19 Mar Tattoos With A Deeper Meaning
This piece is all about tattoos and how they can help people. Tattoos are often looked at in a bad light, whether that be the way they are shown through the media or other preconceived notions people may have. I wanted to show how for some tattoos can actually help someone mentally, both for mental health reasons and for personal medical reasons. My aim was not to change people’s minds, but to give them more of a backstory on why people choose to have body art. My intended audience is a slightly older audience (ages 40+) that may not necessarily understand why some tattoos can actually help people.
The morning of my tattoo appointment I had a million butterflies in my stomach. I wasn’t nervous. Instead, very excited and already rushing with adrenaline. Heart racing and body shaking, already getting ready for the excitement and pain I am about to feel. The day before, I was feeling homesick, feeling overwhelmed and depressed, but I knew that this tattoo I was getting the next day was going to change the way I was feeling. It was going to make me feel like I always had a piece of home with me. It was going to make me feel like my other tattoos already did; like I added the missing piece to the puzzle.
For many years, tattoos have been seen as something that only people rebelling against society would have. Gangsters, mafia men, criminals and sailors of the past are traditionally known for having tattoos as well as being on the outside ring of our everyday society. However, throughout the past 50 years, the tattooing industry has changed tremendously. Tattoos are now part of our mainstream society. It is estimated that 1 in 5 adults and 1 in 3 young adults in the UK are tattooed. Although tattoos are now very popular, there are many people still very confused by this form of body art. They may ask questions such as “why would you ruin your body like that?” and “why do you even get tattooed?” But what if I said that having tattoos could actually help people and even enrich their lives for the better? Whether it’s tattoos to help with self expression while suffering from depression, anxiety and other mental health issues or getting tattooed to help bring back confidence after overcoming breast cancer, body art has many different faces and can help in many different ways.
Original infographic – sourced information here
Tattoos date further back in history than you may think. The earliest evidence of tattoos actually date back to the Egyptians as far back as 2000 B.C. These tattoos were discovered on female mummies from the time. At this time, tattoos seem to have been exclusively on women. In slightly more recent times, A.D., tattooing started to spread into cultures such as the Romans, Native Americans, Japanese and many African nations. However, tattooing only truly made a name for itself much more recently in history around the mid 19th century when the first professional tattoo shop was opened in New York City. Around the early 1900’s, body art became popular with sailors, gangsters and criminals and around this time, it was more of a male dominated hobby to show strength and rebellion. The largest rise in the tattoo industry happened in the 1960’s when people started to get tattooed for arts sake alone. Rock stars, actors and entertainers started to become heavily covered and getting tattooed, which used to be seen as an anti-social activity, was now a trendy past time.
Fast forward to today and there are over 2,000 tattoo studios dotted around the UK. Tattoos are now a huge part of our society with now even doctors, lawyers and business people being inked. Many people now view tattoos as art and self expression, not holding their opinions on body art for only those who are trying to escape the norms of society. People start getting body modifications for many different reasons, but one thing always runs true, we get tattooed because it’s something we like seeing on our body. Our body art may not have a specific meaning, but in a time in history where studies have shown that 1 in 4 people in the UK suffer with mental health problems each year, it’s nice to have something that makes us happy.
Depression and anxiety are extremely common in society nowadays. Doctors often recommend people who are dealing with mental health issues to focus their energy somewhere else. Antidepressant drugs, exercise, self-help groups and counselling are some of the more common treatments, while some doctors also recommend picking up an art hobby. Getting tattooed can be seen as having a collection of art on your body. Personally, that is how I view my tattoos. I struggled with both depression and anxiety for about 3 years and it wasn’t until I started collecting tattoos on my body that I felt less depressed. It is like looking at art every day. Not only is it a good distraction, but it is also something that has boosted my self confidence incredibly. “As a symbol and a behavior, the tattoo has power,” says psychologist Kirby Farrell Ph.D. “While rationales can be as varied as the designs, all tattoos modify self-esteem as well as bodies. Like cosmetics, tattoos are prosthetic, since like an artificial limb they make up for something felt to be missing or inadequate.”
In 2013, the nonprofit organization, Project Semicolon was born. This project is a mental health organization with an anti-suicide initiative. They are “dedicated to presenting hope and love for those who are struggling with mental illness, suicide, addiction and self-injury”, and “exists to encourage, love and inspire.” The project is known for its advocates to get semicolon tattoos as a way to show that they are the author of their life and that their story is continuing. The tattoo is now widely known as the most popular mental health related tattoo and is worldwide. The community that Project Semicolon has created is extremely large and has helped so many people become more aware and overcome their mental health problems.
Although tattooing can not cure all mental illness, it certainly can help with the way that you view yourself. We get tattooed not for others, but for ourselves. It is something that is meaningful to us. A 2015 study looked into 2,395 respondents from six public American Universities. Female respondents with four or more tattoos report a substantively and significantly higher level of self-esteem than those with no – or fewer than 4 – tattoos. Many people, have found that getting tattoos that specifically are related to our mental illness can be the most beneficial of all. Even though so many people suffer with mental illness, there is still a social stigma around it. Tattooing yourself with something related to your illness, anxiety or depression can really break down a lot of the walls. It’s similar to the phrase “wear your heart on your sleeve.” You are taking accountability and showing the real you without having to say anything and that can be extremely beneficial in working on your own problems.
Jason Osborn is heavily tattooed and has used body art as a way to tackle his battle with mental health.
Jason Osborn’s tattoos
In contrast, there are still some that do not think getting tattoos can benefit a person at all. I can’t even count the amount of times I’ve heard “what are you going to do about your tattoos when you are old?” and “what if you don’t like them anymore?” My answer to these questions is always along these lines, “I will look awesome when I’m old because I’ll be covered in artwork that I love and I think about the tattoos before I get them. They are tattoos that will always have important meanings to me.” There are definitely a lot of tattooed people who have a very similar answer to those questions. But this does bring up a very interesting point; if you have a tattoo and you get tired of it or start to hate it, will that have more negative effects on your mental health? A study by psychologist Jordi Quoidbach, of Harvard University reported in the journal Science that people change over time and that they are no longer the same person they were decades before. Quoidbach studied over 19,000 people aged 18-68 and asked them how much they changed in the past decade. The study found that the older the participant, the less they said they changed and the less they expected to change.
Although there are tattoos that you can get that can help your mental state, getting the wrong tattoo and regretting it can be harmful. Nearly 38% of people who get tattooed between the ages of 18 and 21 have tattoo regret. Linda Brambila got her first tattoo when she was 19. Now 23, she regrets it and says that the tattoo has not helped her mental state at all. “When I was 19, I got a cat tattoo on my forearm because I thought it was going to be something I would love for the rest of my life. Now 4 years on and I absolutely hate everything about it.” Having a tattoo that you hate can cause a big burden in your life because you have to look at it every day. “I struggled with anxiety before I got that tattoo and thought that getting something fun would make me happy. Now I just can’t wait to get it covered up.” Tattoos are a huge life decision and like having a cosmetic surgery or a drastic haircut, not everyone is going to love the finished product. When getting a tattoo, stay away from things that are trendy and really think about whether this is something you will love long term, to avoid tattoo regret.
With a rise in tattoo culture, there has even been some discoveries that are now used in the medical field. Many breast cancer survivors are now using tattooing as a way to enhance the appearance of their chest after surgery. During the reconstruction period after a breast mastectomy (removing the breast for cancer treatment), tattooing can used to replace the areola which has been removed during the surgery. In addition to this, many women are also getting tattooed over their mastectomy scar, adorning their bodies in beautiful designs to celebrate their journey of overcoming such an illness. Whether a woman gets a tattooed areola or a tattoo to cover a scar, the main reason they do it is to be more confident in themselves. The tattoos these woman get are badges of honor and overcoming something as big as a life threatening illness.
Amy Kernahan has been a micropigmentation artist for over 10 years in New York City. She started her career in brow micropigmentation (better known as microblading) but then started working with breast cancer patients doing 3D areola pigmentation. “I got into areola tattooing after a surgeon asked me to tattoo a nipple for his patient who had breast reconstruction. After that, I was hooked!” Kernahan stated. What is her message to anyone that still doesn’t approve of body modification? “I would tell anyone who is against tattoos to be open minded. There are many times that I have clients that start crying after seeing the work I’ve done for them because it restores their self confidence that they had lost due to breast cancer.” Kernahan also states “You can already see the mental change in my patients the second they see the tattoo. During their breast cancer, they were stripped of something that made them feel womanly. The areola tattoos are 3D and look so lifelike, that they feel they are being given back their womanhood. I’ve never seen woman so happy.”
3D areola tattooing done by Amy Kernahan
Each tattoo I have had done has had a very specific and sentimental meaning to me. I’ve had these tattoos done at a point where I felt like I had a missing piece and after I had them done, I felt like that piece had been filled. And now that it has been a couple of months since I got my last tattoo (the palm tree seen above), I can seriously say that I feel like the missing piece has been filled. It has been filled in with the form of a tattoo. I no longer feel the depressed feelings about missing home. When I feel even the slightest bit homesick, I look in the mirror and see a palm tree on the back of my arm that just feels like a piece of home. Tattoos may not have this effect on everyone. To some, a tattoo might be just a fun or pretty thing to look at, but for the people who tattoos actually help, the way we feel will forever be changed. Whether you lost someone and want to get a memory tattoo of them, you overcame breast cancer and want to tattoo something that you lost or wether you want to get tattoo because you are feeling lost.
Your emotions are a personal experience and so are your tattoos.
My tattoos
