Content warning: self-harm

Related posts:

I often experience an interesting feeling when receiving a tattoo. After sitting for a long session (e.g. 4-6 hours) in which I receive a large or extensive tattoo, I experience a physical feeling of satisfaction and relaxation. This feeling is very similar to the pleasant rush of satisfaction and relaxation that I feel after exercising strenuously (e.g. after participating a soccer match). There are differences in the accompanying sensations—after a tattoo, my skin stings and feels blistered, while after exercising it is my muscles that ache. But there is certainly a common sensation of relaxation and satisfaction.

As it turns out, I am not alone in experiencing this subtle “high” during and after receiving tattoos.

The opening sequence of Needles and Pins, a documentary series hosted by British tattoo artist Grace Neutral, includes a short clip of Grace Neutral being tattooed. Neutral faces the camera and exclaims: “I’m on a little tattoo high right now. Feels so good!”

In Hurts So Good: The Science and Culture of Pain on Purpose, biologist and science communicator Leigh Cowart examines activities that involve subjecting oneself to pain deliberately. Cowart considers many examples of such activities, including BDSM (of which Cowart is an enthusiastic practitioner), tattooing, and strenuous exercise:

What these activities and compulsions all have in common is that they involved me deliberately using my own body, the phenomena of my physiology, to feel bad, and to feel better. I choose to suffer to reap very specific kinds of rewards. Endorphins are a hell of a drug. It is generally understood that endorphins feel good, and they get you high. So, when I talk about feeling bad to feel better, I mean it very literally. Pain can lead to feel-good chemicals and I, like so many people, am all too willing to exploit this fact for my own benefit.

A 2021 study by Störkel et al examined endorphins in 51 cisgender women who engage in self-harm (link). This study found that salivary β-endorphin was higher immediately after self-harm than it was before self-harm. The authors wrote: “our results provide a first indication that NSSI [non-suicidal self-harm] acts could be associated with a momentary increase of β-endorphin, and this might reinforce NSSI engagement.”

Pankiv-Greene conducted a study on the spiritual meaning and transformative potential of tattoos (link). Among the many interesting results of this study, one participant “posited that pain is an integral part of the tattooing process because it induces electro-chemical changes in the body which release endorphins and alter our state. It induces a liminal state where changes in perception can occur.”