Tattoos certainly divide opinion. There are those who just straight dislike the way they look through to those who enjoy the art but wouldn’t want one on their own skin. Then there’s the enthusiasts, those who spend their lives buildling up an incredible canvas of tattoo artwork right on their body.

Me, well I’m somewhere in the middle. I personally have one very small and not particularly good tattoo. On reflection it was a mistake, but only because it was impulsive and I chose badly. I can however greatly appreciate the incredibly beautiful work that makes up some tattoos. Some of these artists would be hung on the walls of our finest galleries if they had chosen to use regular canvas instead of skin for their work!

Of course, there’s the shoddy end of them market too. The drunken tattoo, the badly copied from the internet job, or the bad spelling job or even the “did it at home myself”…

Thankfully there is a way out for people who unfortunately fell into this latter category. You can get tattoos very cleanly removed now using laser removal services like those at Texas Tattoo Busters (find them on Facebook here too). Because things have changed a lot with this technology – the results can be virtually undetectable, which is amazing considering this was designed to be a permanent thing.

And I can tell you, from seeing the results of even the very first treatment (thankfully they cover San Antonio too) I am incredibly impressed. It depends very much on the type of tattoo you have, but watching a tattoo fade by about 80% in seconds before your very eyes is just like magic.

I should point out that it’s not cheap, it is uncomfortable (painful if you have a low pain threshold) and it does take multiple treatments. It is however the only sane option if you want to get ink removed. There are other crazy surgical or acid based things people do but I’d rather keep a bad tattoo than go that route. The other possibility is a cover-up tattoo, which really can work – but find a properly talented artist and see what they can some up with.