Tattooing My Neck (And Other Ways I Saved My Own Life)
CW: This article depicts scenes of self-injury and suicidal ideation. Reader discretion advised.
I was a young teenager the first time my skin met the needle. It was not at the hands of a tattoo artist or piercing professional. The purpose was not to create art. At an age so young I can hardly remember, I clutched dollar-store sewing needles in my shaking hands with the intended purpose of harming myself. That was the first time I left a permanent mark on my skin.
Over the course of the next few years, I harmed myself repeatedly. Some days it was shaving razors in a dark shower stall, other times I reverted to the traditional sewing needles of my youth; they came in inexpensive packs and varied in size and thickness. At the worst of it, I became enthralled with marking my thighs with hot cigarette ash and freshly burnt matches. The burns left the darkest marks. The thighs were the easiest to hide.
Living with undiagnosed childhood mental illness almost killed me. Living with a teenage eating disorder almost killed me twice. And living in silence as a victim of sexual violence was the final straw that led me to self-injury and suicidal ideation.
The year I turned eighteen was the year I almost died — really died — meaning, my college roommate found me on the sidewalk in zero-degree weather in the middle of the night, just laying there, hoping for a freeze to take me into the wind. The next day, I was met with intervention from my roommates and peers: I needed help. With their support, I began therapy, psychiatric medication, and a new life in which my voice was loud and my identity was boldly unapologetic. I wouldn’t let fear or silence kill me.
By the end of that year, I’d reclaimed the life that I’d almost lost by empowering myself to be honest about who I am, why I exist, and what I’ve experienced. I knew I could only stay alive by putting the ugly parts of my life on display instead of sheltering them. The silence, and hushed tongue, and hidden scars on my thigh — those secrets nearly ate me alive. Finding my voice — and amplifying it — made me born again.
I began commemorating this rebirth by marking my skin in a new way — black ink tattoos; a permanent marker of words and symbols that have saved my life, fully on display.
Of course, modifying my skin with substantial ink has been met with judgment from those who know me and those who do not. In spite of pursuing law school, working in the United States Senate, leading an international nonprofit organization, speaking at universities nationwide, and receiving widespread recognition for my work — I have been told that the choice to heavily tattoo my skin is reckless and will present employment challenges in the future.
Perhaps this is true. Perhaps tattooing my body will present employment challenges — but six years ago I was nearly dead, which would’ve presented the biggest employment challenge of all. And tattooing empowering messages on my body is one of the many methods of self-care and therapy that has saved my life.
Reclaiming my desire to injure my body by instead decorating it is revolutionary and life-affirming.
Now, regarding my work as a titleholder in the Miss America Organization:
There has never been a Miss America (or a Miss Connecticut) who has won their title with visible tattoos. In 2013, Theresa Vail represented Kansas on the Miss America stage as the first candidate to showcase her tattoos in the swimsuit competition. It was a striking moment. And she only had two tattoos!
I have over forty tattoos on my body. I will not hide them with the intention of looking more employable, more trustworthy, more elite, or more professional. I prove myself with my voice, my story, my lived experiences, and my ability to create a better world for those, like me, who have been marginalized and oppressed because of who they are.
This week, I tattooed my gender pronouns (“they/them”) on my neck in celebration of my non-binary identity. Even with forty+ tattoos on my body, I was terrified to show off my new tattoo; afraid I would be judged for the large print and the visible location.
But I am alive! I am living fully and authentically myself as a depressed-but-alive person in America in 2021. I tattoo my body to affirm that I belong here, that the razors will never win, that my body exists for a reason.
The truth? I have gotten one hundred times more compliments about my tattoos than critiques. And that leads me to believe that stigma is shifting, though negative perceptions of tattoos still exist. Even so, I know that these words on my skin have saved my life.
I believe they have the power to save others’ too. When a stranger says “I love your tattoos,” I know they are looking at my hands, which read “I am the love of my own life.” Or the semi-colon on my finger which symbolizes living in spite of suicidal ideation. Or the newly-added pronouns on my neck, that may make someone feel more visible. My body is decorated with beautiful, empowering messages. My body is an empowering message. And for that, I am grateful to live in it.
