A few months a little over a year ago me and my then boyfriend had a 'talk'. It was one of those talks; the kind that ends with tears and sometimes broken hearts. The gist of the conversation was that he didn't feel attracted to me anymore, and one of the reasons he gave for that was my body mods, my piercings and tattoos.
At A Glance Author wolfbane Contact [email protected] IAM wolfbane When N/A This conversation hurt for a variety of reasons. Primarily the guy that I'd been in love with for over a year wasn't attracted to me any more. That's going to hurt anyone and invariably make you question what's wrong with you. But it also hurt because the guy who'd told me he'd love me no matter what found my mods, the things that I loved, unattractive, ugly; a turn off.
There were other things going wrong in the relationship, which in hindsight I can recognise, but I focused on my mods. If he didn't like them then should I take them out? Should I not get any more? I had countless conversations with myself, debating the pros and cons of removing some of my piercings, and tried to think what life would be like if I couldn't have any more tattoos or piercings, much less the implants and surface piercings, the more extreme mods, that I also wanted.
For a while I tried, I really did, to not think about mods, to ignore the itch for a new piercing or a new tattoo, but it was a lot harder than I thought it would be. By this point I'd already had numerous piercings and five tattoos. Becoming modified, while not being an addiction, had become the norm for me and, being immersed in BME and a member of the IAM community, as well as having modified friends, made it all the more difficult to avoid the issue or just stop thinking about it.
A few months later, after unsuccessfully trying to ignore any desire for more piercings or tattoos, I found a piece of text that I really wanted engraved on my skin. I'd been at home in Wales for a few days as me and the boyfriend were having problems and enough was enough. I went to my studio and got myself tattooed. Returning to Bath I told my boyfriend that I couldn't stop getting mods; asking me to stop getting tattoos and piercings would have been like asking him to never play computer games again. I couldn't do it. He said he understood.
For a while things continued in much the same vein. Thinking we'd reached some kind of understanding, and working on the issues we were having, I refrained from getting any more mods, but purely for financial reasons. One day, browsing BME, I came across some photos of surface piercings and knew they were the next thing I wanted done. Plans were made, then fate intervened and they were shelved again, and this went on for a good month or so, until I decided to go to Pierced Up in Bristol and get the piercings done. My boyfriend wasn't happy about it, but said it was my body and it was up to me if I wanted to pierce it. Not entirely thrilled with his reaction, but wanting the piercings enough to go ahead, I went to Bristol and got pierced, coming back to Bath later that day with two shiny new surface piercings. I proudly showed them to my boyfriend who could barely look at them. To say I was disappointed was an understatement. I could appreciate that he didn't like them, but the least he could have done, I felt, was to support my decision. There were things he did that I didn't like, but accepted them as an intrinsic part of his self. I wondered why he couldn't do the same for me.
Things went downhill from there. With the end of December came a row which kept on bubbling under the surface for the following few months. Things weren't right, and I slipped further into depression (from which I've suffered for many years) which didn't help. April saw the loss of one of my surface piercings, following a fall while out riding, and shortly afterwards I removed the other one, partly because I felt lopsided with only one surface piercing, but mainly to try and save the relationship I had with my boyfriend. Needless to say it didn't work and we split up not long after.
The following months were hell. I doubted myself, my abilities, my intelligence and my decisions about my body. I cut more, ate less and ended up taking an overdose. Throughout that I stopped browsing BME, stopped taking part in the IAM community and forums that I'd previously enjoyed, stopped writing experiences and stopped getting mods. Irrationally, and subconsciously, I blamed my mods for a large portion of the failure of the relationship and while I didn't completely remove myself from body modification, I did stop thinking about the next mod I could get. In short, I stopped being me and became lost as a result. I was unhappy, miserable and depressed, and I lost sight of the person I had wanted to be before meeting my boyfriend.
Things have, thankfully, improved since then. A new job, a lot of time (and tears) and great friends have ensured that I am back to being myself again.
But how does this relate to body modification?
I realised in the months following the break up, that I had put a lot of things on hold and, in some ways, stepped away from the person I had wanted to be before I met my boyfriend; not only artistically and creatively, but spiritually, and my mods were closely linked to all of that. Modifying myself, while in only some cases a spiritual thing, meant that I was staying true to myself. All of my mods have a meaning for me, and are all aesthetically pleasing. I think that if I had only gotten pierced or tattooed because I thought it was pretty I would have been able to go without being modded far more easily. Because, however, I put a lot of thought into my modifications, and in some ways identify myself as being modded, it was a lot harder. In deciding that I was going to forgo part of myself, my personality, in order to save a failing relationship, I did myself a great injustice.
Since me and my boyfriend split up I've come to a lot of conclusions about myself. Some have been nice, some have been not so nice, but through it all I've realised that I'm a lot stronger than I thought I was, and that I have to remain true to myself. When I took out my piercings I felt like I was hiding some part of my identity in order to please someone else. I won't say that I didn't feel whole, because I am aware that I am made up of more than my mods, but I certainly didn't feel like myself.
The first piercings I got after my boyfriend and I split up were my cheeks, something I had wanted for a long time but never did. That was followed by getting my bridge redone, another tattoo, microdermal implants and, shortly, two half sleeves. From being unable to think about mods because I was told they were unattractive, I am back to being a fully fledged member of the modded community, and I think I'm happier for that.
Over the last year or so, more than before, I've come to realise that my mods play a large part in making me who I am. While I can take them out or cover them up when I need to (when I worked in a school for example) I like having them on show. They make me feel more comfortable in my own skin, and make me feel more like me. To put it simply, I like being modded. I like having piercings and tattoos and being able to show them off and get comments about them. I like being able to talk to like minded people, either on the internet or in real life, and I like thinking about what I'm going to get done next.
I've written about becoming visibly modified, and what I said there remains true. Mods are a part of who I am and now I can't imagine being without them. I honestly can't imagine how I would look with plain skin, or how my face would be different if I had no piercings.
I said this in the article mentioned above:
Obviously there is the fact that piercings or tattoos define us; they make us feel whole and complete, and for that reason no one will stop getting those modifications because other elements of society disapprove.
And I realise now that I should have listened to myself; that someone else, no matter who it is, disapproves of my mods does not mean I should stop getting modified.If you're going to love me you're going to have to love my mods as well.