My back itches. I feel like I'm mentioning this too much in the How Are You Feeling thread so I'll expand at length here. For those of you who don't know, I got a tattoo on Friday. It was only the outline but it's pretty big so there's a lot of it and a lot left to go.

When I first made the effort to go out and start looking for an artist, finalizing ideas for a design I had no plans to get what has turned out to be a back piece (or at least two-thirds of one). My original goal was to find something to go around the larger of my two older tattoos which have faded and blurred and don't really have the same appeal to me as they once did. I went and spoke to the artist and when I came back to see her design I was instantly sold. It was wider and higher than I imagined but it was as though she just pulled the jumble of images out of my head and combined it with her own ideas to create the perfect design for me. She let me take the outline home and I looked at it every day. Instead of having reservations I found that grew more excited at the prospect of having this beautiful artwork on my back.

As the day for my appointment drew nearer I began to get anxious - what if I had a panic attack and freaked out? A small part of me wanted to wuss out but I knew I'd be hugely disappointed in myself if I did that. Luckily I had a good friend to go with me and once I got to the studio things moved so fast that I didn't really have time to stop and worry. I forgot to bring a button down shirt to wear over my front (didn't even think about it) so I ended up using a jacket I'd brought just in case I got cold. Good thing otherwise I'd have been sitting there topless. Once my back was shaved and the outline was put on I had to sit backwards on a chair and lean over the top which I shortly realized was rather uncomfortable. The moment the tattoo artist started I thought I was going to cry. It hurt so much more than I remembered! I could not imagine sitting there long enough to get the whole outline done much less adding color later on. My second thought was that there was no way my hsuband could ever sit through this. He wants to get something at some point but I honestly don't know if he could stand the it. My friend held my hand and talked to me so that I wouldn't focus on the pain so much. I thought there was little chance of that and I also didn't believe the tattooist when she said it took about ten minutes to get used to it - how could you get used to such a thing? But not too long after this thought I did start to forget and I was distracted. Some parts still really hurt; my ribs, my spine, oh my god those were the worst. At first I thought I'd want to take breaks but I started to realize that it only felt worse even after a minute and that it was better to just gut it out. Two hours later and the outline was done. I was at my limit and didn't want to push it. My back was cleaned and then the bandage was applied and I was sent home with aftercare instructions, A&D ointment, and Smarties (actually, she gave me Smarties at the beginning too). I was exhausted but pretty much unable to sleep that night. My back felt like I'd had a sunburn with road rash. I had a couple of pillows from the couch I was using to prop myself up so that I could sleep without moving too much. Apparently I kept pushing them away in the middle of the night and they'd knock stuff off the shelf over our bed and onto my husband's head during the night I did that twice

I've pretty much moved from the ouch stage to the itchy stage. I'm not sure which is worse. Pain I can deal with but itching is annoying. Hopefully that will go away in a few days.

The funny thing is that when I got my second tattoo I thought it was huge. Couldn't believe I'd done it and thought maybe it was too big. I thought surely I'd do that with this since it's three times as big but no! I was looking at my back thinking, hmmm now I need something on my shoulders.