Highland Park shooting survivors heal with help from tattoo artists

Four sisters who tragically lost their father at the parade. A first responder who was there with her husband and 1-year-old baby. A store manager that crowded people into safety in the basement of his shop. A young woman that watched over someone's else's children in an alley so that their father could run back for his wife. A mom that took her autistic son to the parade to collect map memorabilia. The co-chairman of the parade.

These were some of the participants of Artists 4 Israel's tattoo event that took place in response to last year's shooting in Highland Park.

The event was an umbrella project called Healing Ink, that gathers local tattoo artists who volunteer their time, energy and craft to give free tattoos as a form of therapeutic healing to victims of traumatic events.

Healing Ink is a project of Artists 4 Israel that originated by giving free tattoos to victims of terror in Israel.

Last year, seven innocent people lost their lives to the shooting in Highland Park, and hundreds of others experienced the traumatic event. For many, a new day has begun, but some live with the vivid memories of that day.

Artists 4 Israel offered a unique, nonconventional therapeutic response to help survivors and heroes reclaim their bodies and begin healing, both physically and emotionally. There were 23 participants that received tattoos: a mix of survivors, relatives of those who lost their lives, and first responders.

While the process of getting a tattoo entailed many things, one of the most important aspects of the event was the storytelling. It gave the intimate opportunity for these survivors to talk, reflect, and to be heard. The tattoos were only the icing on the cake.

Eighty-year-old Sue received a sun on the lower inside of her arm.

"My granddaughter drew it," she said. "She's only 12. She was there with me at the parade and she's still processing what happened, so this tattoo is very meaningful for the both of us."

Many of the survivors chose to incorporate something in their tattoo with the number 7, a tribute forever memorializing the seven lives that were lost that day.

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