My teenage daughter ended her life. At 70, I did the unexpected to pay tribute to him

When I was young, a woman I knew had Bugs Bunny tattooed on her upper arm. I didn't know many women with tattoos at the time and I had never been a fan of Bugs. I wondered what would happen once her arms, then as firm and toned as Michelle Obama's, succumbed to age and gravity.

Over the course of a few decades, I suspected the ink would fade and the bugs would turn magpies as the age spots appeared. This pre-teen prankster would become a portly provocateur. “What’s up doc?” would take on darker shades. Rabbits are not rodents, but it would be difficult to tell the difference. How is she going to explain the big rat on what's left of her deltoid?

My daughter, Lydia, started planning her tattoos when she was 13. The intricate design was tattooed on the slender neck. She may have shaved her head again to show it off, or kept it a secret under a veil of natural blue, purple or soft brown hair with sunny highlights. In Maryland, it was illegal to tattoo a minor, so I wasn't worried about it. It was a very beautiful design.

When Lydia took her own life before she was old enough to get her coveted tattoo, my son Daniel, 12, designed a memorial tattoo in her honor. He refined his original works and had them tattooed at the age of 18, while a freshman in college. It is quite large and colorful, although after two decades it is no longer as vibrant as it once was.

At that time, many friends had tattoos, ranging from a small butterfly on their wrist, to a delicate rose above their chest, to a giant tampon that jutted like a baleen whale out of the seat of a pair of jeans. tight and low cut.

Fascinating. I wanted to know everything about every body art I saw. It turns out people are happy to tell their tattoo stories. Some are funny, many heartbreaking, all worthy of an anthology.

When thinking about getting a tattoo myself, I thought of Lydia's name, perhaps on my hip, because I had carried her there when she was a baby. Not for long, however: my independent child demanded to be demeaned, to do his earthly research without attachments.

I thought about the age and severity, imagining being turned around and bathed by surly, underpaid caregivers in a cramped, ammonia-scented room. They'd see the name on my hip and think I'm another old lesbian – maybe they'd laugh. We have all seen those videos of abuse in nursing homes. But as usual, I digress.

For two decades, I never had time to get a tattoo. But I decided I wanted one and refused to die before I got it. At 70, with a strong family history of heart attacks, strokes and breast cancer, I figured it was time.

I stopped at a red light and impulsiveness hit like 220 volts. I typed tattoo into my GPS. There was a place 3.5 km away. Lydia loved palindromes so I had no choice.

My tattoo idea was not unique. The little semicolon, sometimes enhanced with butterfly wings, cat whiskers or musical notes, has become, like a team sweatshirt, the identification designated to belong to the club of people bereaved by suicide .

The Semicolon Project began in 2013 when Amy Bleuel's idea took root and the semicolon became the universal logo for mental health and suicide prevention. The slogan was “Your story is not over.”

My tattoo artist proudly explained the use of the semicolon. He had learned that using one in the first paragraph of any paper he wrote in college meant a guaranteed A. Such power wielded the little semicolon combo that it could stop a sentence from ending.

About to be the target of the buzzing needle, I smiled. I didn't tell him what my desire to have one on my arm meant to me. Or that for many, it symbolizes the choice to continue living. A reminder of strength and perseverance. A signal to some that we are related.

Months after getting a tattoo, I sometimes jump when I see it on my wrist. Looking at it upside down, it looks like a giant ant. Abdomen, thorax, antenna. Still hypervigilant, I jump or slide on it and imagine how amused Lydia would be. Because even though his life is over, as long as I am here to tell it, his story is not over. And neither does mine. I'm thinking about my next tattoo.

Eileen Vorbach Collins is an author and writer. Her essays have been published in literary magazines as well as Shondaland. Her book, Love in the Archives, a Patchwork of True Stories About Suicide Loss, received the Sarton Women's Book Award for memoir.

All views expressed are those of the author.

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