Getting Inked And How to Scare Your Tattoo Artist

I decided to take the plunge and get my first tattoo. A book themed tattoo. Shocking, I know. Apparently, my rebellious spirit is really kicking in as I approach the later part of my 30’s. I’ve wanted a tattoo for a while but haven’t been entirely sure I wouldn’t panic the moment the needle hit my skin and run screaming about psychos stabbing people. I am prone to slight dramatics when in pain. Don’t ask my husband to verify that. He overestimates my drama. However, my oldest was going in to get her daith pierced…note for everyone who has no idea what that is, it’s the inside part of your ear nearest to your head… and I figured if she could be brave I could too! But not that brave. That piercing looked scary as hell.

I’m fully a millennial, so I used Instagram to search for an artist with a style I liked and scheduled an appointment a little over a month in advance. I had a very particular design in mind, so my poor artist got a wall of text and sample photos for each section to work from. Basically, I wanted an open book tattoo but wanted all of my favorite genres represented. I sent her what I wanted for each one and some sample photos. I sent her 5 items I wanted to be springing forth from the book:

1. The dinosaur from Jurrassic Park, my favorite sci-fi novel (and dinosaurs are awesome)
2. The Brother is watching eye from 1984 for dystopian fiction (Read more about it here)
3. A balloon with the SS Georgie on the end from IT for horror
4. Smaug, basically just a dragon, from The Hobbit to represent fantasy
5. A plague mask, this is less for a specific book but because I love books about medical science and epidemiology

Yes, I’m a picky pain in the ass, but this is permanent and I don’t even keep the same hair color that long. Let me tell you the artist killed it. I was totally thrilled that she got my concept. I don’t know how tattoo artists do it but it was like she pulled the image from my brain. But better. Artistically. And I don’t actually see images in my mind, it’s just a running commentary all the time. God, I never shut up.

I went into the appointment completely blind just excited to get my book tattoo. I had no idea what to expect. The tattoo is on my forearm and is about 5 inches. So I start asking the artist some questions about what she’s setting up because I’m nosey and talk a lot when I’m feeling anxious. She stops for a moment and looks at me.

“Uh, is this your first tattoo?”

“Yep!” Que me all excited and not reading the room.

“Oh” She suddenly looks slightly panicked. Now I’m concerned. How did I mess this up already?

Well, I guess people don’t usually go for such large art on the first time and they tend to disclose their newbie status. Oops. I see a look of horror, quickly masked, on her face. She switches gears a bit and after explaining the process; we get started. She takes it slow at first and asks how I’m doing and if I need a break several times, but we both get through it. Two and a half hours later and it looks great.

The big question, though, how did it feel? It felt a bit like jumping through one of those thorn bushes, jaggers if you’re from around here. Scratchy, a little stabby, but not really painful. I ended up not needing a break. Of course, the forearm is a pretty chill place to get a tattoo. Not like one of those crazy, painful sternum deals. I’ll be skipping those for now. For the next few days, I kept thinking it felt like sunburn, but as a disturbingly pale individual, I usually avoid the sun. Along with my serotonin, my vitamin D is store bought.

After a while it started flaking, again very sunburn-like, and no amount of lotion was staving off the itching. And every. single. person. Said I couldn’t peel at it. So, the only thing I could think about was peeling it. It was days of constantly reminding myself, and being reminded by other unnecessarily critical family members. When the peeling was over it ended up feeling great, like brand new baby skin, but someone should speak to their parents because babies shouldn’t have tattoos.

And then my dad said the dinosaur looked like a leaf. So there ya go.