Technology is a wonderful thing; yesterday I got a text from John Joyce telling me to check my email which was about to be filled with amazing pictures of Ryann’s leg. Healed and fresh!

John said that the healed cuttings are around three months old. I’ll see if we can get Ryann to send us another healing update as these newest additions settle in.

It’s been far too long since I’ve featured new work by Scarab’s John Joyce.
You can reach John via the SCARAB link on the sidebar!

I’m a big fan of letting the works speak for itself; mainly because I’m lazy and hate writing entries. Thankfully the lovely Ryann was kind enough to type up some thoughts for the scarblog. We usually show the fun part of Scarification; the pretty cuttings and branding. Ryann didn’t shy away from the nasty bits of healing… so read up. If you’re planning a cutting, it’s always good to know what to expect!

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Often times you will see the freshly done scar, and the years plus follow up pictures of them. Rarely do you see or hear about the middle stage, the healing of these works of art. First, a little about me. I’m a 27 year old lovely lady who’s been getting cut by John Joyce of Scarab Body for the past few years now. I have a fair amount of tattoos, saw some various scarification pictures over the years, and this seemed like a natural progression for myself. I do not thrive on pain, I do not enjoy it. The finished product is beautiful and that’s what I seek.

More after the break!

I’m currently healing my fifth serious cutting, a series of lotus flowers down the side of my thigh. First things first, I bleed, I bleed a lot. I expect that my cutting will bleed for the first 24-36 hours after it is done. This makes for a fantastic 4 hour drive home from Scarab, note the sarcasm. Yes, my beige seats in my car have been spotted with blood.. oops!

One of the worst parts of my healing process is when I first get home. Water on a fresh cutting hurts, like a searing burning, “I want to vomit/faint”, pain. I refuse to shower until the day after the cutting. Like I said, I do not like pain. This cutting was actually the most simple one to clean up initially. For the first time I did not feel like I was going to pass out in my shower. Or maybe I am really just getting used to this by now.

On to the fun part! I keep my new cutting covered in vaseline and saran wrap, for at least 7 days. This is the part that I hate, and that makes me feel like my skin in crawling. I’m yet to experience my body being so uncomfortable than I do at this stage. Now, there’s so many various ways of healing up cuttings that I’ve read and heard about. I’m a sissy. There is no way I can splash lemon juice, pour salt, or red wine vinegar on my already sore, fresh open cut. Do those methods help some people get the really heavy keloid scarring they want? Yes, but that’s not how I scar, or what I aesthetically prefer.

After I clean it off in the shower with soap, removing as much of the vaseline as I can because heat rash is imminent, and the excess blood, not to mention the blood clots either! I pat it dry and pour Hydrogen Peroxide all over. I have a small baby style tooth brush, that is a bit softer than a normal one, that I’ll then use to irritate the cuts. After about 5-7 days I’ll start irritating it more in the shower. This is proving very difficult this time.

Have you ever tried to look at the side and back of your thigh and ass?? It’s not that easy! Anyways, once the cut is beat up enough, I pat it dry. I use sugar to help irritate it more, and sugar does not burn like salt does. Hooray! More vaseline, more sugar, then it’s wrapped back up and taped all around. It is an ordeal, it takes me 15-25 minutes to do this, 4-6 times a day. Finished product right? Ask me how I am on day 6! An angry, uncomfortable mess.

The worst part truly starts right away. From the blood running down my body, to when it finally subsides the plasma, wetness that’s been accumulating under the wrapping, all runs down my body. This is the part I find the most uncomfortable. It affects the way you sit, sleep, walk, live for the first week. I’m constantly changing my pants, because the icky wetness has reeked havok on my clothes. This is not the good kind of wetness we’re talking about here! But I digress. At this point, even just 3 days into healing, my body is pissed off that it has been stuck and irritated with tape over and over, is constantly wet, sore, and now is starting to get itchy.

I will put up with this for the next week, JUST until I can tell the heat rash is about to kick in. For me this seems to happen around day 8-11. Thankfully soon as I stop covering it, there’s no more leakage! Relief! For the most part. Now it’s just a constant battle of dealing with vaseline seeping into my pants, using the trusty kids toothbrush to mess with my fresh cutting, and not scratching at it hard enough to tear it up, but just enough to relieve the itchiness. I will itch for the next month like I have scabies.

All in the name of beauty.

You can never go wrong with a cutting by Wayde Dunn. I had already called it a day when I came across this photo; having updated several other blogs and finally settled down to watch Richard Pryor in THE TOY I had no plans to update the Scarblog. But what the hell. It’s been too long since I’ve featured new work by Big Red.

You can contact Wayde via WaydeDunn.com.

Photo by Atom Moore.

I was just thinking to myself that the ol’ SW blog needs more Jesse V.
Shot by Atom Moore at the 2006 event, Jesse was working on a huge lotus cutting on my friend Jezebel. The finished piece can be seen after the jump.

Jesse is expanding his THRIVE STUDIOS; you can check the progress here.

Photo by Atom Moore.

]]> http://scarwars.net/2009/09/10/panic-on-the-streets-of-jesse-v/feed/ 1 http://scarwars.net/2009/06/16/just-the-beginning/ http://scarwars.net/2009/06/16/just-the-beginning/#comments Tue, 16 Jun 2009 21:59:22 +0000 John Joyce http://scarwars.net/wordpress/?p=79

This is the start of a full thigh piece. I really like doing cuttings with a henna style to them. Hopefully I’ll have some some updated pics up soon and I’ll be adding onto it in the near future as well.

-John

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