Tattoos in midlife

It's a cliche but it's happening folks

I got a new tattoo last week. It was my fourth. For the past few years I’ve been meaning to get a tattoo for my youngest daughter. One that is a dedication to her. It wasn’t easy getting pregnant, and I had to go through 7 rounds of IVF to conceive her and her older sister. I struggled through early motherhood. I treasure my kids but man have they taken a toll on my body and mind.

I ruminated a lot on what to get. I thought about dates. My late dad and her share the same birthday so should I get the date on my arm? Or something else? In the end I ruminated so long that I just came up with a design on a whim.

‘What do you want Mummy to get on her arm,’ I asked my daughter one evening.

‘Get a cheetah,’ she said, ‘I’m a cheetah. I am also a sabre toothed tiger. So maybe get one of those.’

I am not a cheetah.

I am not fast (not whilst running anyway) and I am not one of those hunters who chase pray and kill them with one fatal bite on the neck (my daughter isn’t either). This wasn’t about me though and yes my daughter has some cheetah like qualities (she CAN run fast but isn’t a predator), and she also has a giant soft toy that she got from Ikea which is a cheetah which she has adored all her life…a cheetah it was! I booked an appointment without even thinking about it. So different to the times when I’d considered getting tattoos in my youth (never able to come up with something that I deemed ‘cool enough’).

At the tattoo place (local) the music was stressful- like some sort of Death Metal combo frenzy and I asked if maybe they could turn it down. They didn’t but I got used to it. Sometimes as you get older you need to get out of your comfort zone and I can listen to Desert Island Discs at home. I also realised that the traditional tattoo place isn’t quite designed with the midlife woman in mind. And that was the actual point of doing it. It was again about not swimming in the same pond with the same fish.

It can feel intimidating. The tattooist however was lovely. We chatted- a bit like the chat you get when you’re having your hair done but not so inane. More substance. I was interested in finding out more about the world of tattoos. I like to learn about things I don’t know about and how it works. The tattoo was a bit painful but not as bad as I remembered. I left with a small cheetah on my wrist. I felt elated. There is something about getting a tattoo in midlife which is very different to getting one when you’re in your late teens.

I have quite a few friends who got tattoos early. My younger sister got a band’s logo tattooed on her back- she still has it but the band is long forgotten now. Another friend got a rose on her shoulder and hates it now. I had the phrase ‘We’ll be happy again nevermind,’ (a mantra from an old wartime postcard I found in a charity shop) on my arm. I remember staring at that phase a lot when going through all the IVF. The scans. The egg collection. The transfer. More scans. The miscarriages. The operations afterwards when the babies didn’t miscarry completely. Then the positive scans. The labour of two children. The fear. The first few months of feeling like I was living on another planet and wasn’t myself anymore.

I looked at it when I was in jobs I hated. When I was typing my books. When I had good news on emails and bad. When I was crying after a demotivating Zoom call with a boss who undermined me at every turn. When I picked up the phone and my dad was gone, just like that, evaporated and disappeared with no explanation or final conversation or chance to say all the things I’d waited to say to him.

The longer I’ve had that tattoo, the more it made sense. Reminding me that pain and discomfort and grief is temporary. It passes or changes flavour and happiness comes eventually (it too is fleeting and passes unfortunately). In my forties I got tattooed because I finally didn’t care about what others thought. I didn’t think about what sort of designs would ‘make me look cool.’ I knew that I didn’t want to get any partner’s name tattooed on my person. I loved my partner but was convinced that I was responsible for my own happiness so why would I get their name on my body? I also cared less about my body as something that is subjected to the male gaze.

Men look less at women my age so I wasn’t thinking about what they might like to see. Much of my twenties had been spent thinking this way and I was done with that (my clothes now firmly reflect what I like now and are often the opposite of what is deemed ‘sexy’ in the traditional sense). I wear pants that I like. Make up I like. I don’t care if it’s not sexy, it’s irrelevant.

I was coming out of school this week (finally they are back!) and another mum told me she too had had a tattoo in later life. ‘I feel so much more liberated,’ she said. She told me she wanted to get more. That she thought it was fun.

I have another friend who has tattoos that cover her legs. She has chosen lots of different symbols that represent personal struggles and things she wants to celebrate. They are only really meaningful to her. They aren’t about pleasing anyone or explaining herself. I feel this way too. I want to look at my arms and see things that remind me how far I’ve come. I want to be old and think back on not only the shit that I went through but also the triumphs. I am proud of all this stuff now. I have survived and will continue to survive.

I am going back to get another tattoo, this time one for my dad. I am becoming addicted now. Dad would be bemused by this. But also tolerant. He would possibly laugh.

‘Don’t get a pig please Niki,’ he’d say, ‘I know it’s my favourite animal but I’m not sure a pig is a good idea.’

Which is exactly what I am getting next.

‘I guess it’s not really about what I think any - hoo’ he’d say to that (he always said ‘any-hoo’ with an upward inflection at the end when he wanted to change the subject).

He’d be right. It’s not any-hoo.