Pregnancy and tattoos

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Saturday October 27th, 2007 @ 8:30 PM

Filed under: Tattoos

I’m not sure if this question has been answered or not but here goes: I just recently got a tattoo about a week ago and just today found out that I’m pregnant. Will this have any effect on my baby?

First of all, congratulations! I’ve recently discovered that we’re in the family way as well (I’m just over nine weeks pregnant as of this writing), isn’t it just the most exciting thing? It’s like joining some secret women’s club or something, ha ha!

It’s not ideal to get pierced or tattooed during pregnancy, and most reputable artists won’t even touch you if they know you are pregnant (because, from a liability standpoint, nobody wants to be the last person who did anything to your body before you miscarried, not to put too fine a point on it). Your immune system becomes depressed during pregnancy, and healing will certainly be impacted by that, and it’s just common sense not to put too much stress on your body while it’s working on such an important project - pregnancy is, after all, a temporary condition, and you can easily put off any projects for a few months until Bubs is here!

All of that being said, however, no, the fact that got tattooed before you knew you were pregnant really shouldn’t have any effect on your baby. I’m assuming that you went to a clean and reputable artists and the tattoo was done with sterile equipment, of course, but I can’t imagine any serious risk/trauma/stress to the developing foetus just from the act of Mum receiving a tattoo. I’ve known lots of women who quite intentionally got pierced and tattooed during their pregnancies - I’m reserving comment on that, much as I’m reserving comment on women who smoke and drink throughout their pregnancy - and their babies were fine, at the end of the day. Almost all pregnant women do SOMEthing naughty during their first few weeks of pregnancy, because they don’t know they’re up the duff yet, and their kids are fine and any dramas, if they have them, are unrelated. Don’t worry too much about it, just be good from here on in and take care of yourself and your bub!

Posted by Lori St.Leone | Permalink | Leave a comment | Trackback