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I'm finishing up a body suit this year and at 64, I've been concerned about my skin continuing to be fit to tattoo. I took a break during COVID, so I lost two years, but I've had four appointments in the last several months. In preparation for the appointments, every day I applied cocoa butter liberally on the areas to be tattooed for a full month prior to my appointment. My last two appointments focused on the ribs and in addition to not hurting nearly as much as my previous rib tattoos, both sessions healed in record time. All of the red was gone within two days, I had very little pain and they healed very nicely. I've probably got another 6 sessions left and I'm going to continue doing this; hopefully it will help all my sessions heal quickly. Anyway, it's not a scientific experiment, it's only one person, but I thought I'd share it. It certainly won't hurt and it might help.

From what you've got above - If there's something wrong with a 6 day old tattoo it would likely result from putting something on it (sunscreen) while the skin is still not fully healed. Heat from the ground isn't going to hurt it. A reasonable amount of indirect sun probably won't either. Sunscreen maybe not either - but I don't like putting anything on/in that wound for at least a couple of weeks.

As said, you have to wait. The answer is the same regardless of how you many times ask it or how you phrase the question. 4-8 weeks to heal. Longer for a rough heal. Looking at it every five minutes won’t speed up the process.

My advice would be to think it through before the consultation. If you want changes, think them through and send a single email. A good tattoo artist is busy. What if all their clients sent multiple emails? Yes, you should get the tattoo you want, but you also need to trust your artist. For my first sleeve I said, “Japanese, anything you want.” It turned out great. Same with my back. All my other work I threw out ideas, but what he came up with was way better than I imagined.

So i did an in person consultation with a tattoo artist and made an appointment with him. During the two months leading up to the appointment i remembered a few things i forgot to mention during our in person consultation. Long story short, after sending him one too many emails the tattoo artist sent me an email saying that he feels i dont trust him enough and that im micromanaging the tattoo design so he doesnt want to do it anymore. On the plus side he said he would refund me my deposit and at least this time i didnt end up with a tattoo that i have regrets about. On the down side of things i feel bad because i had been planning this tattoo since january. i really like his individual style and im not sure if hell ever consider letting me book him again. I just wanted to express my thoughts on the subject. I seem to have a problem with finding a balance between speaking up at all and speaking up too much about things. I sent him an email asking if maybe he would change his mind but not sure if he will consider it.