BMX 8 days ago and one nipple only (not areola) is turning black

My PS was decent and warned me that my nipples would likely get 'black or dark brown scabs' that would look horrible but would fall off on their own, revealing new pink skin underneath. I also knew about it prior as, since there wasn't much information out there about healing with nipple sparing/grafting after a BMX, I ended up looking at a lot of forums for FtM people who have had "top surgery" (essentially, a nipple sparing/grafting BMX) and the 'black skin on the nipples' thing was a common theme; a few described it as their nipples looking like 'well cooked bacon' for a couple weeks after surgery, then the dead skin sloughed off and they had pinkish nipples underneath.

Since I was prepared for it, when she removed the bandages after I got my drains out, my reaction was to laugh and say, "Oh god, they look like two little oval pieces of cooked bacon!" They were super gross looking, but I knew it was just the outer layer of skin dying and sloughing off, so it wasn't worrying--just gross to look at.

With mine, she advised to keep them well moisturized with neosporin (moisture & antibiotic just in case) and keep them covered with non-stick gauze that got changed morning and night until about week 3-4; once the skin sloughed off and they stopped leaving lymphatic discharge on the gauze, they were good to be left uncovered. I did have random little 'bleeding' episodes from the nipples for about a week after that, as the skin was still new and easily irritated, however. 4 months out and they're pretty normal; they're still mostly numb, but they react to cold and touch, if nothing else.

She also advised me NOT to ice my chest, no matter how much I might want to, as grafted or repositioned nipples need a good blood supply to survive their initial few weeks, and icing your chest constricts blood flow and can kill the nipples. Her recommendation was "No icing for at least the first 5 weeks, but preferably, no icing at all for at least 6 months."

Those sites also prepared me for the fact that, if you didn't start with pink nipples, you could end up with "piebald" nipples that were partially the old tan or brown color with areas of hypopigmentation that would remain pink. Mine are pretty funny looking due to that; the nipple itself is pink, but the surrounding areola is a blotchy mix of tan and pink; for me, it doesn't matter, as I plan to tattoo over my chest next year, but for the present, it looks kind of weird.

It's sad that a lot of doctors don't tell their patients that the ick looking black scab is common, especially after grafting or nipple placement being moved (which is just a graft anyway), as it just unnecessarily freaks the patient out if they look under the bandages and see blackish skin.

Boots2, the main thing to look at isn't so much the blackish ick skin on top but what it looks like underneath as that sloughs off; if you're seeing pinkish looking skin, it's probably fine and it's just the dead layer on top sloughing off.

If it looks "angry red" underneath the stuff that's sloughing off, has more 'black' underneath, or is super painful, hot to the touch, etc...it's worth having your PS look at it to make sure it isn't necrosis.