Un-lurking

[jaimilyn]

Got my first tattoo about a month ago, everything seems to be healing well, and of course I've got a million plans for future tattoos.

 

I've been lurking at LST for a little over a month, and just wanted to say thanks for all the advice in the old threads. I'm the kind of person who needs to obsessively research things before I do them I order to feel comfortable in a new situation, and this forum is the best thing I found to get an idea of what I was going into.

 

Story: showed up to my session, I'd sent the artist a couple of reference pics, but had no idea what he'd come up with. All I knew is that I wanted an ankh with an overlaid eye of Horus, and if he could also possibly work in some mandala design. So he showed me the outline he came up with, and while I absolutely loved it, the size was a little bigger than I expected, and I waffled a minute. But I remembered all threads at LST I'd read with experienced people saying "go big or go home" and "thou shalt trust thy tattoo artist if you want their best work" - so I let him pick the right size and placement, and two hours later I had my lovely tattoo!

 

So anyway, that's me, looking forward to participating a bit more now that I know it's definitely a thing I want to do more of.

 

 

 

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[oboogie]

Nice. Welcome!

[el twe]

Good story, good looking tattoo.  Who did it?  Welcome to LST!

[jaimilyn]

Thanks! I live in Las Vegas, so there's a lot of good choices (as long as you stay off strip, the prices won't kill you), this time around I went to Studio 21. They came highly recommended by a former coworker who was a regular, and also they have phenomenal Yelp ratings. My artist was Das Frank, he was great. When my husband gets doctors clearance to get a matching piece, will be calling back!

Me, we will see...I've got an existing appointment late in May at another studio, but it was a really informal consult with the artist and she hasn't confirmed it other than an email that she got my reference material email, no deposit. The tattoo I ended up getting first was what I'd planned as a second piece originally, but got impatient once I had made up my mind to get a tattoo. Ended up working out fine because this is the one with actual meaning, the first was intended to just be a trial run experiment with flowers or mandala type thing. I have Fibromyalgia and some other chronic pain issues that limit what I can do physically and I often don't know from day to day how I'll feel, so the first was just going to be an experiment to see how my body healed. So, if she confirms, great - I love her work, but I've popped the cherry (so to speak :D) so I'm not crawling the walls with impatience anymore either!



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[zetroc]

That looks great! Welcome to the club!

[Michaelshane]

My wife has fibromyalgia and is afraid to get tattooed.Dont know what will happen.

[jaimilyn]

My wife has fibromyalgia and is afraid to get tattooed.Dont know what will happen.

That's been one of the factors holding me back for years, but I recently joined a Facebook group of about 20k ladies with Fibro and there were a lot of positive experiences, far more than anyone reporting issues, as long as they weren't already in a flare. The endorphin rush is great actually, and because my body is always in some kind of pain or other, it's pretty cathartic to know that I chose the pain this time, and something good will come from it - instead of what seems like a never-ending slog of non-rewarding pain that's my normal life.

I actually chose the forearm because I wanted to always be able to see something I like and chose for my body. My fibro (and the other associated issues) dictates a lot about my life, from what I can wear, how I can wear my hair, what jewelry I can wear, so many things. In the last six months, things have gone pretty badly health-wise, and feeling like there's something I chose has been nice. The symbology is Egyptian and stands for life, health, and strength. Egyptian because my husband loves ancient Egypt stuff. (When he gets his tattoo, it'll be king Tutankhamen's cartouche)

So basically I chose something that's the equivalent of those hipster "strength" tattoos - just more badass :cool:

Anyway, this reply was mostly to say that there's a lot of us in the Fibromyalgia community that have had success with tattoos and other body modification, if doc clears it. Good luck to her, chronic pain of any type is tough.


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[Devious6]

Great story and insight into why you chose the design - and lovely work. Welcome to the forum!!