A tattoo is, in its core, puncturing ink-carried needles repeatedly into your skin, so it is worth considering if you should shower afterward. Then, How long after getting a tattoo can you shower? After all, you are having countless open wounds on that particular part of your skin.
Let us answer this question in the below article for you!
How Long After Getting A Tattoo Can You Shower?
Your tattoo’s type and location determine when you can take showers again. It can be from one hour to a full day without bathing, so you should consult with your tattoo artist.
The covering on top should also let you know whether or not you should shower. The artist may choose to let your tattoo rest under a piece of plastic or regular bandage, for which you must wait to take off. If your artist uses a medical-grade or waterproof cover, you can take a bath as water will not touch your damaged skin.
Nevertheless, be super careful dealing with this issue. Because as easy as it might seem, misunderstanding the period you should wait will result in severe damage of allergic reaction or bubbling.
How Should You Shower After Getting A Tattoo?
After the bandage is off, your tattoos will no longer be open wounds. They are still very fragile and sensitive, though, so you should treat the area with care. Here are some tips for those who want to go for a wash after getting body art stabbed into them:
1. Treat Your Tattoo Like A Newly Opened Wound:
The art on your skin, medically speaking, is just a bunch of very small open puncture wounds on one area of your skin. Therefore, you will need to deal with this skin patch with the same gentleness and hygiene as any cuts or scratches. Avoid anything that can cause the wound to infect, and touch it with caution to prevent wound reopening.
[alert-announce]Here’s an unrelated tip: Your diet will need to change as well. Eat lots of protein to let your body have more nutritions to operate. Remember to take out any food that promotes mucus or causes infection, like glutinous rice.[/alert-announce]
2. Don’t Shower With Hot Water:
Dousing your new tattoo in hot water will encourage skin drying and flaking right after the bath is over. You will feel itchier than ever!
To prevent this, shower with cold or lukewarm water instead.
3. Don’t Use Your Showerhead On Your Tattoo:
Speaking of water, perhaps you should avoid pouring water directly onto the new tat at all. Dampening the tattoo will cause it to wrinkle up, encouraging the skin patch to dry up later and flake off.
4. Use Mild Soap:
You can use soap on the area, but please ensure that the soap is gentle and fragrantless. The lack of aroma in the soap guarantees that the soap does not contain too many chemicals, therefore having fewer chances to cause your skin to have an allergic reaction in its weak state.
Aside from using mild and natural soaps, you should avoid using loofahs or any scrubbing pads on the new tattoo.
5. Keep Your Showers Short:
Those with new tattoos had better take a quick shower. Exposing new tattoos to too much moisture for a long time can force the pigments injected in your skin to break and lose their bright hues.
6. Keep Your Tattoo Dry:
If you have accidentally dampened the tattoo spot, you can try using a clean, soft towel to dab the liquid and moisture away gently. Work quickly, or the skin will wrinkle before you can get rid of the trouble!
7. Use Moisturizer:
In case your skin breaks and falls off too much, right after a bath, you can apply a bit of moisturizer on top of the tattoo! Be sure to choose a moisturizer type that is natural and gentle so your skin will not react negatively to it.
You should consult your tattoo artist on this; they will likely recommend an oatmeal-based ointment!
How Can You Tell When Your Tattoo Has Healed?
There is no clear-cut “healed tattoo” list of signs because everyone’s body will show different symptoms throughout the process. Your tattooist is probably the best person to let you know when your tattoo has completely healed. Keeping contact with the artist and acquiring answers from them is the most surefire way to stay informed.
On average, the outermost layer of your skin will regain its former glow within three weeks to a month. However, this does not mean that you should immediately head to the pool or scrub the patch of skin as you usually would, as tattoos can also affect deeper skin layers.
The duration your tattoo takes to get back on its feet depends on a lot of factors. To precisely predict your recovery speed, you must know your skin condition, how much skin the tattoo covers, where the tattoo is, your diet and lifestyle, as well as how you take care of the wound.
The combination of these determiners should tell you when it’s safe to hit the beach again. You should take no less than half a year to be completely confident in salt or chlorine water or any environment that can cause your skin to dry and flake again.
Final Note
Like open wounds, it is common knowledge that you should not expose your new tattoos to water for a long period. Now that you have the answer to the question of “How long after getting a tattoo can you shower?” you can treat your new body art with care better. We wish you luck!
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