo and your body naturally processes it. You may require as many as 12 treatments over a year to reduce the appearance of the tattoo. The treatment might not be able to completely erase it. Black ink is the easiest to remove, and red and yellow are the most difficult.

Dermabrasion. The tattoo area is chilled until numb, and then the skin that contains the tattoo is sanded down to deeper levels. This shouldn't be too painful, but it may leave a scar.

Excision. A doctor can surgically cut out the tattoo and stitch the edges back together, but this also can leave a scar.

A piercing or tattoo may take only a few minutes or a few hours to acquire, but invest plenty of thought and research before getting one. Take steps to protect yourself against possible risks so that what seems like a cool idea now doesn't turn into a source of regret later.

Additional Resource:
http://tattoo.about.com/od/tattoo101/a/tatbegguide.htm

[sprezzatura]

It is a very useful guide for those who want tattoo or piercing here or there.

[gelionie]

Very useful guide.
I'm not planning to have any tattoos and probably only just one piercing and each of my ear lobes.

[shortiiex]

hearing the risks freaks me out...i probably can't take care of it...i know taht tatoos were bad for blood b/c my mom was donating blood but her blood was no use b/c of the tatoo material

[iheartjohn]

*kiss for Kiera*


Thanks. I'm thinking about getting a tattoo in a few weeks.

[*AngelicEyz00*]

Woo hoo, tattoo here i come!

[hi-C]

Something I just realized:

When I decided I was going to get my cartilege pierced my freshman year of college, I told my friends that I would just go get it done at Claire's. They literally yelled "NO!!!" and told me to get it done at a professional piercing place. This is because Claire's uses guns to pierce whereas a real piercing place uses needles.

The piercing gun procedure causes more tissue trauma than the piercing needle procedure. The studs are considerably duller than a piercing needle and literally tear a hole through the tissue, whereas the needle slices a clean hole the gauge of the jewelry to be installed.

Most importantly, the cleanliness of the piercing gun method is questioned. Ear piercing guns are often made of plastic which cannot be properly sterilized in an autoclave. Simply wiping the gun with a surface disinfectant between clients is not adequate when the piercing gun could have possibly been exposed to bloodborne pathogens. Although the piercing studs themselves may be sterile, piercing guns which touch the earlobe before and after the procedure can be easily contaminated with blood.  The gun may also be indirectly contaminated if the piercer touches the studs after they are installed and then touches the piercing gun without changing gloves.

[*mzkandi*]

Now that is interesting. I got my cartiledge piercing done at Claires....hrmmmm.

[hi-C]

Yeah, I know, right. My friends pretty much told me about the piercing trauma but I learned about the sanitation thing when I looked it up. I got my second lobe piercings at Claire's too and when I read that I breathed a silent sigh of relief that I didn't get an infection or disease. I used to think that the gun is okay for the lobes since they're soft and fleshy so the trauma couldn't be that bad but now I'm not so sure.

[sharpandcuddly]

if i get a tattoo it'll have to be at some new place cause i dont want to end up with a damn disease.
thats helpful, thanks.

[silver-rain]

Something I just realized:

When I decided I was going to get my cartilege pierced my freshman year of college, I told my friends that I would just go get it done at Claire's.  They literally yelled "NO!!!" and told me to get it done at a professional piercing place.  This is because Claire's uses guns to pierce whereas a real piercing place uses needles.

The piercing gun procedure causes more tissue trauma than the piercing needle procedure. The studs are considerably duller than a piercing needle and literally tear a hole through the tissue, whereas the needle slices a clean hole the gauge of the jewelry to be installed.

Most importantly, the cleanliness of the piercing gun method is questioned. Ear piercing guns are often made of plastic which cannot be properly sterilized in an autoclave. Simply wiping the gun with a surface disinfectant between clients is not adequate when the piercing gun could have possibly been exposed to bloodborne pathogens. Although the piercing studs themselves may be sterile, piercing guns which touch the earlobe before and after the procedure can be easily contaminated with blood.  The gun may also be indirectly contaminated if the piercer touches the studs after they are installed and then touches the piercing gun without changing gloves.

Hmm, I'm considering getting my cartilege pierced and a second lobe piercing there with a friend who's getting her lobes pierced for the first time. Eh, I might look for another place for my cartilege because I've also heard that the piercing guns are not good for those piercings.
Hmm, for my first lobe piercing, I went to a place that used a gun and my ears have never had any problems though...

[omgah_itsmaggiex]

i always wondered..if you fell on your knee and that tattoo was on your knee (idk why it would be there) and you ended up scraping it so it bled, would the tattoo still be there?

[*mzkandi*]

^ I've wondered that too. Since two of my friends are planning on getting inked this weekend I'm going to ask the tattoo artist that. I'm guessing that tattoo would become disfigured.

[lovescream]

o_o OKAY.
Thanks. XD
I wanted to get a tattoo when i was older ( and wow, my mom actually said i COULD XD )
but after reading that, about the diseases, infections, and crap, yeeeah. I think I might change my mind. ;_;

[xxhorsexxaddictx...]

Very useful guide.
I'm not planning to have any tattoos and probably only just one piercing and each of my ear lobes.

why not? im 12 and i have 2 peircings in one ear and 2 and a cartilage peircing in the other. when i turn 16 i am going to get either my belly-button peired or my nose peired. (only a little stud tho) tatoos are stupid tho dont get one.

1. too panfull
2. PERMANANT ewwwwww

[illriginal]

I hope all of you get AIDS when you get your tattoos.


Just sayin'

[sixfive]

I hope you get aids when you f*ck your monkey wife, or wait y'all ain't married yet.

[YoIndra]

yes its very usefull!
i always wanted a tattoo but my friends always said that its permanent n stuff so that kinda scares me...what if i dont like it in 10 years or 20 or when im a grandma

[illriginal]

yes its very usefull!
i always wanted a tattoo but my friends always said that its permanent n stuff so that kinda scares me...what if i dont like it in 10 years or 20 or when im a grandma

Exaaactly.



My uncle hates his tattoo and he got it when he served the military.

[Superase]

Hmmm...i think if i were ever to get a tattoo. I'd get my entire body done.