To feel ambivalent about this "invisible" tattoo?

[TheOtherGalen]

I recently (last month) discovered that a small scar on the back of my neck is actually a very old, degraded UV tattoo. It's only visible under a black-light. In normal light, it's a barely-perceptible scar that you have to really work to see. Under UV light, however, it fluoresces a faint bluish-white and clearly spells out the word "mine" in letters that are about three-quarters of an inch tall.

It was put there when I was eleven (over 30 years ago) by a very disturbed (and possessive!) relative by what I think is called a "poke and stick" method. At the time, I didn't really understand what was happening, and it was only last month, after a routine visit to a dermatologist, that I finally put together that it was a UV tattoo.

On the one hand, I feel fucked up about having been so blatantly marked as a possession, without my knowledge or consent, and in such a permanent way. I feel creeped out, violated, embarrassed -- and like somehow something important was stolen from me and I've only just now figured it out. It also gives me the screaming heebie-jeebies in a more general sense to think of a grown man doing that to a little girl.

On the other hand, I keep thinking it shouldn't matter: It's basically invisible; I've gone this long without even knowing about it; and unless I make a point of dragging people off into dark corners and whipping out a black-light, no one else ever even needs to know it's there. My childhood was a bit of a hot mess, but things evened out and for many years now I've had a happy life, full of love and laughter and contentment. Nothing I do now is going to change what happened back then, so what's the point of even fussing over it?

I go back and forth between "So what?" and "OMG this is horrible!" Sometimes it seems like in comparison to other stuff in my early years, this is just a stupid tame thing, and other times it feels more awful than the other, more dramatic (or more obviously abusive), stuff. I'm not in a giant emotional crisis over it or anything, but I am struggling with finding a way to frame it.

I'm also trying to figure out what, if anything, I should do. I mean, I'm not going to do anything right away. I think I need to let my feelings sort themselves out before I stampede off into some solution or reaction that I might regret later on, ha. But it's been six weeks and my feelings are still all over the place.

Any advice, insights, words of wisdom? Am I making a mountain out of a molehill here? How would you feel?

Just wanted to say that this is horrible and you're not overreacting to be confused about this. What an absolutely horrible thing to be dealing with. I would personally get it cut out: the physical scar would sit better with me than knowing it was there for the rest of my life.

I just signed up for a six-week workshop that's built around the idea of helping people articulate and heal from difficult stories from their pasts. Writing has always been my go-to when I'm trying to figure something out, but I've been a bit blocked over this tattoo thing. I'm nervous and excited -- first meeting is January 26.

FellOutOfBed2wice Thank you for your response. I completely understand what you mean about how a physical scar might be preferable to the tattoo.

ZebraOwl I love the snow globe analogy. I do feel in the middle of some swirly, low-visibility conditions here! I looked at the link for the tattoo removal cream. I thought it would be a wax-on, wax-off type thing, but apparently it's applied exactly the same way as a tattoo, and can take up to three or four applications to get results. Yikes! Definitely for now I'm just going to sit with it all. And I think you're right about my tendency to shrug it off as "just one of those things." I'll have to watch that. My uncle put a lot of effort into getting me to accept bizarre/inappropriate things as normal, and I'd hate to replicate his grooming all on my own, thirty years later.

iminshock Thank you! I will kick everyone's ass in the writing workshop, mwahaha!

Oops, forgot to clarify it's a writing workshop!

Oh wait, yes I did. NEVER MIND CARRY ON NOTHING TO SEE HERE

I think for you it'd be fewer applications due to type of tattoo - though still not a pleasant process, I appreciate! I think it's definitely one to give thought to - maybe let the snow settle a bit, as it were?

Writing workshop sounds awesome. And you can totally be the best writer there. Just, you know, maybe keep the fact it's a competition to yourself?

Me, competitive? I'm the least competitive person you'll ever meet! I'm so non-competitive, you could siphon off a mere one-fifth of my non-competitiveness and you'd have enough to make a complete additional totally non-competitive person out of it.

And I would be less competitive than THAT person, too.

Yes dear...

You're awesome. You really are. You "sound" disconcertingly like a kind of amalgamation of some of my most favouritest & best people, which is slightly disconcerting. But...

I didn't even know what is a UV tattoo until I read this thread. I'm sorry you had to put up with having one done to you by your relative and even more sorry that the tattoo studio accepted doing it onto you when you were a child. But if you can't remove it, I suppose the only option left is to accept it as a part of your history. Ellisandra (above) has formulated it so well. Anyway, it could partially come in handy if you were to, say, be robbed of all your possessions when you're stranded faraway overseas on vacation and have to prove your identity without any paperwork whatsoever. In your case you might expect to just walk up to the embassy, show your unique tattoo and they'll issue a replacement passport straight away, wouldn't you? As you say it's probably not possible to cover with an 'ordinary' (e.g. black) tattoo as it would glow beneath, leaving you with two tattoos superimposed on top of each other, and the only way to make it go away, sort of, is if you were to make another UV tattoo of a different shape on top, the new UV ink blurring the shape of the old one, if it's something nasty you could want to make a more neutral pattern. On the good side is that lots and lots of people are having tattoos these day, it's mainstream to have one, there's no stigma attached to it now, even bank tellers and brilliant business men (and women) have visible tattoos.

Also, you might want to reinterpret (for yourself, obviously) the word "mine", it's your word now, you are the one who is the owner to the word, to the tattoo, and to your rightful self. If you like to write, you could check out 'The New Diary' by Tristine Rainer, it's an old book from the eighties but still sells in reprint on Amazon. I recall a passage from the book, about writing techniques and how to work with difficult problems, techniques that I think could suit you now that you mention you like to write.

ZebraOwl Aw, thank you! Wait, are you asking if I might be someone you already know, but in disguise? If so, no, or, I don't think so, unless you happened to play the game "Glitch" some years back. In which case, you should totally PM me so we can commiserate about its untimely demise!

EvaSthlm I love the stranded overseas without identification scenario! Oh but just to clarify, this tattoo wasn't done in a tattoo studio by a professional tattoo artist, or even with a tattoo machine. It was done more like a prison tattoo -- with just a needle of some sort and a bottle of ink. And I actually have a copy of "The New Diary"! Another writing book from that era that I like is "Writing Down the Bones."

Oops, no, sorry, was just meaning you that you sound a bit like some of my favourite & best people. But I know you're not any of them. Well, not unless they have whole secret other selves running about the place. Which would be a bit much really. And damaging the fabric of the universe is Naughty. Definitely naughty. All the literature agrees on that. And that it's an utter arse to repair. I also feel like I should apologise for never having heard of "Glitch" until you mentioned it. Though have of course Googled & am sad it is no more because the concept sounds cool - & the only gaming I've ever done = Pokémon Go! & absolutely ANCIENT educational Apple games like "Granny's Garden". (Not to brag, but my friend & I were the first in our class to complete it. Much to the chagrin of, well, everyone, basically. Bwahahaha...)

When things are so weird, so no one talks about them, there are no cultural guides to what it means and exactly how and why it's so awful.

A head fuck, in short.

The theme of ownership and taking your bodily autonomy seems to crop up. The branding of someone is an attempt at ownership and trying at dehumanization into property.

The closest thing it reminds me of is slavery. I wonder if you've thought about it in this way? And whether that would help anchor some of his weird and freakish acts into a framework of sorts...?

It's vile and I am so angry for that child you were and I'd have fucking killed him if my child, no, if any child had been branded like this.

Fury would have rained down from the skies in biblical volumes... at this revolting man and every person that had contributed to this little child's exposure to him.

You poor poor thing (not meaning to offend in any way though, you sound ace and I'm so glad for those brilliant women who surround you now!). But I would really like to go back in time and protect and help the younger you, and maybe tell her that she's going to be a wonderful person with a good life ahead of her...

I keep thinking about you and his I'd feel if it was me.
I'm curious to know why the memory / realisation of the tattoo has only recently come up. ( unless i misunderstand )

What caused the memory to resurface ?

Also can you redefine the " branding " as a kind of trial by fire you stepped through and rise from , Phoenix like ?

In the same way that while no one really wants stretch marks it's possible to have a positive attitude towards them.

I have a relative who was badly burned as a child. He has bad scars. However he is completely ok with them. In fact he kind of likes them because they remind him of the events that shaped him and the fact he has come through the fire (literally ) unscathed in all the ways that matter.

I get the impression you are in a similar mind space. Please forgive me if I'm wrong or have been insensitive with the stretch marks comparison .

I've just remembered my beautiful young colleague whose arms are scarred from her teenage self harming.

For a long ting she covered her arms but now her past is so far in the past she wears short sleeves with pride and is not ashamed of the elements in her past that still show themselves in the present.

ZebraOwl My first computer game that I got really into was Crystal Quest on a Mac SE. (Due to crazy childhood I didn't get in on the computer scene until my late teens.) Glitch was my first MMO, and it kind of ruined me for all other MMOs. Pokemon Go is fun -- and I've even been tentatively looking into Ingress as a result. Mostly as a way to find a spawn-free area near me so I can test out the rural incense thing. But I digress ...

MiscellaneousAssortment The slavery analogy is interesting. For sure the part about being branded as property fits. Although he didn't want blind disobedience. In fact, I would say that my various forms of defiance were what mattered most to him. There are definitely some parallels, though. It's an intriguing framework to start from, and one I'll have to spend some time poking around at.

When things are so weird, so no one talks about them, there are no cultural guides to what it means and exactly how and why it's so awful.

Yes. This, very much, yes. It's a challenge to try and figure out how you feel about something when you can barely find words to even articulate the scope of the thing you want to address!

iminshock What caused the memory to surface: About a year ago I decided to finally tackle some longstanding issues I had with my appearance. In particular I decided to get fractional laser resurfacing for some old facial scars, a process that involved going every two weeks for a total of five treatments. I'd go home after each treatment feeling (understandably) sort of physically wiped-out, but there was also an emotional aspect, and when I'd try to suss that out, what would come up was the time I spent with my pervert uncle. (There were other, skin-related, things that he did.) The more I focused on that stretch in my life, the more I remembered strange, small details about what had happened with him.

I think you're right about the redefining. I mean, no matter what I decide to actually do about this mark (if anything), I think I need to first make some kind of peace with it. I've been able to do as your cousin did for other scars along the way, so even though right now I still feel pretty unsettled about it all, I have a lot of faith in my own resilience and hope eventually something will click or fall into place. I'm not terribly susceptible to shame, so thankfully that aspect shouldn't be too problematic!