Every tattoo I get feels like a step further towards the truest version of myself (Picture: Aidan Milan)
My mum has always been enviable.
All my friends have consistently said so, admiring her style and the general way she moves through the world.
From introducing me to System of a Down and The Cranberries to bringing me along to lectures and workshops when she was getting her art degree, she made my earliest years very cool.
So her getting her first (and so far only) tattoo at 39 and taking her 14-year-old kid along for the session was a very Mum move.
I remember the buzz of the needle, the sterile surroundings, the art on the walls, and her smiling, saying it didn’t hurt much at all. I can’t recall what we chatted about with the guy holding the needle while he was working, but I do remember that he was nice and accommodating.
I was excited – I’d only witnessed people being tattooed on TV, and there I was, seeing how it all worked first-hand.
I’d wanted something to wrap around my forearm for such a long time (Picture: Aidan Milan)
Mum was so happy with the result – a Celtic knot on her wrist that represents her bond with me and the rest of our family.
Going with her really helped demystify tattoos for me, and made that kind of artful self-expression feel very attainable.
The whole thing was fascinating to me, and I couldn’t wait to get some ink of my own.
Now, at 29, I’ve just got my third tattoo, and every one I get feels like a step further towards the truest version of myself. The chic and sexy woman I picture in my head.
I’d wanted something to wrap around my forearm for such a long time, but there wasn’t a design I’d been able to think of that felt quite right. But when I came across a new artist’s work on social media, I knew right away that her sharp, elegant, abstract designs were what I’d been looking for.
No, it doesn’t ‘mean’ anything – just that I think it’s beautiful enough to be on my body forever.
Before each tattoo, my mum was among the people I ran the ideas by (Picture: Supplied)
When I told my mum that I’d booked this latest session, and showed her examples of the artist’s work, she said she wished she could get one just like it. That was pretty validating, especially from a woman who hasn’t been able to choose a second tattoo for over a decade!
Conversations like this are the reason why, the rare occasions where someone tells me ‘you’ll regret that when you’re older’, asks what my mum would say, or brings up employability are always so funny to me.
If someone expects me to say my mum is dismayed and disappointed at my chosen method of self-expression – I tell them about how I sat with her through her own tattoo.
There’s not much else they can say after that, and regardless, my mum’s support for the body art I chose counts way more than the opinions of any naysayers.
On top of that, I’ve worked office jobs where my managers had tattoos, my stepdad’s 78-year-old father has two – one on each forearm – and my aunt (a lawyer who now manages a corporate document review team) has a neck tattoo.
As such, it didn’t exactly break the mould when I got my first one at 23, a cute little alien on the back of my ankle, nor my second at 28, a line from a song down my back.
Before each one, my mum was among the people I ran the ideas by, and I was reassured by her validation that yes, the ink would look great on me. She wasn’t with me when I got them done, but her approval helped give me the guts to sit in the chair
Tattoos might not be for you, but the art form has been woven into human history for millennia.
My latest tattoo stretches from my forearm to around my wrist (Picture: Aidan Milan)
People all over the world have been getting body art since at least the Neolithic era – we know that because tattooed mummified skin has been found by archaeologists in dozens of countries.
According to a YouGov study in 2022, over a quarter (26%) of the British public now have tattoos, one in three (31%) workers say they have one, and 13% of those employed reported having at least one visible tattoo – meaning on the head, face, neck, forearms, wrists or hands.
Now, thanks to my latest tattoo – which stretches from my forearm to around my wrist – I can count myself among that 13%.
More: News
When I shared photos of the finished tat on Instagram, joking about how ‘gorgeous gorgeous girls get tattoos that don’t mean anything, actually’, Mum commented under it: ‘Does a beautiful painting have to have a deeper meaning?’
She added: ‘The body is a canvas, that’s all the meaning you need.’
Yes, my mum is very cool, and when I get future tattoos, though I’ve yet to decide what they’ll be, I know she’ll be a fan.
Do you have a story you’d like to share? Get in touch by emailing [email protected].
Share your views in the comments below.
MORE : Katie Price gets new tattoo after nearly eight hours under the needle
MORE : It took less than two weeks for this man to regret his Messi tattoo
She got her first tattoo at 39 and took her 14-year-old kid along for the session.
