There’s a lot of hate towards lesbians and I just embrace it

I started getting tattooed at a young age. I kind of came from a tattoo family. I loved art and I won a scholarship to go to any art school I wanted to. I hated art school, it’s sucked. They wanted you to just do what they wanted and it wasn’t very creative. So I started apprenticing. I just took it and ran with it. My first year of tattooing I won best portrait, over 600 tattoo artist in DC Tattoo Expo. And it branched from there. I love creating art on other peoples bodies and I love being different.

I’m a lesbian. I came out when I was 12. My mom was very shocked by it but the next day she took me and my girlfriend out at the time and we had ice cream. She was very supportive until she found out that it wasn’t changing, wasn’t a phase. I’ve always been looked at like “the lesbian” of the family. That’s what helped me to be different.

I think that’s actually what helped fueled my tattooing because it separates me even more. I love it. I overcame a lot of struggles, being married to a woman and having tattoos. You’re always constantly get looked down at, especially when I started getting tattooed on my hands. It’s taboo. There’s a lot of hate towards lesbians and I just embrace it. I wish them love and I move on.

I have a partner and we’ve been together for 4 1/2 years. I carried our triplets. They were big babies when they were born. I was 280 pounds the day I delivered. I’m 155 pounds now, so that’s good. Our life is crazy. We’re kind of exiled in the kid community because people are like “oh my God, triplets”. You wouldn’t believe the horrible comments that I get all the time. “What do you do just stay home all day.?” “No I have very successful career still.” I want to show my kids that they can still have a career and still have children. Being a woman and having 3 girls, especially in a man’s industry, you know they can do anything. I want them to take from me that they can do that.

My partner and I get looked down at at the tattoo conventions because they think it’s men’s work. We’re normally the only women tattooing on the floor besides maybe 2 or 3 other ones. Even then we’re kind of separated from them because we’re a duo. We don’t like that in the tattoo industry.

I’ve always been a dinosaur fan. I had a little stuffed dinosaur. Have you seen the “We’re Back!” dinosaur’s movie. I always had that. It was my dinosaur. They kind of gave me comfort, I guess. I like to carry him around and pretend it was a baby. It’s kind of weird because he’s not a baby, he’s a damn dinosaur.