Remove a Tattoo at Home With Salt

Do you have buyer's remorse on your tattoo? As tattoos have become big business, the amount of people who regret their ink has risen dramatically. New procedures now exist for removing unwanted tattoos, many of them remarkably successful. Unfortunately, many DIY home remedies have also sprung up, many of them unsafe or ineffective. Here's what you'll want to know about using salt on tattoos, along with other helpful information on removing your unwanted tattoo.

Steps

Knowing What Not to Do

  1. Be very careful about rubbing salt into your tattoo. Whether you've just gotten your tattoo or have had it for longer than you'd like, using salt to remove a tattoo is a dangerous proposition. Here's why:
    • Your skin has effectively two layers — the dermis, or inner part of the skin, and the epidermis, or outer layer of your skin. When you get a tattoo, the ink travels past the epidermis, or superficial layer of skin, and into the dermis. Rubbing salt onto the epidermis is easy but useless. You need to get the salt into the dermis; even if you did manage to rub away the top layer of your skin to get at the ink, it's probably not going to end well.[1]
    • Rubbing your tattoo with salt will give you a pretty nasty road rash. It may also cause pigmentation of the skin, wrinkling[2], and possibly scarring. Know that doing this procedure at home can have significant adverse consequences, and may make your tattoo look even worse.
  2. Know why this myth started. Although there is a dermatological procedure that uses salt as a slight abrasive, there is probably one glaring reason why salt is thought to be a good tattoo eraser. When you get a tattoo, you're told not to submerge your tattoo in water, especially in salt water. If you're not supposed to soak your tattoo in salt water if you want to keep it, maybe you could soak your tattoo in salt water if you didn't? That's the reasoning at least.
    • Soaking your tattoo in salt water, in fact, will only cause the ink to disperse, run, or possibly fade. It won't cause your tattoo to magically vanish. It's likely your tattoo will look worse after you soak it in salt water if your tattoo is newly inked. If you've had your tattoo for several weeks or longer, it's likely that submerging your tattoo in salt water will have no effect.
  3. Know that procedures that use salt as an abrasive do exist. Trying DIY salt abrasion, also called salabrasion, is probably not the best idea. As mentioned earlier, you're likely to hurt yourself and do more harm than good. But there are professional procedures out there that use salabrasion, and some of them can be promising.
    • According to a German study in the National Institute of Health database, salabrasion had "perfectly acceptable to good results" in tattoo removal.[2] In this study, wrinkling did occur, but not scar formation.
    • In one salabrasion procedure, a topical anesthetic is applied to the top of the tattoo. An ink gun-like device used a saline solution to effectively puncture the dermis and draw ink up instead of deposit ink in the skin. Effectively this is like getting a tattoo in reverse. The procedure heals in 6 to 8 weeks. Ask to see testimonials before agreeing to the procedure.

Considering Other Options

  1. Try laser tattoo removal. Laser tattoo removal is the safest and most effective means of eliminating an unwanted tattoo. Doctors or aestheticians shoot highly-concentrated pulses of light at the ink, which can help shatter the ink and lead to a remarkable reduction in visible ink.
    • Depending on the size of the tattoo, laser surgery will set you back anywhere from $100 to $1,000, making it one of the most cost-effective removal procedures on the market.
  2. Talk to an aesthetician about dermabrasion. This procedure is very similar to salabrasion in that it's administered under the supervision of trained professionals and sands down layers of skin to get at ink.
    • This method is a bit less pricey that laser treatment, costing about $1,000 to $2,000.[3] This procedure tends to hurt as much as getting a tattoo, and the ink generally is more visible after a dermabrasion than it is after laser removal.
  3. Consider cryosurgery and chemical peels. With cryosurgery, the skin is frozen and the ink burned off with liquid nitrogen. Chemical peels cause the skin to blister and slough off, removing some of the tattoo ink. Neither is a horribly popular option, as they are both expensive and painful. If you are desperate however, they may be worth considering.
  4. Talk with your doctor or aesthetician about surgery. Surgery is the final option. With a scalpel, a doctor will remove the skin of the tattoo and cinch old skin around it.[4] A new scar will form, and it may be painful, even if you are given a topical anesthetic.

Tips

  • After each application you should consider applying antiseptic ointment to prevent infection and also apply a sterile gauze over the area.
  • Don't be disappointed if it doesn't work to begin with. You have to be patient.
  • Do not rub too hard, because this may result in pain and bleeding.

Warnings

  • If you have heard of "The Salt Challenge" then you will know that the act of rubbing salt on your skin will cause you to feel like you are being burnt! Take 'extreme caution please!
  • This approach can be dangerous and result in unwanted pain and scarring.
  • Do not apply salt to open wounds.

Related Articles

Sources and Citations

  1. ↑ http://www.realself.com/question/safe-remove-small-tattoo-home-salt
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/6845800
  3. ↑ http://www.anestcadiz.net/tattoo-removal-cost/
  4. ↑ http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/tattoo-removal/MY01066/DSECTION=what-you-can-expect

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