REBECCA: Hey everyone, this is Talon Marks Multimedia editor.
REBECCA: In this podcast, I’m describing my self-esteem or self-image and my tattoos. I don’t really know where to begin but I guess ill start with myself and the time it took to finally get my first big tattoo.
REBECCA: I grew up in a small family where anything you did, basically the entire family knew. Tattoos are a bit taboo in my family but I think that’s been kind of going away recently since my art on my body seems to grow each year. So as a kid I felt that getting tattoos was definitely out of the question growing up which made me feel hopeless about ever feeling good about myself. I would always draw on myself with pens markers, anything that was a ballpoint pen, I drew on myself. Of course, my mom would hate it and id get punished or she would scold me that tattoos aren’t ladylike in a sense. But the thing is, I had already seen beautiful women who have tattoos so it would throw me guard as to what was lady-like and not.
REBECCA: As time went on, I gained weight and wasn’t the prettiest. I definitely wasn’t happy with myself and still kept wanting tattoos even though I was only a freshman in high school. Like if my mom was really going to let a 14-year-old with a crappy tattoo walk around campus. Anyway, I joined color guard and did that throughout high school- lost some weight and finally had some braces slapped on my teeth. I kind of felt good about myself in a way, I guess.
REBECCA: Once I graduated high school I knew it was finally around that time to start thinking about what I wanted on my body that was potentially going to be on my skin for my friends and family to see forever. I needed to choose between me wanting a tattoo to me taking the time to get the perfect one. I grew out of my kid mindset about having something cartoony and went into more of a cultural representation as well as tributes and representations of my family and the things I keep so near and dear to my heart.
REBECCA: At one point in my life, I fell into depression and gained a bit of weight again. I thought I was never going to be able to get a tattoo since my skin was stretched out and I had stretch marks. I wanted tattoos in places where I thought I had the confidence to show off but ended up feeling short just because of all the negative feedback about being a plus size girl and having tattoos in revealing places. My confidence was slowly dimming out and I just didn’t feel like I loved myself.
REBECCA: I decided that for my 21st birthday I finally wanted a tattoo that represented my culture. I ended up getting a huge portrait of the Goddess Xochiqueztal in Aztec Mythology which took about three 5-hour sessions to fully complete. Once finished, I realized that in order for my flaunt my tattoo, I needed to wear things that show my legs. I’m very self-conscious of my legs and knew that if I wanted to strut my stuff, I needed to add effort into me eating healthy, discovering new exercise habits, and most importantly learning how to love myself regardless of my weight.
REBECCA: After that, I started my journey of working on my self-image and how I needed to perceive myself regularly. I know we all have our kinks as to what makes us feel good, but seriously believe that my tattoos gave me a boost of motivation to work on my weight and being able to show off my tattoos without having the worry of having people say bad things.
REBECCA: I think this whole tattoo journey has given me a sense of relief and a bit of a clear image of who I am supposed to be.
