Can You Finish A Tattoo The Next Day – Expert Point Of View

Getting a tattoo can be a fun way of expressing one’s mindset, opinion, and personality traits. Getting the first tattoo always requires a bit of courage. But after you get that first tattoo done you may fall in love with tattoos and just keep going for more. As you get more tattoos done you will most likely get interested to get a bigger-sized tattoo. A bigger-sized tattoo usually takes more than one session to be completed. The gap between these tattoo sessions can be annoying. So you might wonder, can you finish a tattoo the next day instead of waiting between tattoo sessions?

I get it, waiting for a few weeks just to complete the tattoo is very annoying. You can hardly wait to complete the tattoo and show off to your friends and family. But there are reasons why breaks between tattoo sessions exist. In this piece, I will answer if you can finish a tattoo the next day and discuss the matter in detail.

Key Takeaways

• You should not finish a tattoo the next day instead you should follow a proper session break.
• Finishing a tattoo, the next day includes risks such as delayed healing, increased chance of infection, more discomfort during the healing phase, etc.
• You should wait around 2 weeks between tattoo sessions.
• Factors such as tattoo size, the strength of your immune system, and the placement of the tattoo can affect the time you should wait between tattoo sessions.
• During the session break, you should wash your tattoo, apply moisturizer, avoid direct sunlight, etc.

Finishing A Tattoo The Next Day

A small tattoo can be done in a single day. But bigger-sized tattoos may require multiple tattoo sessions to be completed. Because a tattoo session should not be more the 7 hours or so. Getting over the 7-hour mark can be harmful to health. That is why a tattoo artist takes a few sessions to complete a big piece of art. Now let’s say you do not have much patience or you are in a hurry and don’t want to wait for your next session, instead you want to finish your tattoo the next day, can you do it?

Simply put, you should not finish a tattoo the next day. Getting a tattoo is like having a fresh wound. This wound takes time to heal. If you irritate the area by trying to get the tattoo done before it heals then it can cause more trauma to your body. Getting more trauma is never a good thing, you don’t know how your body would react to it. You may get sick and delay the healing process.

Getting sick after getting a tattoo and delayed healing process is never a good thing. You will be prone to infections and may face critical health issues. Working on unhealed skin can cause the skin to react badly to it. The skin may appear red and inflated and give you severe pain and a burning sensation. Even if you want to get the tattoo done the next day, most probably your tattoo artist will refuse to work on your tattoo. Because professional tattoo artists know the risk of not maintaining proper tattoo session breaks and won’t provide service if you want to break the session break.

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6 Reasons Not to Finish a Tattoo the Next Day

There are many reasons why you should not finish a tattoo the next day.

1. Risk of getting sick

Getting a tattoo is making your body go through trauma. Now if you try to go through the tattooing process continuously without taking a proper session break then you will put your body through more trauma. And there is a limit to how much trauma your body can take and trauma can increase the chance of getting physical health problems. So getting a tattoo done the next day will increase the chance of you getting sick.

2. Increase the chance of infection

Getting tattoo sessions done without taking any breaks can lead to infection. As your body will be weak and you may even catch sickness which would further weaken your immune system and increase the chance of a tattoo infection. Getting a tattoo infection is never cute. It can ruin your tattoo and create critical health issues for you.

3. More pain during the procedure

Going through the tattooing process the next day without taking a session break will cause you more pain as your body has not yet recovered from the previous wound.

4. Delayed healing

When you get a tattoo your immune system starts to work on the area to heal it. Getting a big tattoo done the next day without a proper break can overwork can exhaust your immune system. As a result, you will have a delayed healing process. A delayed healing process means you will have to stay in that uncomfortable state for more days. And delayed healing can easily because you tattoo infection. Remember your immune system is already exhausted, and if you get an infection during this time it will make the matter worse. Because your body won’t be able to fight the infection with full strength.

5. More pain during the healing phase

Mild discomfort during the healing phase is normal. But getting a tattoo done the next day will cause more trauma on your skin than usual tattooing. More trauma will cause you more pain during the healing phase. You may experience itchiness, redness in the area, inflated skin, excessive puss coming out, etc.

6. Availability of tattoo artist

Despite all the risks I have mentioned so far, if you still want to finish a tattoo the next day you may not be able to do so because of the availability of tattoo artist issues. No professional artist would agree to work on the tattoo without giving it a proper session break. Because they know tattooing an area without proper breaks can cause problems.

The Time You Should Wait Before Finishing Your Tattoo

In the tattooing process, a tattoo needle may poke a few hundred to thousand times to insert ink deep into your dermis layer which is the second layer of your skin. By this, you can tell your body will require some time to heal all the damage a tattoo needle does to your skin. If you require multiple sessions to get your tattoo done, then a proper break between sessions is crucial. The purpose of this break between sessions is to give your body time to heal. So how long should you wait before finishing your tattoo?

Your tattoo artist can tell how many session is required to finish your tattoo. A big-sized tattoo can require 2-4 sessions to be completed. And the gap between tattoo sessions can be around 2 weeks. Because it takes around 2 weeks for your epidermis layer of skin to heal. And for your dermis layer to heal it may take a few months. You do not necessarily have to wait a few months for the dermis layer to heal to attend your next tattoo session. Just the complete healing of the epidermis layer gives you the green signal to attend your next tattoo session.

Simply put, you should wait at least 2 weeks before finishing your tattoo. That said the break time may vary depending on a few crucial factors.

Factors Determining How Long You Should Wait to Finish a Tattoo

In general, it takes about 2 weeks of break before you can go for the next tattoo session. But there are some factors which can increase this time length.

I have listed such factors below:

1. Tattoo size
   If you are getting multiple sessions to complete one tattoo, then of course it is a big tattoo. But how big is it? The bigger the tattoo the more break time it needs to heal. Any tattoo over 6 inches are considered huge.
2. Strength of immune system
   Not all of us have an equally strong immunity system. The strength of immunity can vary from person to person and it can get weaker and stronger for many reasons. If you have a stronger immune system, then you will have a faster recovery from your first session and will be ready to go for the next session within 2 weeks. But a weak immune system can increase the break length by 1 or 2 more weeks. A person with a weak immune system may need to wait 1 month to attend to next tattoo session.
3. Placement of the tattoo
   The placement of a tattoo can speed up or delay the healing process. Any tattoo that is closer to your heart will have a faster recovery and as a result, your session break will be shorter. But a tattoo that is far away from your heart such as a tattoo on your leg or feet can take more time to heal and increase the break length between sessions.
4. Tattoo design
   A complex-designed tattoo will naturally take a bit more time to heal. And a simple tattoo will have slightly less time to heal. Which can affect how much you have to wait for the next tattoo session.

Why Tattoo Sessions Breaks Are Important?

There are many reasons why tattoo break sessions are important.

Gives your body time to heal

Getting poked by a tattoo needle deep into your skin requires time to heal. So taking a session break to heal and then going for another session makes sense.

Lowers the Chance of getting sick

Session break ensures your body gets enough rest time to recover from the trauma of the tattooing process. And prepares you for the next tattoo session. So the break is basically saving your body from excessive trauma which you would have faced without these session breaks. As a result, it reduces the chance of you getting sick.

Helps with pain tolerance

Dispersing the amount of trauma into sessions gives your body enough res and strength to tolerate more pain. If you avoid session breaks you will face more pain from the tattooing process than usual.

Fasten the healing process

By giving session breaks the immune system in your body gets time to rest and charge up. By not putting too much stress on your immune system you are giving them to stay strong. As a result, you will get faster healing.

Lowers the Chance of infection

Thanks to the session break your immune system stays strong the whole time as a result it lowers the chance of infection. Getting an infection can be severe, so preventing such an issue before it happens is a huge plus.

Things to Do During Tattoo Session Break

There are many crucial things you should be doing during the tattoo session break time.

• Wash The Tattoo
  Even though your tattoo is not finished yet, you still need to wash your tattoo with gentle and fragrance-free soap twice a day. Do not rub the area vigorously, use your fingers to gently rub and clean the area. After washing use a paper towel to dry the area.
• Keep The Tattoo Moisturized
  Use a fragrance-free and harmful chemical-free moisturizer to keep the tattooed area mildly moist. Mildly moist tattoos can heal faster.
• Stay Hydrated
  Just applying moisturizer on the surface is not enough. You have to stay hydrated from the inside as well. So drink plenty of water daily to stay hydrated.
• Avoid Direct Sunlight
  Avoid exposing the tattoo to direct sunlight it can as UV rays can cause issues with unhealed skin and make the tattoo fade. So use sunblock whenever you go out in the sunlight.
• Do Not Poke or Pick
  The tattoo may form scabs. Do not poke or pick on the scabs as it can fade your tattoo. Moist scabs soak quite a bit of ink for the dermis layer. When it is dried it will automatically release the ink into the skin before falling off. But if you pick on the scabs and make them fall premature it can potentially fade or distort your tattoo.

FAQs

Final Thoughts

Getting a small tattoo done in a single session is normal. But it becomes nearly impossible to do a big tattoo in a single session, especially if the tattoo is big as 6 inches or more. When you have to take multiple tattoo sessions make sure you take proper breaks between sessions. Not maintaining a break or just finishing the tattoo the next day is not recommended, as it can create multiple issues.

Finishing a tattoo, the next day can cause delayed healing, increase the chance of infection, increase the chance of getting sick, etc. On top of that you may not find a professional tattoo artist who would agree to do tattoo sessions without any break. So even if you are in a hurry or don’t want to wait to complete your tattoo, I strongly recommend taking proper breaks between sessions and making a schedule beforehand so that session breaks don’t overlap your work.

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