My first tattoo wasn't what I hid from my mom.
Actually I asked her if I could get one (I was just 18 at the time), she said no way. A week or so later I asked her if I could get my labret pierced, she said hell no, I said ok, what if I got a small tattoo that is hidden by my short sleeve, she begrudgingly said "well, I guess", she didn't know my friends were waiting in the car in the driveway, I said thanks, and ran out to hop in the car and we went and got my tattoo (tribal arm band!!).
She demanded to see it when I got home, so I showed her, she just rolled her eyes. My old man (who was tattooless, but was in the navy for 25 years at this point), said that I better not go below the sleeve until I was independently wealthy (this was '98).
I started my first sleeve in '01, I lived with a roommate in an apartment, it was around late July, so I just waited to come over to their place until night and wore longsleeves. It was still so hot, and I was sweating, but I'd just stay outside and then say I have to run, and take off haha. For some reason, I decided to show it to my mom when I took her to dinner for her bday (maybe the worst day to do it in hindsight). I had my sleeve pulled up a little, hoping she'd see it (she didn't), so I just bit the bullet and showed her. She just said "Oh Daniel, what am I going to do with you". I never talked to my old man about it.
For years, she would be like, are you done yet? everytime I got tattooed again, I moved to CA in 2004, so when we would go visit her in Indiana, she would make me show off my new tattoos to everyone and called me her "tattooed wonder", although I have a little brother who has a dreamcatcher, wolfhead, and kanji tattoos, and little sister that has lower back dolphin jumping tattoo. It always made me laugh.
In 2007, my daughter was born, Eli Quinters was in town, so I was going to get a tattoo from him at Tattoo 13. My mom was in town to visit her granddaughter, and decided she wanted to get tattooed ha. I called Eli, he had space, so I got tattooed, then she got a yellow rose with an american flag draped around it. It was so wild to me, her first tattoo, which was for her dad (died in 06 in a motorcycle accident). Last year, I wake up to a picture message of a tattoo that was on my Grandmother (mom's mom). I had previously been weary about showing her my tattoos, and when she finally saw them, she said "well at least when you die, we'll know it was you" haha. Her tattoo was her first and also for her husband (my grandfather). Wild.
Sorry for the lengthy story haha.