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bruising from shooting up?

mrs_mia_wallace

mrs_mia_wallace

Bluelighter
Joined
Jan 9, 2009
Messages
2,395
Location
London
I'm an IV H user and have been for a few years now...

I always shoot up in the same place (right in the crook of my elbow on both arms) but lately I haven't been able to hit myself there so I've been fixing to the left, a little below the elbow on my forearm. I've never, ever had bruising on my arms from shooting up before--I get track marks but not bruises.... now I'm bruising and it will not go away. Does anyone know why I'm bruising? And if yes, what I can do to stop it/heal the bruise/

Thaks!
 
Are you using a different gauge needle than usual? that's really the only thing I can think of if you're doing everything else the same as usual.
 
you may be slightly poking through the other side. some people bruise when using certain veins though. I stopped bruising when I got scar tissue. fresh vein might be too fresh I guess. lots of phlebotomists bruise people along with nurses and they went to school for spiking veins. let alone one of us who learns through trial and error. maybe try putting pressure on the site upon pulling the needle out to keep blood from coming out of the vein into your tissue. or don't use a tourniquet if you don't need to.
 
It's common to bruise in that area. It's happened to me, and I've seen it mentioned here a lot, plus from a few friends who hit that area too. I'm guessing that the crook is less likely to bruise since the skin is always moving so used to some kind of contact, but the area below it doesn't move all the time and is less 'worn' so probably bruises easier since poking a hole there is so foreign to it.
 
come to think of it, if you're using a spot 3-5 inches from the crook of your arm going up toward your hand on the inner fore-arm....I know the vein you're probably using. It's a pretty good one. Hard to see if you have bad vascularity. It does bruise though. Anything up that way seems to bruise more easily....I've had a few really colorful yellow/purple bulls-eye kind of bruises on that part of my arm...There's a some good ones on the outer wrist area that may be better for you. It all depends on your body...what you can see, your technique.

edit: There's a vein chart somewhere on here, which is better than a vague description. But the vein I'm thinking of is actually one of the two "big ones" that are on the crook of the inside of your arm, opposite your elbow. There's one that keeps running up toward the outer half of your arm toward your hand. I can only see it on one of my arms. there's also a few smaller ones in that same latitude, but none of those can really be fucked with long-term IME.
 
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I usually always bruised in those areas. Try to always use a new rig as it'll keep the bruising at a minimum.
 
mrs_mia_wallace said:
Thanks guys! What's the best thing to do to heal the bruise? Neosporin isnt doing shit...
Click to expand...

There's nothing you can do really. You could cover it up with skin-concealer. I find time is the only thing that really helps...once they turn yellowish in hue they're vanish in a few more days.
 
Another thing... If you are bruising more easily generally - eg, from small knocks, not just at injection sites,
and if this is a new thing, you should get a liver function test and clotting screen done - because it could be
a sign of something going wrong with the clotting system. You aren't taking any Aspirin at all for any reason?

I'm sure you know this but... never share needles or any of the equipment or filters or solutions or anything;
even if you have in the past, don't do so in the future! As well as general infections, and HIV, the risk is of
Hepatitis C which is 100x more infectious than HIV!

On a happier note, Hep C can be treated and often cured, but the treatment is quite gruelling for 3-6 months,
so it is worth getting a general health check if the bruising is anything other than just related to the change
of injection site!
 
Can you get tested for hep c at a free clinic? I went for an HIV test today just to be sure.... I was negative, thank god. I exposed myself in the fall and it's been hanging over my head since then. I wanted to wait the 3 month window and then I was too scared to go. I almost started crying I was so relieved when he told me I was negative! He was so confused, he asked me "why are you crying? Most people are happy when they're negative!" I don't think I've ever cried because I was so happy before!

I'd like to get tested for hep c, just to be sure-- but I'd rather do it quick and anonymously like I did with the HIV test.

Also, this is unrelated but, is it possible to get HIV/Hep C from sharing a cooker with somebody? I shared a cooker with somebody six months ago and that was why I was scared I had exposed myself to HIV but the guy at the testing place wasn't sure if I actually had exposed myself...
 
Over half the people I know who have IVd drugs for any significant period of time have Hep C....HIV is a lot harder to get! You can get Hep C from water, cookers, cottons...basically from sharing anything related to IV drug-use....You can get HIV via the same routes, but it's pretty much always directly through used syringes, not rinsed or cleaned, where blood is involved....It takes a lot less "Parts Per Million" of Hep C infected blood to contract than HIV infected blood....The Hep C virus is also much "tougher" than HIV...It can survive for weeks outside of the body, whereas HIV usually dies in seconds..

The HIV virus can survive for a long time provided it's not exposed to air...The most likely place is usually a used syringe. the blood in the barrel of a used syringe is pretty much sealed-off. The virus will die in time, but any exposure to air kills HIV very quickly....Hep C, not so much!

If you shared something like.....water, that may have contained trace amounts of HCV infected blood, chances are that you'll probably still come up negative, but you never know!

You don't have HIV, and Hep C is actually curable in 50+% of cases these days.....Also, it generally takes decades for symptoms to manifest at all! It's definitely bad, but not a death sentence....

And yes, if you're in the US, I can almost guarantee that free testing is available within 100 miles of your location.
 
you can get it from cookers, tourniquets, cottons, water, etc that is shared. get checked. better safe than sorry.
 
If I know I'm gonna be using IV drugs with other people, I always have a fresh 10 pack of my own rigs... my own cookers, cotton, water etc....

I'll always offer up clean needles to anyone, I don't care who it is, I'll give you a clean one if I have it!

I make sure my cooker never leaves my sight. I destroy my used ones and dispose of them properly!

I understand that it doesn't always happen exactly as planned, but I never leave the house without a new rig, or at least one of MY dirties, and a water bottle...I use the cap of a water bottle as a cooker for a lot of reasons and I always have a few q-tips on me for filters too, but I'd gnaw a piece of my t-shirt off before I'd take a used cotton....No excuse for used cottons! Sometimes waters not available, but I always have a bottle of water on me, when I'm using H daily!

I'm on suboxone now, so that nightmare is over for the moment!

girls can get away hiding their IV kits easier than guys....We don't generally have purses! lol, that's pretty much why!
 
BlueHues said:
Over half the people I know who have IVd drugs for any significant period of time have Hep C....HIV is a lot harder to get! You can get Hep C from water, cookers, cottons...basically from sharing anything related to IV drug-use....You can get HIV via the same routes, but it's pretty much always directly through used syringes, not rinsed or cleaned, where blood is involved....It takes a lot less "Parts Per Million" of Hep C infected blood to contract than HIV infected blood....The Hep C virus is also much "tougher" than HIV...It can survive for weeks outside of the body, whereas HIV usually dies in seconds..

The HIV virus can survive for a long time provided it's not exposed to air...The most likely place is usually a used syringe. the blood in the barrel of a used syringe is pretty much sealed-off. The virus will die in time, but any exposure to air kills HIV very quickly....Hep C, not so much!

If you shared something like.....water, that may have contained trace amounts of HCV infected blood, chances are that you'll probably still come up negative, but you never know!

You don't have HIV, and Hep C is actually curable in 50+% of cases these days.....Also, it generally takes decades for symptoms to manifest at all! It's definitely bad, but not a death sentence....

And yes, if you're in the US, I can almost guarantee that free testing is available within 100 miles of your location.
Click to expand...

Damn I had no idea that Hep C could survive that long or was so easy to catch... I assumed it was the same as HIV. But I also assumed you could get HIV from a needle whether it was cleaned or not. I did share a needle with somebody the first time I shot up-- and he had Hep C. We bleached the needle out in-between uses. At the time he said he was clean but then a year later sent me a message telling me he had lied and that he had Hep C. My other friend that used the same needle came up clean when she got tested for it, and I've never gone, because I'm the queen of denial (took me six months to get tested for HIV) so I guess I should really go then, it sounds like there's a chance I might have it.

Should I just do a search for free hep c testing? And can hep c be transmitted through sexual contact?
 
yes it can.

please get yourself tested for your own sake and sanity, and for any other partners you may be with here on in.

they deserve the right to know whether theyre messing around with someone who is clean or not. no excuses.

you could be unknowingly infecting people. think about that for a minute and see how it weighs on your conscience.
 
tentram said:
they deserve the right to know whether theyre messing around with someone who is clean or not. no excuses.

you could be unknowingly infecting people. think about that for a minute and see how it weighs on your conscience.
Click to expand...


Amen to that. Unknowingly infecting people either because you don't care or are too lazy to get tested is always something that really pissed me off.
 
Well now I know why I got this nasty mark. I hadn't shot up in a while, used a fresh spike in the crook of my arm and I might have went to far. Also, I think I might have held the tourniquet too long...lost my touch I guess, but I don't think that is necessarily a bad thing.
 
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