Blisters - to pop or not to pop? (Read 978 times)

You will probably get several opinions on this. But I wouldn't pop the blister unless I thought it was going to pop anyway. If you've been running this week and it hasn't popped, I would leave it. You can apply a wet black teabag to it and that will help to dry it out (this sounds strange I know). Once you pop a blister it becomes a wound. Wounds s*ck. Blisters are annoying. On the other hand if it's going to pop on its own, it will be a messy wound, which is worse. Your call.

If it's been a few days since you first got it, I say pop it. Just leave the old skin on it to give the new stuff some additional time to toughen up. I recently acquired a blister on the ball of each foot from playing soccer and I didn't pop them right away. I kept running on them, and the result was that they actually grew in diameter b/c I was forcing the liquid to the edge of the blister w/each foot strike. This was more than irritating, it was a bit painful. One popped on its own, and I popped the other one intentionally. The very next run, all was well. Sure, it makes for some ugly feet, but then again, they're pretty beat up anyway so what's the diff? It's a pretty common problem, and has been bandied about here recently (I'm too lazy to look it up) but from my recollection I don't think you can really do much damage either way. It's more of a personal preference as to what's more tolerable to you. Q

Pop it like it's hot

Pop it.

If you decide to pop it, leave the old skin and then put some A&D on it for protection of the new skin underneath.

Pop goes the blister! New skin (or crazy glue) helps in case things get bad.

Krazy Glue is a client of mine. I'll have to be sure to let them know that runners use this stuff for this.

I'd pop it. With a sterilized needle, preferably, but you can just wipe a regular needle with alcohol swabs. Then just drain the liquid with kleenex and keep it dry.