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I have now completed the interpretation of the dream. Though it will be understood that I have not reported everything that occurred to me during the process of Interpretation
As I begin what feels like a monumental endeavor — to prepare to write this paper — I am struck by the difficulty I am having. “Maybe if I just read a little bit more; maybe if I organize another outline — then maybe things will start to crystallize.” True, writing is always difficult — especially starting — but something about this subject in particular feels different — more elusive and daunting and with more anxiety and doubt than the mocking blue glow of a blank Word document usually demands. Maybe it's because I'm writing about my personal experience, maybe I'm not sure what I have to say, maybe I just can't find the right words. The more I sit with my experience it becomes clear something inherent in my subject fights against crystallization. And I in particular — the space I am attempting to occupy between clinician-observer, tattooed woman/embodied subject, and the melding of those realities as an embodied-tattooed-clinician as both subject and object — from what perspective shall I write? Am I writing about tattoos as a tattooed woman, or about personal disclosure in the clinical dyad using my tattoos as a foundation from which to speak?
Much comes up for people around the subject of tattoos. The anxiety that surrounds the topic produces a tendency, in both clinical and non-clinical spheres, to collapse the experience of tattooing into more manageable parts — that tattoos are “merely” a representation of one's pathology; they are a variant of self-mutilative practices; well, everybody has them nowadays so what's the big deal? Tattoos have become more widely accepted in the western world and the meaning and significance varies with each person who has gone under the needle. But the significance of each tattoo isn't immediately obvious, even to the person who carries