The Painted Lady

I am officially inked! What I tried to do in March, and then April...finally happened in May. This was a long awaited challenge that I chickened out of on a couple of occasions and was incredibly nervous to have done. But I must say that I absolutely LOVE it, and could even see myself getting another one.

The entire day leading up to my 6:15pm appointment I was thinking "I'm cancelling, I'm not showing up, I'm NOT doing this!!!" I was absolutely petrified about the pain, envisioning it being something like a scene out of Hostel. As I sat on the table while he prepared the print - I started chatting with another woman who was there getting her fourth tattoo. She could tell I was a novice - as I was taking lots of deep breaths and sweating profusely - and she was explaining to me the meanings behind all her tattoos and how it really isn't that painful, and she promised me she wasn't lying.

While I don't think that conversing with her actually helped me be less afraid of the pain, she did help to distract me from my nervousness and before I knew it he had the needle and was ready to start. I warned him (tattoo artist - Eric from New Tribe) that I would probably be screaming and crying, and he said in all his years tattooing he had never once had someone cry and that I couldn't be the first. So like a brave little girl - I crushed my friends hand and made faces instead (see below for video footage). It helped that Eric was an incredibly cute guy, so I didn't want to look like a fool :)

It DID NOT feel good. But to be honest, it really didn't hurt that much. There were parts that hurt more than others - I would explain the feeling to be like a bee sting over and over again and the after feeling is like a bad sunburn. The pain is so brief though, that almost as soon as you're done getting it you've forgotten how awful it felt. And really, the most inconvenient part of the process was the forced week and half of no working out, cause I couldn't put on runners until it scabbed.

I'm so happy that I went through with it and had it done - I've always thought about getting a tattoo and now that I've got it, I'm not sure why I waited so long. I don't know if I will ever get another one, probably not unless there is a reason for it - but it was a great experience and something I'm so happy I can say I've checked off my bucket list!