Speaking for myself, I don’t mind being asked about my tattoos.

I don’t even mind when people draw conclusions about me when they see my tattoos because I was once that person…

…yes, that person who secretly assumed the worst about anyone who would “defile” their skin with such permanence. That was me.

Being “inked” has opened doors that may not otherwise have been opened, specifically with regard to conversations with people who know that most tattoos have a story behind them, and they wanted to know mine.

A heavily-inked 20-something girl who also had a few piercings stopped me at Target one evening to ask about the dragonflies tattooed on my back. “Those represent my six children,” I told her.

Rial "flitting" off to heaven

Then she asked, “Why is one different from the other five?” She referred to the one that has a date tattooed under it.

“That tattoo represents my fifth child and memorializes her; she died in 2000 at the age of 10 weeks,” I said.

She wanted to know more about Riál, about her illness, her hospitalization and her death. Then she began to tell me how one of her twin daughters had died earlier this year at the age of 11 months.

“I’m still so angry and in so much pain about her dying,” she said. “How do you get past that?”

Thank you for a wide open door to tell her my story. I told her honestly that during the seven weeks I spent with her at Children’s hospital, I didn’t think I could hear anymore news about “turns for the worse” and actually requested to be put into a room and knocked out until she was better.

I told her that my personal faith in God was tested. I felt weak. I had shaken my fist at God between periods of hope and faith that she would fully recover.

I told her I felt God was failing me when my prayers for Riál went unanswered, and that it wasn’t until I finally prayed, “Father, if healing Riál — making her ”whole” — means having her with You, then I’m okay with that.” And after a great day where things were improving, she died in her sleep that night.

How merciful for God to wait until I could accept things as they were before taking her home to heaven.

And I told her that I finally found that my faith was real…that I could still love the giver of life who didn’t preserve my daughter’s life on earth.

The “inked” crowd is more receptive to me now that I’m not the stereotypical silent tattoo-condemning Christian they’ve encountered so many times before…like I said, that used to be me.

Though I don’t quite understand what vibe I put out that makes people think I am unapproachable or that I have it all together, being “inked” means I get more opportunities to share my life experiences and my faith in a non-condemning way.

© Alexa Lopez, 2009