Recent Alterations

[halloweenjack]

Nothing major, but some recent changes in me:

1) By altering my dietary intake, I've lost about thirty-three pounds since last fall. I hope to continue the trend.

2) Last weekend, I got my left earlobe pierced, and it's already mildly infected. The care instructions warned me sternly to not touch or play with my piercing. Fat chance of that. I think that it's starting to go down, though, since I've started to douse the little earrings that I'm using with Bactine. I may get my first tattoo as early as this weekend.

3) I've also gotten this delightful little nose and ear hair trimmer (yes, I continue to find interesting places to grow hair--puberty never ended, it just took a little break). It has a nice heft to it, and knurled metal grips. I'd probably start wearing mascara if the brush came with a knurled metal grip.

4) I've started in on the Culture novels of Iain Banks. Just started in on the first one, but already it shows much promise.

Comments

[switchknitter.livejournal.com]

What sort of tattoo?

[jackolantern.livejournal.com]

Either the Tree of Life (http://www.gnosticassociationny.org/Tree_of_Life_color.jpg), or the weird little symbol from "Heroes" (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Image:Heroes_helix.svg), or both. Still deciding.

[switchknitter.livejournal.com]

The Heroes helix would look totally awesome. I'd never seen it before, but the design would look incredible in stark black on skin.

Groovy

[mary-mayhem.livejournal.com]

What's inspired the recent body mods?

And bravo! on the weight loss. :-)

Re: Groovy

[jackolantern.livejournal.com]

Just something that I've contemplated for a while.

[a-nightengale.livejournal.com]

That's fantastic on the weight loss! Way to go! So how have you been altering your food intake?

Don't stress on the ear; when I got mine pierced lo these many years ago, they were infected a lot a first then healed nicely after a few months.

[jackolantern.livejournal.com]

Mostly just eating less junk and snacking on fruit and little baby carrots more.

[alessar.livejournal.com]

Those care instructions sound way off. Playing with it, no but:

You should be rotating the training post earring on a regular basis to make sure the piercing hole doesn't try to stick to your skin and forms a clean circle.

Also, you should have been given a little tube of antiseptic and told to dab a little antiseptic jel on with freshly washed hands.

[turkelicious.livejournal.com]

congrats on the weight loss! it's awesome that you are thinking of getting a tat. anytime anyone loses that much weight, it seems appropriate to mark it in someway and celebrate.

[kwsapphire.livejournal.com]

1. Grats!

2. Harsh chemicals aren't really the best idea for piercings. (Though bactine isn't quite as bad as, say, the people who use listerine on their tongue piercings.) The chemicals can hurt your own cells as much as the bacteria. Using a saltwater rinse (with natural salt) is far better. I can also give some pretty good tattoo care instructions if you care to hear. (My credentials (http://pics.livejournal.com/kwsapphire/gallery/0000359a).)

[jackolantern.livejournal.com]

Sure, I'm always open to suggestions.

[kwsapphire.livejournal.com]

I hope I didn't come off sounding like a know-it-all, there. :)

The thing about tattoos (and to some extent, piercings) is that you are purposely scarring your body. You don't really wan't it to "heal" (in the sense that healing usually means going back to normal). So the idea is to get your body to heal into the new pattern you're setting for it.

Do not use neosporin or any other kind of "first aid" ointment on your tattoos. Someone once told me to do this and it's a bad, bad idea. Luckily someone else corrected me fairly quickly, so I only lost *some* of the color in my tattoo (the green fan on my right shoulder, you can see some pale spots where the color didn't take, that's from the neosporin). First aid ointments will cause your skin to force the ink out in an attempt to "heal" the wound.

Most tattoo places will put a very light bandage on the tattoo before you leave, just so you don't walk out with an open wound. You should not keep it bandaged for long, though, as it needs to breathe. This means, unfortunately, that you will stick to things (clothes, sheets) and it will hurt, but it really is better if you can let it breathe.

You will want to clean the tattoo a few times a day (between two and four). Wash it lightly with room-temperature water and a mild soap. (Recent studies show that antibacterial soap don't actually kill any bacteria and may simply increase bacteria's antibiotic resistance so take that as you will.) By wash it lightly I mean get it wet with your (clean) hand, soap it lightly with your hand, and rinse it by putting water in your hand and dropping the water on your skin. You don't want to allow running water to hit the tattoo, even in the shower, because that can force water into the skin and mess up the ink. It's not an ENORMOUS danger, but it's just one of those things that if you're going to be a perfectionist about protecting your tattoo, there you go. (You can obviously shower normally once the tattoo has closed all the way.)

After you rinse the tattoo, you should apply something like Vitamin A&D ointment. This will help the skin "heal" without actually forcing the ink out. Because the tattoo feels like a road-rash, I have found that the best way for me to apply A&D is to take a paper towel, get it wet, wring it out, put the A&D ointment on that, and then wipe the ointment lightly on to the tattoo. A wet damp paper towel won't pull at your skin as much as a dry one will, and using a paper towel ensures a more even coat of ointment. There should just be a very thin layer of ointment on your skin when you're done, just a slight sheen. You don't want too much goop on there because that will not allow your skin to breathe.

Your total time to "heal" (again, I use the term loosely) depends on your own body.. it used to take me about a week to go from fresh ink to normal skin, but more recently (last tattoo was 2004) it took about a week and a half. It takes less time for some people. It's a good idea to keep sun-screen on your tattoo if you plan on being out in the sun for a very long time. Sun exposure (over a very long time, we're talking years) can fade the ink or even make it darker, hence the really dark, fuzzy, horrible tattoos that so many old sailors have. Though keep in mind, as your skin loses its elasticity and ages your tattoo is going to change anyway, so it's not always going to look as good as it does the first day no matter what you do.

But those are basic care instructions. :) I don't put sun screen on my tattoos when I'm specifically going out to sunbathe anymore, though I do still put sun screen on if I know I'm going to be outside all day for other reasons. Like I said it takes a LOT of sun to do noticable damage so you don't have to be anal about it.

[x-creepy-doll-x.livejournal.com]

Soak earlobe in distilled water heated with a pinch of sea salt.