How safe is it?

More people than ever are getting tattoos, according to all the latest studies. Because of that, tattoo removal businesses are popping up all over the place. Laser removal is considered one of the most promising methods.

Is it safe?

Medical officials say there are risks, but current lasers are considered to be safer than most older methods of tattoo removal, including excision and dermabrasion.

The popular site WebMd describes the risk of laser tattoo removal as minimal, but it lists the potential side effects nonetheless.

* The tattoo removal site is at risk for infection. You may also risk lack of complete pigment removal, and there is a slight chance that the treatment can leave you with a permanent scar.

* You may also risk hypopigmentation, where the treated skin is paler than surrounding skin, or hyperpigmentation, where the treated skin is darker than surrounding skin.

* Cosmetic tattoos like lip liner, eyeliner and eyebrows may darken following treatment with tattoo removal lasers. Further treatment of the darkened tattoos usually results in fading.

According to Pat Donahue, operator of Best Skin Care in Auburn, a person should rethink laser removal if he or she suffered infection after getting a tattoo.

A handful of states, including California and Florida, have laws requiring that only licensed doctors and nurses can treat patients with cosmetic lasers. Maine has no such law. For that reason, it is recommended that consumers carefully consider the qualifications of the person who will perform the laser removal. Recommendations from satisfied customers is one good sign.

Two sources for additional information:

* www.webmd.com

* MedlinePlus on the web

When Pat Donahue gets you into her chair, your life is transformed. That serpent tattoo you dreamed of when you were young and wild? The Rolling Stone mouth so luscious and red it looks wet to the touch? The wedding band tattooed onto your finger to mark that stormy romance?

Gone. All of it, gone.

Pat Donahue doesn’t giveth. Pat Donahue taketh away.

Take it off

In a day when one in five adults sports at least one tattoo, business is expected to be brisk at Donahue’s new Auburn business, where she specializes in the removal of tattoos using a high-powered laser.

Yes, one out of five men and women have got their ink on, but you know what? According to the latest studies, a jaw-dropping 40 percent of them regretted the art almost immediately because it wasn’t what they were expecting.

Others may not come to rue their ink for decades.

“A lot of people simply grow out of it,” Donahue says. “You get a tattoo when you’re 18 and then your tastes change by the time you’re 30 or 40. Maybe it just wasn’t what they expected. Maybe they just consider it bad artwork.”

She’s only been set up since June, but business is growing by the day. Men, women, young and old come to her shop seeking to erase things that seemed like a good idea at one time.

Recently, a 75-year-old man came into her shop at 34 Center St. He had “Love” tattooed across the knuckles of one hand, “Hate” across the other. It’s the ultimate homage to Robert Mitchum in “Night of the Hunter,” and it probably seemed fantastic in 1955, when the movie was released. On the knuckles of a grandfather, maybe not so much.

“He wanted it gone,” Donahue says. “He told me he’s wanted it gone forever.”

Can do. While the setup at Donahue’s office at least vaguely resembles that of your standard tattoo parlor, the differences are significant. You could spend an entire day in a tattoo artist’s chair if you’re looking for something exotic. Some people spend days or longer getting their artwork finished.

Getting them removed won’t require that you call in sick to work and get a babysitter for the kids.

“It’s certainly a lot faster than getting a tattoo,” Donahue says. “A long tattoo removal would be five minutes.”

These are not your grandfather’s lasers, you know.

“The early lasers left a lot of scar tissue,” Donahue says. “One person told me he had an eagle tattoo removed. What he was left with was a scar in the shape of an eagle.”

The laser Donahue uses employs ultra-short pulse duration, which triggers a photomechanical effect, according to Donahue. Shorter pulses mean less disruption to good old human tissue and clearance of the offending tattoo with fewer treatments.

In short, what took hours or days to create, Donahue can erase in a matter of seconds, although several sessions are typically required before it’s gone.

The laser equipment, which looks a bit like a wood-burning tool attached to a computer tower, cost her $150,000. Will business be good enough to justify the cost? Do that many people want gone what took cold cash and hours of pain to obtain?

It seems likely. Today, more women are getting tattoos than men. Women are also twice as likely to have those tattoos removed, according to the studies. And responses to a recent Sun Journal query seem to confirm that. The first five people to respond – and they responded with white-hot regret – were women. They have artwork, all right, and they want it gone.

“Well, I went to get my first tattoo at 18 because, hey – I’m 18 and what better reason to alter my body forever, right?” says Renee Desmarais of Lewiston. “And due to my lack of world experience and funds, I went to an apprentice for my foot tattoo. When he said ‘Oh, cool, my first foot,’ I should have turned and ran, but I didn’t. So now, 80 dollars and three three-hour sessions later I have a blue blob on my foot with stars in and on it.”

Like most people with tattoo regrets, it’s disappointment with the artwork that caused Desmarais to lament her decision. Mistranslation, they call it.

“It’s supposed to be clouds with stars shooting through it,” she says. “Not at all what I have on my foot. The first question people ask? ‘What is it?’ It’s awful, but I can joke about it now. I have plans to get a coverup when I have some extra money . . . so like 20 years from now.”

A couple things might prevent a person from seeking removal of a bad or unwanted tattoo. One is ignorance about the latest technology. Who knew lasers had come so far over the past few decades? The second is money.

This might sting a little

Donahue charges $50 per square inch, which is about the same cost as having a tattoo needled into your skin. If you have just a small heart with your heinous ex-boyfriend’s initials in it, you’re in and out in 5 minutes only $50 poorer. If you have sleeves on both arms and a life-size Jim Morrison face on your back, things could get more costly.

Donahue sees ink everywhere. One man she spoke with had tats on both eyelids. There are tattoos on buttocks, on breasts and in even more intimate places. Donahue herself has eyeliner tattooed onto her eyelids.

“At some point,” she says, “I got too lazy to do makeup.”

Those eye tattoos can be removed like any other, although they require special metal contact lenses to protect the eyeballs from the laser.

Does removal hurt?

“If you didn’t use anesthesia, it would probably hurt more than the original tattoo,” Donahue says. There are reasons for this and they involve cellular something and moisture yada yada. The bottom line is that you want the anesthesia, and Donahue can hook you up. She uses a numbing cream and another magic wand that dispenses super-cool air to minimize scarring.

Heidi Knight recently went to Donahue’s office for a second round of lasers to remove a tattoo. A radio disc jockey, Donahue described her issue with her tat as a matter of location – she has a small heart tattooed on the upper part of her chest and she wants it gone.

“It was the first one I had done,” she said. “It was poor placement.”

She has quite a lot of ink, does Knight. She compares the feeling of getting a tattoo to a hot ash or a cat claw in the flesh. The feeling of getting one removed is slightly worse, but doesn’t last as long.

How does the removal process feel?

“You know when it’s winter and you shuffle across a carpet in your stockings and touch a light switch?” Knight says. “Like that. Or like getting snapped with a rubber band, but really fast.”

Both ends of the tattoo process are a bit uncomfortable, Knight says. Her advice: Choose the location of your new artwork carefully if you’re going to get one.

Or just don’t get one and make your momma proud.

“I have tattoo regret,” says Nancy Townsend Johnson of East Dixfield. “I regret that my daughter tattooed her lovely skin that I grew in my womb.”

Throw parental guilt into the mix and there you have it, one more reason to get that tat removed.

Regret reasons: Bad artists, “drunk and foolish,” soured love

Seeking removal doesn’t mean you hate tattoos as a rule. It just means you hate YOUR tattoo, even though at one time or another you wanted it more than anything.

“I have a home-done heart on my pinky and a home-done flower on the back of my hand,” says Anissa Roberts, who hails from Bridgton. “I was 21, drunk and foolish. I hate them. One day I want to get them re-done as permanent henna by a professional. I also have another tattoo that I love and will never regret getting. It is over my heart and is a triple goddess symbol with a pentacle in the center and opposite facing moons.”

Still another woman came into Donahue’s with a wedding band tattooed around that very same finger. When love goes bad, you can’t just pluck that kind of ring off and chuck it into a lake.

“I have a tattoo on my shoulder,” laments Lea Francavilla Whittle, “that I would love to have covered. It’s not ugly – a bit faded over the years – but it just wasn’t what I thought it would be. It wasn’t what I really wanted and that has always bugged me.”

“One regret because,” writes Lisa Bechard Chouinard of Lewiston, “I went to a well-known unlicensed person in the area (well-known except to me). My tat looked like I burned my leg! I had to go to a professional and he fixed it.”

And we have this beauty who responded to our query but declined to leave her name.

“I went to get a tattoo. I was old enough to know better, but I did it anyway,” the anonymous respondent reports. “I told the ‘artist’ that I wanted something small and delicate. What I got was large and vulgar. I had a six-inch-by-three-inch tattoo on my lower back (a.k.a. tramp stamp) of three daisy flowers with multiple petals on each flower. Each and every petal of every flower was shaped like a penis. I was horrified! I never showed it willingly to people and it took years for me to tell my husband why I hated it so much – we weren’t married when I got it and obviously he didn’t look very close.”

She eventually went to a qualified tattoo artist who “removed the vulgarity” and she vowed never again when it comes to tattoos.

Not everybody Donahue sees in her office is there to make a tattoo vanish because they dislike them, however. Some people have simply run out of fleshy real estate or they just want to do some creative editing on an existing tattoo.

At a recent tattoo show in Lewiston, Donahue was approached by a guy interested in having tattoos removed from his arm.

“He said he wanted them cleaned off,” Donahue says, “so he could get something new.”

A woman came in with a diamond tattoo on her ring finger. She didn’t want the rock wiped from existence with a laser, she just wanted it cleaned up a bit.

A market for fading memories

For 20 years, Donahue was a nurse who helped deliver babies. She went back to school to learn other things including laser technology. At the time, she planned to work mostly in cosmetics – you know, zapping wrinkles, cellulite or unwanted hair. Then she noticed how many people are sporting tattoos these days, a trend that just seems to keep climbing.

“It’s been going gangbusters,” Donahue says. “I saw a real market for this.”

But not everybody knows what lasers can do these days. They know little about the cost, the level of discomfort or the time involved. Donahue tries to spread the word by setting up booths at tattoo shows and visiting the many, many local tattoo parlors with pamphlets.

Some folks appreciate Donahue’s work even if they don’t have tattoos of their own. David Orino is one of those. In a moderately ranting response to our query, he expressed a desire to see less artwork gracing the skin of the people he sees day in and day out.

“I regret seeing how much amazingly beautiful female flesh has been changed forever into some tacky cartoon,” Orino says, adding, “I regret that ink has completely changed how ‘normal’ people wear clothing.

“When did it become OK to walk around with one sleeve rolled up (so you can see the tattoo) if you weren’t packin’ a pack of Lucky Strikes? When did it become OK to roll up one pant leg ’cause you have a dragon on your calf? (Oh, sorry, I didn’t realize that was a butterfly.) When did it become OK for women to have “plumbers’ crack” in order to show off some kinda . . . oh, wait. Never mind.”

Heidi Knight doesn’t necessarily agree. Although she was having a pair of tattoos removed, she planned to replace one of them with some fresh ink.

For her latest session with Donahue, her treatment was stacked, meaning she got three treatments with brief pauses in between. The heart on her chest is a faded remnant of what it was a few weeks ago when she first came in.

“It’s pretty impressive, right?” Knight says. “I couldn’t be more pleased with the results.”

Tattoo impressions

Jimmy Buffet sings about tattoos in this song of the same name, “It’s a permanent reminder of a temporary feeling.”

Women are more than twice as likely to have a tattoo removed as men.

The first recorded tattoo is believed to have been found on a mummified iceman in 3300 BC. He had 58 tattoos, mostly dots and lines.

Thomas Edison had five dots tattooed on his left forearm, similar to the dots on dice.

The second most common reason for tattoo removal is mistranslation (the tattoo didn’t turn out as expected).

More women than men are getting tattooed today.

Until 2006 it was illegal to get a tattoo in Oklahoma

1 in 4 women age 18 to 50 have at least one tattoo.

U.S. President James Polk is said to be the first white man to have a Chinese character as a tattoo.

Blues singer Janis Joplin had a wristlet tattoo and a small heart on her left breast.

The first occurrence of the word tattoo in the Oxford English Dictionary came in 1769 and is credited to Captain John Cook.

26 percent of Americans with a tattoo say tattoos make them feel more attractive, with women voting that way almost 2 to 1 over men.

35 0f the first 43 U.S. presidents reportedly had tattoos.

Article Source: Noel Christian, EzineArticles.com