It's been everywhere, the poor mother who had a fake tan disaster, her baby had it's first fake tan - by mistake!  Haters gonna hate!  The short of it is when the baby was feeding, the mother's tan transferred over as she was still wearing the colour guide. You've probably noticed, depending on the brand you use, that the product can rub off onto clothes during the development time and so the product rubbed off onto the baby's face. The mother in question was then pilloried on social media for being irresponsible, vain, and goodness knows what else.  For me it was more the mistake of the professional who gave her the spray tan than her mistake and here's why.

The fact is, most people who either apply self tan themselves or have a spray tan, don't necessarily think about the detail.  Using a tanner be it a self applied product or having it done professionally is safe when you are both pregnant and breastfeeding - FACT!  There is no scientific proof that either can cause harm to the unborn or breast feeding child.  You might end up with a dodgy tan as the DHA in the product can do strange things to the skin when you have raging hormones when pregnant as it works with the PH of the skin.  However, I would not want any baby of mine ingesting in any way a tanning product.  If you are carrying out a professional service, charging a fee for your professional knowledge and skill then you should be professionally trained and certainly know what you are doing.  One of the major items we cover in our training of professionals is you NEVER spray tan a breast feeding mother topless and this would be a contra indication in the client consultation which every spray tan professional should carry out prior to tanning their clients.

Believe me, when you explain to that mother the reasons why, she will be more than happy to wear her bra with the straps dropped than have the product transfer onto her baby.  In all my years of experience (excess of 14 years) I have never had to reason with someone over this point.  At the end of the day I would just say no if I had to.  

So for me it was the professional for not carrying out a complete consultation with her client, asking her if she was breastfeeding and then going onto explain why she wouldn't be prepared to spray her topless, who was to blame for this mishap.

Here are some other questions you should be expected to answer as part of the consultation process and why:

Do you wear contact lenses?  Sometimes when being spray tanned, due to being sprayed in a confined space you can have "fogging" on your lenses.  This simply gives you the opportunity to remove your lenses before being sprayed.

Do you suffer from asthma?  We would ask this question to inform you and the therapist if being in an enclosed space and having spray particulates around you could - usually in extreme circumstances - cause you to have an asthma attack.  By asking you in advance all parties become aware of the possibility of this happening and can be prepared.

Are you taking any steroid type medication?  Products which are applied to the skin can have a detrimental outcome to your tan and this varies from product to product. It often causes a failure to show any colour or extreme patchiness.  If your client is taking an oral form then this can cause extreme drying of the skin, thereby giving a poor result.

These are just a couple of questions as an example, make sure your spray tan professional knows what he/she is doing and if they don't carry out a consultation with you then perhaps you might think about finding another therapist.

I hope you find this post helpful and be sure to sign up for our newsletter to receive more top tips and tricks.  You might also like to read this Fake tan tips and mysterious white marks next.