So you want to get a tattoo!

It seems that recently I crossed an apparent line from "person with a few tattoos" to "tattooed person" and that means that now strangers approach me when I'm out and ask me not just about my own tattoos but about theirs. They show me tattoos and ask what I think about the design, the placement, how it's healing; they eye my tattoos and ask, "Do you think I'll get a disease?" and "Will it hurt a lot?" and "Do you think a tattoo artist will make fun of me?" People want to know what the words say -- or they want me to know they recognize the words.

(The other day at the mall, a teenage girl came up to me and interrogated me on getting her first tattoo; when she was done, she said, "I knew I could trust you when I saw you had a Fall Out Boy lyric on your arm.")

To me, there are two great things about this:

1. I can give people information and advice! I love giving advice, and I love helping people be informed so they can make the decisions that are best for them.

2. When I had just a few tattoos, people would touch me without my permission to look at my tattoos. However, I have realized that the more tattoos I have, the more people are afraid that I will hurt them if they touch me without permission. They don't know I am a pacifist and am much more likely to snap irritably, "KEEP YOUR HANDS TO YOURSELF." Yay, cultural stereotypes working in my favor! \o/

Here are the questions I hear the most, and the answers I usually give, and some unsolicited advice I always try to work in. I am the kind of person who prefers more detail to less, so... there's a lot of detail here. And, of course, if you have questions when you're done reading (or you want to jump in with something I've missed), go for it!

Disclaimer: IANATP (I am not a tattoo professional!) -- I am just a person who has a lot of tattoos, who has sat for a lot of tattoo sessions. I'm at the "I can't even count anymore" point. So this is all what I know, what I've picked up; it's not the one true way or medical advice, blah blah blah. I also want to shout out to belladonnalin, bessyboo, and sassbandit for pre-reading this and giving me some invaluable suggestions.

Figuring out how to organize this was a little complicated, so I've organized it the way I would want to read it. Feel free to skip around. Additionally, note that this is US-centric; I've never gotten a tattoo outside the US, so I can't speak to how that works. However, I've been tattooed all across the US (from MA to WA!), so this speaks to my experiences throughout the country, not just on the East Coast.

( I. How do tattoos work? )

( II. Aren't they dangerous? I am going to get a disease! )

( III. Does it hurt? )

( IV. What kind of tattoo do you want? )

( V. I want a tattoo but I don't know what I want. )

( VI. What if the artist is drawing something for me? )

( VII. Where do you want your tattoo? )

( VIII. Finding a tattoo artist. )

( IX. How much is it going to cost? )

( X. What do I do to prepare before I get a tattoo? )

( XI. Can I bring someone with me? )

( XII. Tattoo procedure )

( XIII. What about when it's healing? What do I do? )

( XIV. It's normal when your tattoo... )

( XV. What about paying and tipping? )

( XVI. I had a terrible experience with my tattoo artist. )

( XVII. But won't people think -- )

So there you go, that's my two cents and 6200 words on the subject. I do, in fact, run through pretty much all of this with people, which is why when I went to Sephora, I spent 10 minutes trying on tinted moisturizer and 45 minutes giving a tattoo tutorial to the salespeople.

Go forth and have needles poked into you! Enjoy!

(And, as I said above, feel free to leave questions in the comments, or add your own experiences/thoughts.)