A cashier once told me my tattoos were beautiful. I thanked her, but inside, I couldn’t help thinking, “Good. That means you didn’t see me.”
I wonder, when you look at me, what do you actually see? Do the tattoos catch your eye first? Do you focus on the art etched into my skin, the marks that seem to shout louder than my voice ever could? You might call it confidence. Boldness. But the truth is, I’ve spent years covering myself in ink, trying to create something I could stand to look at. Years making sure that when people stare, they see the art, not the body beneath it.
But you don’t get it. You think that because I decorate myself, I must love what I see in the mirror. But these tattoos? They’re not declarations of pride. They’re armor. A way of saying, “Here’s who I am,” while silently pleading, “Please, don’t look too closely.” Because if you strip it all away, what’s left? Just another woman trapped in a body she never asked for, a body she’s fought with her whole life. A body she hides from, hoping it will shrink, hoping it will disappear, but still begging to be seen.
I remember one night, standing in front of a mirror, fully dressed, yet feeling utterly exposed. The clothes clung to me, reminders of everything I couldn’t hide. My reflection felt like that of a stranger—alien, unreachable. I could feel my heart racing, and my hands shaking, as I tried to smooth out the mess inside. “Are you really wearing that?” asked a voice in my head, a cruel comment I couldn’t forget. Words like that carve themselves into your memory. I wanted to disappear. But I couldn’t. I was still there.
Maybe you know that feeling. Maybe you’ve stood in front of the mirror, wishing you could be someone else. Maybe you’ve told yourself stories that weren’t true, trying to fill the silence with anything that says, “I exist,” even when you didn’t believe it yourself.
I don’t date. I don’t take up space the way I should. At work, I’m loud, fearless, unstoppable. But in my own skin? I play it small. I stay quiet. I hold back. Because the world has already told me what a woman like me is allowed to be. And I’m still trying to figure out how to show you—how to show myself—that I’m more than that.
But maybe I don’t need to prove I’m more. Maybe I already am. Maybe we all already are.
One day, I looked at my reflection—covered in ink, bold and thick, a map of everything I’ve tried to hide—and for the first time, I didn’t want to disappear. For the first time, I wondered—what if this isn’t armor? What if these tattoos are a love letter? What if they’re a bridge? A bridge to the woman I’ve been running from. What if I’ve been hiding the truth all along? What if everything I’ve been afraid of—my body, my scars, my voice—are the very things I’m meant to love, embrace, and become?
I need you to hear me. I need you to see me in all my mess, in all my imperfections. If you’ve ever hidden, if you’ve ever felt like you don’t belong, stay with me. This isn’t just my story. It’s yours too. If you’ve ever felt too much, or not enough, I need you to believe that you are worthy. We are worthy.
I’m not asking you to fix me. I’m asking you to listen.
To sit with me in that uncomfortable space between wanting to be seen and being terrified of it at the same time. To understand that I’m not hiding because I have nothing to say. I’m hiding because I’m still learning to believe I’m worth hearing.
If you’ve ever felt this way, know this: You don’t have to hide to be loved. You don’t have to earn your worth—it’s never been in question. You are more than the things you wish you could change. You are here. And that’s enough.
Maybe, if you see me, I’ll start to believe it too. Maybe, if I see you, you’ll start to believe it too.
We’re not broken. We’re becoming. Every scar, every line, every tear is part of the truth we’re learning to live. And maybe, if we keep looking at each other with open hearts, we can finally see the whole picture. Because I believe, with everything I have, that we are more than what the world told us we could be. We are the love letter. The story. The art.
You are worthy of love and grace, from others and yourself. You are enough, here and now. If you’re dealing with self-injury or self-harm, we encourage you to use TWLOHA’s FIND HELP Tool to locate professional help and to read more stories like this one here. If you reside outside of the US, please browse our growing International Resources database. You can also text TWLOHA to 741741 to be connected for free, 24/7 to a trained Crisis Text Line counselor. If it’s encouragement or a listening ear that you need, email our team at [email protected].