ADHD Impulse Tattoos: No Ragrets and Disruptions in Time

Dear reader,

I saw the above image from a psychology study in the Journal of Creative Behavior (White 2018) looking at the “creative chaos” of ADHD minds. Two groups of participants- one ADHD, the other non-ADHD- were told to draw an “alien fruit”, and these were the results. The image of these alien fruits affected me deeply. I stared at these fruits for what felt like a long time. I thought this study was so phenomenally freeing when it made me realize that a) there is power in my divergent brain to create strange and beautiful art and b) I needed that bottom fruit as a tattoo, now! I grabbed my tattoo gun and leaning over my ankle, I tattooed the alien fruit (strawberry? Apple? Squash? Pear? I love it!) wrapped around my ankle. It might be my favorite tattoo, and of course it was impulsive. But it is a reminder of who I was and what I felt at that time- and who I still am: a young, queer ADHD artist, literally an alien fruit. Get it, because gay?

By the time I was 18, I already had ten tattoos, including the half sleeve down my left arm that became a full sleeve by age 20. I was rarely carded at bars because (and I’d joke about this) people don’t expect teenagers to have so much ink, because we are often reminded of how “you’re going to regret those when you’re older!”

Well, no, I’m not. It was me who chose to put this ink into my skin, and it was Me at That Time, at That Place of That Tattoo. Me back then is me now and I cannot forget her. Check it out: here is a stick and poke of a 17 from Me at 17 in 2017 in Jenna’s living room in Bound Brook, New Jersey.

I’ve also heard the “Don’t you realize that’s permanent?” I hope so! (I wouldn’t pay hundreds of dollars for a fancy temporary tattoo.) I never feared the permanence of my tattoos, something I admired and questioned about myself as I’ve gotten them. It is a part of my skin now, and I can’t change that unless I want to pony up like $500 to get them lasered off, although I do support removing and covering tattoos of all kinds.

The impulsiveness with which I have tattooed my body is certainly influenced by my characteristically ADHD risk-taking and “disruptions” in understanding time. The permanence of body modifications is not separate from our cultural understanding of “poor time management”. However, I don’t think these traits are shameful, despite the tsk-tsk from my elders or peers. I have lots of questions about why I was conditioned into thinking that “good” and “meaningful” tattoos can only be ones you think about for five years before getting. In reality, my impulsive tattoos are my most meaningful tattoos because I am ADHD. Exploring the “other side of hyperactivity”, as the PhD dissertation by fellow ADHD-er Mark Goodwin is titled, has given me the language to explain what I already knew to be true about my disruptiveness and “troubling decisions”. I need an external reminder of who and what I wanted on my skin at the time, otherwise I might forget. If I tattooed every meeting I had this week on my hand, I would not forget them! I would also quickly run out of space if I kept doing this, but you get the gist. I still actually do write reminders in pen or Sharpie on my hand, though. No planner, no problem (it’s so obvious, it’s right there on my hand, hello!). Studying neurodivergent experiences of time and talking to young neuroqueer artists for my thesis research (most of whom also had very cool tattoos) further inspired me to think about the role “poor” object permanence plays when deciding to get tattoos. I’ll write more on this later when I share about my interlocutors. Anyways, I embrace the “impulsive tattoo” as an artistic resistance to linear time. No Ragrets!

Not all artists have the space and safety to get tattooed, of course. Tattoos are received quite differently depending on the privilege and environment we are in. I am one of the few heavily tattooed students I see around Rice campus and one of many heavily tattooed people in the Houston punk creative scene. When I got my half sleeve freshman year, some of my classmates were concerned about what my parents might think about it. This is fair, considering that many of my peers’ parents threaten to stop paying their tuition if they get a tattoo while away at college. Other times, tattoos (especially face tattoos) bar people from getting job security, or housing. Tattoos are still controversial because of colonialism: European Christian colonialists saw tattooing traditions being practiced in Africa, Pacific Islands and the Americas and viewed tattoos as “uncivilized” because they were racist greedy bastards. Today, white supremacist narratives about the violent nature of BIPOC people with tattoos continues to harm communities by discriminating against and othering tattooed people of color, excluding people of color from opportunities necessary for survival (like f*cking jobs). As I praise tattoos, it is not without recognizing the space I have to do so. There is an organization called Homeboy Industries that provides community support for youth gang rehabilitation and the largest re-entry program in the world. One of the primary services they offer is free tattoo removal (as well as mental health services, legal services, workforce development, education services, and an art academy). If you are a white person privileged to embrace your tattoos in places where you can also make a living, Venmo your BIPOC friends after you read this to make their lives easier. I am very privileged to freely show my tattoos as a conventionally attractive young white woman and university student in anthropology. My parents are supportive of my tattoos, if not indifferent to the actual art. However, while both of my parents have said verbally that it’s cool, tattoos were still secretly discouraged in my household growing up. When my parents got married, my mom told my dad that he couldn’t get any more tattoos when they were together because his body belonged to her now. When my parents separated, my dad went back to getting more tattoos, and it made me really happy to see him getting more, in the least “f*** you, mom” way.

I learned recently in a TED Talk called The End of History Illusion that explained how people think they all have changed a lot in the last five years but are surprisingly reluctant to acknowledge that they might change much in the coming five years. Psychology Today summarized the result of this illusion: We consider ourselves to be the finished product, the present point is the end of our personal history. Psychology Today also says that in response to tattoo regret, we don’t want to accept that we might regret our tattoos because that regret would be dealt with by cognitive dissonance resolution (and cognitive dissonance is stressful and bad for our health). However, this explanation was largely based in response to people regretting their tattoos because of changing aesthetic tastes. The permanence of tattoos complicates natural changes in aesthetic tastes, though, because tattoos can’t be switched out like a dorm room tapestry or kitchen backsplash. There is a time-enduring bravery in the artistic commitment to get a tattoo that goes deeper than the design itself. Maybe one day, I will hate alien fruits. Even if it’s tomorrow, I am still curious to see what strange experiences I might have with alien fruits. In any case, I really love them right now.

Thanks for reading and talk soon,

Libby