After my dad died I was lost in grief. My tattoos brought me back.

• My dad died in 2020 of a heart attack and I fell into deep grief.
• I flew to Brazil, where my father lived, and struggled with depression after his death.

My life was perfect at the beginning of 2020. It sounds like an exaggeration, but it's honestly what it felt like. I was booked and busy with my band, thriving in my new job in the marketing industry, and living with my partner in a great apartment in Los Angeles.

And then there was a global pandemic. I had to say so long to my partner, who could no longer stay in the country due to pandemic work visa restrictions. Goodbye to all my dreams and aspirations, and just like that, I moved into my mom's house in Illinois — and left my entire life behind.

The only person who seemed to get my pain was my dad. Just like me, he was an artist. After years of estrangement, exacerbated by the fact that he lived in Brazil and I in the US, my dad and I were bonding again over our restlessness. And then he died.

He had a heart attack

He, too, was a person driven by music and theater, and although he was semi-retired and struggled with illnesses, he would often join productions in his area. He could never stay away from his muse for too long.

Dad managed to avoid COVID-19 by remaining home in almost total isolation. He got vaccinated and did everything he could to stay alive. Then he had a heart attack, and that was that. I wonder if his heart was broken, too. We shared melancholic talks, and our last moments together were spent in real intimacy over the phone. The true closeness shared in the words that neither of us could quite say.

We were both depressed, but my dad died wanting to live. While I lived, to be blunt, hoping to die. That's how depressed I was back then.

As soon as I could, I arrived in Brazil, but I still didn't make it in time for his funeral. I was restless, and I was grieving, but there was something else begging to come out: a feeling I couldn't describe, but a need to feel like I was alive. But I had unlearned that skill.

So I went out with my friends, and I cried with my sister, and I even tried to play a bit of music again. Nothing worked. Nothing brought me back.

And that's when I booked a tattoo session.

Getting tattoos made me feel alive again

I got my tattoo in 2012. It's a big dagger on my forearm, something to say I'm dangerous but colorful. It took me years to get my second, third, and fourth tattoos. All of those were spur-of-the-moment decisions and meaningless, which is why I love them so much. Looking at them, I see how free I felt at the time.

This time, however, I just wanted to get a cool anime-related tattoo. I had no big ambition. Yume, my tattoo artist, was gregarious and cheerful, and I felt at ease as she started getting us ready for our session. I was having fun, but it wasn't until I felt those microneedles piercing my skin that it hit me, for the first time in two years, that I had a body. I was in the now.

It was like a rebirth. I could feel that I had an arm. I had two arms. My legs were still there, and soon, my breathing was heard again. I don't think I even remembered what my loud breathing sounded like. The cold air from the AC unit in the room felt sharp, and that sharpness made me almost giddy.

I know I'm not the only masochist out there who loves the feeling of getting your skin pricked by needles repeatedly until an image is carved there, etched forever. I'm not the only person who loves getting a cool, rad tat. And although that tattoo wasn't particularly philosophical, it ignited the reclaim of my life.

From another artist, Fefe, I got tattoos of my two other favorite characters, Usagi and Nana. Usagi represents the energetic and joyful side of life. I chose a humorous scene of her to remind me to stay in this state of zest for life. Nana, my third and final tattoo in this era, embodies boldness and fearlessness. Just like me, she was an artist who left everything behind to pursue music. As Fefe worked on my tattoos, I felt connected to my image again. As the machine pricked my skin and etched these two sides of myself into my skin, I felt as if my identity was returning to me. Looking at myself in the mirror afterward, I saw a living, breathing human with cool tattoos.

My father disliked tattoos, but he cherished life. His deep love for it, and for how humans choose to express life, are tattooed within me so deep and so powerful. He always believed in the promise of a new day and that all sorrow leads to some sort of beauty. Although I don't know his thoughts during his final days, I will always remember his uninhibited love for art.