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Mixed Removal Messages

Pippy1976

Hi

I have a tattoo on my back, under my left shoulder blade, running to just under my left arm. I've got a wedding next year and really want this gone - However, I've tried laser before and it didn't work.

Wondering what other options I have. I don't want a cover-up as I don't want this tattoo or any other tattoo.

I've heard of creams etc and salabrasion but not sure of the effectiveness of either. Any other suggestions? I know there's a thread on here for Laser removal already but I'm looking for something different... hence the new thread.

Thank you!

p

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Pippy1976

Actually, maybe an Index of Useful Removal Tips / Methods could be created - ? There seems to be alot of interest in getting rid of tattoos....

Princess Peach

There's one here

Maybe a mod could add a link to the sticky of helpful tips?

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2054996676

Just Like Heaven

I think there's different types of lasers, if the treatment doesn't seem to be effective, go to another studio and ask if they're using a different machine etc.

Before people jump in and say the creams are no good, I know a women who applied the cream and the tattoo is actually completely gone, although she applied almost every day for 18+ months and the tattoo was probably 5+ years old to begin with.

Pippy1976

Interesting, @fewtinsoffroth - people are very quick to rubbish those creams alright. Although, no-one can say for certain only those that have used them. I just think if the creams were that effective alot more people would be using them...

I'll try another laser studio and see what they recommend. Is it best to go to a dedicated laser removal / cosmetic place or are the ones provided in tattoo parlours just as good too? What laser should I be asking about? I can't remember the name of the one that was used on me in Derma Laser in Tallaght. It has left a very faded tattoo and some scarring also. My tattoo is black.

I know there is no quick fix but was hoping that enquiring a year ahead of schedule would give me plenty of time to get working on it and do the process properly... including appropriate healing times etc.

Thanks guys

Pippy1976

Princess Peach wrote: »

There's one here Maybe a mod could add a link to the sticky of helpful tips?

http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showthread.php?t=2054996676

I read through all of this thread today but alot of it is quite old and some of the studios are closed now, prices outdated etc etc

Just Like Heaven

I don't know much about the types of lasers, but this person certainly had mixed results depending on laser type http://www.boards.ie/vbulletin/showpost.php?p=77905052&postcount=73 (Could have even been the person operating the machine that makes the difference?). If I were you I'd ask as many people as possible and go to the place that seems to have the most success.

As for the creams, I'm sure most of the major brands do all work, but just having the patience to apply it everyday for possibly months and months before seeing any noticeable fading/result probably puts people off or causes them to give up.

Like, although I know somebody the cream has worked out for, it seems like a lot of effort (having to put bepanthen on new tattoos routinely drives me nuts and that's only for a couple of weeks) I think I'd still be going for the laser anyway.

Sorry my experience isn't first hand, all I can say is keep asking for as many opinions as possible.

Marty McFly

Laser does seem to be the best method, avoid beauty clinics for tattoo removal I tried one for my first laser removal session they werent knowledgeable at all on tattoos as there more used to doing hair removal kind of procedures they will also charge you more than double any tattoo shop will charge you.

How many laser removal sessions did you have? Results can vary all depending on a few factors and can take a few sessions to see anything noticeable. Take a picture before and ater its healed up from each session to the naked eye you wont really notice it as it fades slowly so by the times youve fully healed up from a session your eyes will have adjusted to looking at it and wont see any difference.

They can increase or decrease the strength of the laser but the stronger they set it the more likely you are to blister and be left with scars so its a fine line.

billyhead

Has anyone had great success with Laser Tattoo removal in Dublin. I went to Zulu for my first treatment and it doesn't look like it made a difference. Could I just be wasting my money trying to get it done here:(

Marty McFly

billyhead wrote: »

Has anyone had great success with Laser Tattoo removal in Dublin. I went to Zulu for my first treatment and it doesn't look like it made a difference. Could I just be wasting my money trying to get it done here:(

I have people just expect miracle results you will see no benefits after one session it takes time, patience and costs money.

feelpablo

I had ten sessions on a big piece just to get it faded enough to do a coverup....its a long drawn out process and with the gap of 4-6 weeks between each session it takes a while to see the effect.

Pippy1976

I had about 7 - 10 sessions (can't remember now) and I'm left with a faded, ugly, scarred thing. It looks like a really badly done old, old, old tattoo!

It cost too much money to continue with the treatments so now I want to explore different methods. It's alot darker than before but it's still there & looks ugly.

Anyway, thanks for all the feedback / help. It seems like this is a popular topic.

Marty McFly

Pippy1976 wrote: »

I had about 7 - 10 sessions (can't remember now) and I'm left with a faded, ugly, scarred thing. It looks like a really badly done old, old, old tattoo!

It cost too much money to continue with the treatments so now I want to explore different methods. It's alot darker than before but it's still there & looks ugly.

Anyway, thanks for all the feedback / help. It seems like this is a popular topic.

So you've had 7 to 10 treatments so far, it's faded looking old as you say and ugly congratulations that means the lasers doing it's job and is removing the tattoo I don't See the issue you have with lasering so far??

Of coarse it's going to fade look old and ugly before it's gone. As I've said it takes time, patience and costs money but it works it's most popular method of tattoo removal for a reason.

How has it taken you 7 to 10 treatments to come to the realisation it's to expensive. Laser treatments can be reasonable these days costing 40 to 50 a session as long as you avoid beauty clinics.

As for scarring are you taking care to make sure the blisters don't burst also could ask them to lower it down will take longer but reduces the chances of scarring.

Reku

The reason people are quick to dismiss the creams is that a lot of them, not unlike many beauty creams, do not have any worthwhile ingredients in notable quantities.

You're looking to remove ink from under your skin so you're looking for either:

a corrosive to either burn away the surface skin over the tattoo & let the ink weep out, or to bleach the ink and everything around it (e.g. your skin)
or a solvent that can get through the skin, dissolve some of the tattoo and then take the ink into your bloodstream. This is the same place laser ablation will put it of course, but at least with laser you only need to worry about the ink being toxic/poisonous and not the solvent, which I'm sure you'll find many of the more powerful solvents (e.g. acetone, IPA, methanol, ethanol, etc...) are.

Of the two the solvent definitely sounds healthier but I'd still be careful and make sure that there's been some decent lab testing done on the product.
As such when buying a cream read the ingredients and use the web to do some research into the nature of each of them, see if there's anything that sounds like it might be effective. Otherwise you could just be another victim of a hoax product where they know that by the time you're certain it's having no effect you'll already have paid out them small fortune.

Unfortunately there are a variety of factors that will affect how quickly a tattoo will fade during treatment:

Your own skin - since this will shield the ink underneath.
Colour of the ink
Volume of ink - it's easier to fade a thin outline than a completely coloured in portrait.
Composition of the ink - tattooing is not an exact science and so the chemical makeup of similar pigments can differ based on who the manufacturer was.

And I'm sure there are others that I'm not aware of.

This is why even though it is possible to get tattoos removed people still need to make sure to put a lot of thought into whether they really want the tattoo, otherwise you can be looking at a fairly large sum of money to get it removed. With people getting windpipes and ears grown through stem cell research it's probably only a matter of time before they go this route for tattoo removal, slice away the tattoo and replace it with lab grown skin from the same person, it'd be a single treatment but still pricy as hell.

Just out of curiosity do any of the tattoo removal places have a selection of lasers so they can pick the best one for the pigment in question (e.g. green ink appears green because it tends to reflect green light, thus a 532nm laser might not be particularly effective on it)?

Pippy1976

I began the laser treatments years ago .. over the course of about a year and a half the process stopped having any effect and I was told by the clinic that it was as good as they could get it.

It was expensive back when I started getting it done which was about 5 years ago now (I've been away for the past 3), about e70 a session I think - or was it e100, I can't remember.

To answer your question, yes I took time to be careful of blistering etc etc. Believe me, I did everything right: correct amount of sessions, appropriate healing time between sessions and gave it ample healing time / aftercare.

Marty McFly wrote: »

So you've had 7 to 10 treatments so far, it's faded looking old as you say and ugly congratulations that means the lasers doing it's job and is removing the tattoo I don't See the issue you have with lasering so far??

Of coarse it's going to fade look old and ugly before it's gone. As I've said it takes time, patience and costs money but it works it's most popular method of tattoo removal for a reason.

How has it taken you 7 to 10 treatments to come to the realisation it's to expensive. Laser treatments can be reasonable these days costing 40 to 50 a session as long as you avoid beauty clinics.

As for scarring are you taking care to make sure the blisters don't burst also could ask them to lower it down will take longer but reduces the chances of scarring.

Pippy1976

Thanks so much for your extensive reply. It really was informative.

My tattoo is a solid black shape about the size / diameter of a mug! (It's kind of a triangle though - high in the middle, petering out on either side to points. The artist made it solid in the middle fading out on either side... so it could be not so difficult to remove -although I'm speculating there!)

So, what I'm garnering from the posts here a visit to a tattoo parlour for laser treatment is better than a cosmetic studio for removal? Any recommendations on that, then?

Reku wrote: »

The reason people are quick to dismiss the creams is that a lot of them, not unlike many beauty creams, do not have any worthwhile ingredients in notable quantities.

You're looking to remove ink from under your skin so you're looking for either:
a corrosive to either burn away the surface skin over the tattoo & let the ink weep out, or to bleach the ink and everything around it (e.g. your skin)

or a solvent that can get through the skin, dissolve some of the tattoo and then take the ink into your bloodstream. This is the same place laser ablation will put it of course, but at least with laser you only need to worry about the ink being toxic/poisonous and not the solvent, which I'm sure you'll find many of the more powerful solvents (e.g. acetone, IPA, methanol, ethanol, etc...) are.

Of the two the solvent definitely sounds healthier but I'd still be careful and make sure that there's been some decent lab testing done on the product.
As such when buying a cream read the ingredients and use the web to do some research into the nature of each of them, see if there's anything that sounds like it might be effective. Otherwise you could just be another victim of a hoax product where they know that by the time you're certain it's having no effect you'll already have paid out them small fortune.

Unfortunately there are a variety of factors that will affect how quickly a tattoo will fade during treatment:
Your own skin - since this will shield the ink underneath.

Colour of the ink

Volume of ink - it's easier to fade a thin outline than a completely coloured in portrait.

Composition of the ink - tattooing is not an exact science and so the chemical makeup of similar pigments can differ based on who the manufacturer was.

And I'm sure there are others that I'm not aware of.

This is why even though it is possible to get tattoos removed people still need to make sure to put a lot of thought into whether they really want the tattoo, otherwise you can be looking at a fairly large sum of money to get it removed. With people getting windpipes and ears grown through stem cell research it's probably only a matter of time before they go this route for tattoo removal, slice away the tattoo and replace it with lab grown skin from the same person, it'd be a single treatment but still pricy as hell.

Just out of curiosity do any of the tattoo removal places have a selection of lasers so they can pick the best one for the pigment in question (e.g. green ink appears green because it tends to reflect green light, thus a 532nm laser might not be particularly effective on it)?

Marty McFly

Pippy1976 wrote: »

Thanks so much for your extensive reply. It really was informative.

My tattoo is a solid black shape about the size / diameter of a mug! (It's kind of a triangle though - high in the middle, petering out on either side to points. The artist made it solid in the middle fading out on either side... so it could be not so difficult to remove -although I'm speculating there!)

So, what I'm garnering from the posts here a visit to a tattoo parlour for laser treatment is better than a cosmetic studio for removal? Any recommendations on that, then

Yes in my own experience the cosmetic studios were more expensive and lacked knowledge when it comes to tattoos. I can recommend places if you are in the Dublin area?

Im surprised you've been told laser treatment could take it no further really. Your best bet is to go along to a tattoo parlour have a consultation and take it from there.

Pippy1976

Marty McFly wrote: »

I can recommend places if you are in the Dublin area?

That would be really helpful and very kind if you could. Thanks!

Marty McFly

Pippy1976 wrote: »

That would be really helpful and very kind if you could. Thanks!

It's no problem at all. I found Zulu tattoo and Dublin ink both town to be very good when it comes to lasering, also ink west in Blanchardstown I would recommend. I had treatments in all three at different stages.

I also know skin city in town do laser treatments, I never got one of them but it is a place Id trust.

Pippy1976

As an experiment, boys & girls, I purchased some cream... It's called LazerCream (how innovative!).

It comes in a white tube, directions for use on back along with ingredients details. The cream itself is white, light enough and easily absorbed on the skin. I've conducted a patch test (with no adverse effects as yet) to the skin this morning. I'll apply the first layer to my tattoo later this evening. It says to apply twice daily but more if you want / need.

I will update on my progress, be that positive or negative, along the way. I thought this could be useful for other people reading this thread and wanting to know about it. Either way, removed or not removed, it's an interesting thing to do.

Wish me luck! p

Pippy1976

Hi,

Tattoo Removal Cream Update!!

I've been applying the cream, liberally, for a little over a week now. There doesn't seem to be any difference in colour... in fact, none at all.

It's still very early days though. By the way, I should point out the cream is easily absorbed, doesn't have any corrosive smell (good ? bad ?) and is quite watery in texture.

For the next week I think I'll try apply it to the area 3 times a day - up the ante! I'll post again next week. I wonder will anything change??!

Pippy1976

So in a few days it'll be a month of applying the cream, twice daily, to the tattoo.

Update: It's still black!

I'll continue to use it and report back but so far, nothing....

martomcg

Thats unlucky OP, I'd personally be worried that some manufacturers would make advantage of the fact that its a "slow process" and produce creams that don't work.

Surely for the wedding theres some make-up/tan cover-up that can be done so it doesnt ruin any photos?

Star Lord

Pippy1976 wrote: »

So in a few days it'll be a month of applying the cream, twice daily, to the tattoo.

Update: It's still black!

I'll continue to use it and report back but so far, nothing....

I wouldn't keep the hopes up tbh, those creams really don't contain anything that could break down the ink in the skin. Worth the shot though, even if it is only so you know for sure!

Pippy1976

@martomcg I think I'll have to resort to make-up / cover-up creams for the wedding. Or hopefully I can get a dress with a back and sleeves!!

@DamoElDiablo Not keeping the hopes up and definitely worth a shot.

I think the only way you'll get rid of a tattoo, effectively, is with laser treatment from a reputable clinic that deals with this - expensive as it may be in the long run I'd opt for this option over creams any day.

Sometimes, in certain light, I think the tattoo is fading but in reality it's not. I hope someone's gotten some use out of this thread... I'm going to continue applying the cream and will update maybe in another little while. (I may as well use the flippin' cream seeing as though I got it!!)

Star Lord

I'd say use the cream till it's done, no harm there. Maybe take a photo somewhere where the lighting is always the same once a week, it's the only way you'll be able to compare for sure!

Pippy1976

I was thinking of the photo thing actually... a visual representation would be useful I'm sure!

I'll take one this weekend and then post one a month down the line. I've got 9 months worth of this cream to get through so I may as well use it up. Holy Hell what have I got myself in for!!

Thanks, chaps!

Star Lord

Pippy1976 wrote: »

...I've got 9 months worth of this cream to get through so I may as well use it up. Holy Hell what have I got myself in for!!

Consider it your possible tattoo pregnancy, and you might have new born skin at the end.

Or not... :pac:

Pippy1976

I'm thinking 'or not'.

I'm afraid (if it is working (ahem!!)) that it'll wipe out my freckles and leave me with a patch of extremely lightened skin...

...although judging by the results so far, this won't happen!

bodice ripper

laser done properly should be able to get anything out - given enough time.

as an aside - I really do not understand women's obsession with hiding and/or removing tattoos for a wedding. It is just a day.

Pippy1976

This isn't just for a day, I don't like it and would like it gone... also, the people you're being bridesmaid for might ask ladies to cover their tattoo's and so, as a sign of respect, said lady might like to oblige said bride.

All a matter of preference. I have a wedding in a year and thought it'd be a good amount of time / good opportunity to try get rid of it.

bodice ripper wrote: »

laser done properly should be able to get anything out - given enough time.

as an aside - I really do not understand women's obsession with hiding and/or removing tattoos for a wedding. It is just a day.