A mum-of-five who tattooed her eyeballs ended up in hospital and could go blind.
Law student Anaya Peterson was inspired by ‘blue-eyed dragon’ Amber Luke. She already regrets not listening to her seven-year-old daughter’s warning over sight.
Anaya, who is 32 and from Belfast, was left hospitalised by the eye alteration and is facing permanent blindness after a suspected reaction to the eyeball ink.
The mum, who also has a tongue split and facial tattoos, now says she wishes she could have done things differently.
Anaya got her right eyeball tattooed blue in July 2020 and despite dealing with headaches and dry eyes as ‘part of the healing process’, decided to get her left eye dyed purple in December that year.
After months without complications, Anaya was shocked to wake up in August last year with ‘swollen’ eyelids as though her ‘face had been inflated with air’ and looking like she’d done ‘five rounds with Mike Tyson’.
As the swelling continued to get worse and worse, Anaya checked herself into the hospital’s A&E ward, after prescribed antibiotics did nothing to reduce the ‘severe inflammation’.
Anaya said: ‘I was just going to get one [eye tattoo] at first because I thought that if I go blind, at least I’ve got the other eye. I should have stuck with that.
‘My daughter told me that I didn’t want to do that [the tattoo] asking, ‘what if you go blind?’ She wasn’t on board with it at all.
‘I just wanted to be at home watching [TV] to be honest. I can’t even put it into words. It wasn’t nice at all whatsoever.
‘It was traumatising to go through. I just remember thinking, I’m not doing that sh*t again, with the eye tattoo. I’m definitely not doing that sh*t again.
‘Although Anaya left the hospital surgery ‘on the mend’, the ordeal has left the parent regretting her choice to follow in the footsteps of alternative Aussie Amber Luke.
Anaya has been told by ophthalmologists that she is now at a very high risk of contracting glaucoma, and her eyesight is already worsening, with her vision clouded by ‘hundreds of thousands of floaters’.
The student claims she is being supported by her university and is being provided with applications to make reading easier, as well as counselling.
