Getting your first tattoo can be a nerve-wracking experience, especially if you have other people who have had them done telling you all sorts of stories. And also, you realize that it will hurt and you may have gone through all that pain for nothing if the tattoo is not how you expected it to turn out or you’ll get bored of it after some time.
So, because of all those fears and various stories told, tattoo artists have to deal with some unexpected situations of clients crying, fainting or even getting sick. Reddit user ArthurThyKing wanted to hear these kinds of stories from a tattoo artist’s view and asked “Tattoo artists of Reddit, who was your worst ‘tattoo virgin?’”
The thread got popular in the subreddit with 47.5k people upvoting it and over 6k people commenting. Not only tattoo artists joined the thread, but also other people who heard stories and some ‘tattoo virgins’ themselves who felt that they caused inconvenience for the artist.
So enjoy this list and upvote the stories you liked the most. Also, it would be awesome if you shared your own experiences in the comments!
The photos in the article are not the actual photos and are there for illustrative purposes only.
More info: Reddit
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Not an artist, but I’m a receptionist at a pretty popular tattoo shop in my town. I’ve seen quite a few people who had no business getting tattooed, but by far my favorite was this one guy who wanted to get some script tattooed behind his ear. He had come in before to get priced out, but absolutely refused to make an appointment and drop a deposit. He came back a few days later as a walk in, so we squeezed him in that day. He was a mess getting done lol; shaking, sweating and basically crying in the chair. The tattoo itself took maybe 15 minutes. Well the reason why this dude refused to put a deposit down was because he planned on getting tatted and leaving without paying.
As soon as the artist put saniderm on his tattoo, he jumped up out of the chair and bolted for the front door. Then promptly passed out as he ran through the lobby lmfao. He ended up breaking his nose as he hit the ground, and we called the cops. The best part was watching this dude cry like a baby because he was just a few days from getting out of the military and local PD notified his command. Best shift ever.
I’ll take this one. I had a client who got a Jesus fish with Greek letters on his chest. I put the stencil on, he looks down says “looks good” and we do the tattoo. Guy sits like a CHAMP through his entire first tattoo. I finish up after about 45 minutes, he checks it out in the mirror and immediately goes pale, starts to sweat and sits down. Dude looks at me and says “it’s BACKWARDS!” All shook. I look at his tattoo, look at him on the floor, look at the mirror and tell the guy “ I’m gonna take a photo of it for you to see, because you don’t know how mirrors work.” A couple minutes go by as I’m handing the dude paper towels, The guy stands up all quick and try’s to play it off like he was just messing with me even though for a minute there, there was a corpse on my studio floor….
One shop I worked at we had a couple come in on the day we did $100 two inch by two inch tattoos, they both were getting these small triceratops outline tattoos behind their ears, nothing too crazy or detailed so maybe about 15 minutes each in the chair at most.
The guy is losing his mind, he’s hyperventilating, laughing, jumping up and down and yelling questions at all of us, visually very nervous. He tells one of our apprentices that this is his first tattoo and keeps asking them how bad it hurts over and over again, the owner went into the back and grabbed an ammonia packet, worried the guy would pass out the second needle touched skin.
Turns out it was this couples first date, he had told her he was impulsive and she tried to call his bluff and suggested they get matching tattoos. To his credit he got the tattoo and didn’t pass out, paid for them both too!
A friend who had never had a tattoo before wanted one on her ankle and was adamant about that. I told her several times that the ankle is a very not fun location, and asked her if maybe she’d prefer the shoulder instead. She insisted on the ankle. Okay then. The moment the needle touched her she hollered. You sure you want to keep going I asked? She said yes. That was the loudest appointment I ever had but to her credit she made it through.
Oh wow, reading this thread is bringing up some repressed client memories. My worst one by far, though, was about five years ago when I was apprenticing in a college town. This girl came in with her boyfriend for a traditional butterfly above her elbow, I was still super new so it took me way longer than it should have (maybe 2hrs). I lay her down on her stomach with her arm bent at her side—this is relevant later.
Anyway, we start tattooing and within maybe 10 mins she starts getting a string of texts from her freshman friends, telling her they’re essentially ousting her from their group and they don’t want her to contact them again. Super mean stuff, obviously she’s upset. As she’s relating all this to her BF, she starts crying, then full on sobbing. I asked her if she wanted to stop, but she insisted on me continuing, and I felt too awkward to counter her.
She continued to sob on and off for probably another hour, while I just kept plugging away at this dumb little tattoo. At this point she had cried so much that her tears had gathered where her arm was pressed against the massage table and had started to spill over into my lap. So I’m feeling uncomfortable as hell, and now also damp. THEN, as I’m within 30 mins or so of finishing, she begins whimpering, then moaning…loudly. At one point she tells the BF “this is more intense than anal” and I wanted to die. As soon as I finished and checked her out, my coworkers (who had all been waiting on me to close) were like “what the actual f**k was going on, and why did you keep going??” But in the moment, all I could think was to finish the tattoo asap.
To her credit, she came back (a year later!) and told me she had been too embarrassed to come back but loved the butterfly and wanted another tattoo from me. Her second session was pleasant and without incident.
Mine was a young lady who wanted a semicolon tattoo on her wrist. Maybe 1inx2in, black ink, no preference on font. Easy enough, and I had the stencil all ready to go before she even came in.
I was expecting a 15 min job max, so I gave her a pretty cheap quote.
Anyway, she turns up for her appt and she’s very nervous. I do my normal, “it’s about as painful as a cat scratch, nothing to panic about!” speech, and she informs me that she’s already taken a strong painkiller, and would like the specialist numbing spray as well.
Uhh, OK. That’s an extra £30. She agrees. Spray goes on, stencil goes on, we’re ready.
I don’t even make contact with her skin before she starts making a very loud, high pitched whine. I try and calm her down again, and tell her that she can have a few mins to get her courage up if she wants, but 99% of the time, the anxiety of getting a tattoo is usually worse than actually getting one.
Bearing in mind, the parlour at the time had 4 other artists, all with customers, all staring at her.
She just kept putting it off. She’d say OK, I’d turn on the gun, and she’d freak out again. After an hour I told her that I was expecting another client, and she could reschedule if she wanted. She just bolts out the door, didn’t even pay for the numbing spray.
To this day, I can’t quite believe how dramatic she made the whole thing.
Had someone come in asking if they can bring their emotional support animal. Usually this is kind of iffy because it could be a sanitation risk, but we made exemptions for good dogs. Found out the emotional support animal was a 3 foot long snake. Turned down instantly.
So many people passing out, high on painkillers before their appointment, taking continuous videos and posting how “inked” they were with their new ankle beach wave, or even one person tipping me in expired Subway coupons.
Just be cool and calm while getting tattooed and everything will go smoothly.
She was HOWLING during a simple solid color fill. Like the grape lady during the whole thing
Not a tattoo artist but my friend tells this story had to share here.
So he went to the pharmacy to get some prescription filled in North Carolina. They tell him it’s going to take about 1 hour to fill and to come back later.
So he walks out of the strip mall and the next place over is a tattoo shop. He goes in and asks for a random tattoo.
They tell him it’s going to take about 15 minutes to do the drawing and about. And about 30 to tattoo it on him.
He asks what they can do right now instantly, and they tell him they can pierce his nipples.
Within one hour he gets both nips pierced, a pretty sweet tattoo and his prescription filled all in one regular Tuesday afternoon.
A bit different, but I was the front counter person for a tattoo store. I was basically just there to look hot, but I was still too young to realize that’s why I had been hired. I had a few tattoos but zero visible while I was working.
Since I’m at the front desk I’m also the DJ for the place, in charge of the music playlist. Anyway, one day I’m doing my college HW, playing some elliot smith and before I know it the store is in ‘after hours’ (aka no new clients, but current tattoo sessions can go on as long as they need to). This guy is getting his neck tattood and he taps the artist for a time out, turns to me, and goes, ‘shut this p****y s**t off the f**k right now and play some death metal or I’m walking out of here with half a bobcat on my neck and no money for your boy’…so I changed the music lol. He was definitely only 1/4 joking.
Not the worst client. But just an unfortunate event. The apprentice at my shop who had only been tattooing for a little under a year was tattooing this girls wrist recently, her first tattoo the word “undefeated”. Gets the tattoo, it goes smoothly, she likes it, walks to the lobby, shows her dad, he likes it. Walks back to get bandaged up, gets bandaged, they walk back to the counter as he’s explaining aftercare she blacks out. Falls back hits her head on a giant painting hanging on the wall (an ed hardy original) the painting falls, glass breaks. He runs over picks her up and is checking the back of her head. Realizes a giant piece of glass had punctured her shoulder/trap. Emt comes, tell her she needs stitches, they end up having to take her to the emergency room where she got 6 stitches. The next week the girl brought him a giant tub of cookies. She wasn’t the worst, but it was an incredibly unfortunate experience for the both of them. His first time having someone pass out and her being “defeated”.
Not an artist, but just got my first tattoo and asked her this question! She had a woman come in with her boyfriend to get her tattoo. The lady screamed after the needle first came down and told her boyfriend that she was going to have to bite him to cope with the pain. Chomped on his arm the whole time while moan/screaming. My artist told me she thinks it was some weird kink thing that she did not consent to participate in.
