In July of 2017, Atlanta Redemption Ink was launched so the redemption Jessica* found when she covered her trafficker’s logo with a new tattoo could be shared with countless others.

* Her real name is used with permission.

Over 160 survivors of sex trafficking, abuse, gang involvement, and self-harm have received tattoos to cover branding tattoos, gang tattoos, and self-harm marks.

Permanently covering the pain from their pasts. 

Redemption.

Jessica coordinates redemption tattoos, because she personally knows the indescribable healing found when you permanently cover the pain from your past.

Academic Struggles

Jessica grew up in a loving, Christian home. While her parents were involved in outreach ministry, she loved singing at church. She also spent time developing her interests in poetry and art. Awards for her vocals and her artwork validated her creative interests.

But, school was hard for her. School work challenging, but so was interacting with other children. Treating her anxiety and depression with medicine only made her feel numb.

“You don’t try. You won’t make anything of yourself,” were the devastating words a teacher said about her. At that point, Jessica tried home-schooling. But, that wasn’t a helpful solution to her academic struggles. To cope with her depression, she began self-harming.

Isolated Her from Her Peers

Because she didn’t complete the home-school work during 7th and 8th grades, she was behind when she enrolled in a public high school for 9th grade. A special education placement isolated her from her peers and increased her depression.

“My interest in painting and drawing waned, and I replaced it with depressive poetry,” she remembers.

Jessica was sent to an alternative school. while there she stole an X-acto knife from the art room and used it to self-harm in the girl’s bathroom. Sadly, it was at the alternative school where Jessica finally felt accepted.

Running Away

About that same time, a man from their church moved into their home and began sexually molesting Jessica. She passed a detailed note about the abuse to a friend at school. A teacher collected it and called her parents. When her parents questioned him, he claimed Jessica was lying.

There were so many things that led to her decision to quit school when she turned 16: academic struggles, anxiety, depression, self-harming, and sexual abuse. Not knowing how to cope with all of it resulted in her running away from home.

“I knew I had to get a job to support myself, so I looked in the Help Wanted section of the newspaper. I called about a job as a call center representative. The fact that it also offered living accommodations made it seem perfect.”

See the Call Center

After meeting the call support supervisor, he invited her to see the call center and living accommodations.

“I walked into the house where the call center was supposed to be. The man shut the door behind me and locked it. He said, ‘She’s here’ to three waiting men.”

“All three men raped me,” Jessica shared.

Three other women were already living in the “call center” and were being trafficked. During her exploitation, Jessica was tattooed with her trafficker’s mark.

A couple of months later on a slow night, Jessica and her trafficker sat across from a well-known strip club. He put flyers about “partying” on the windshields of cars in the parking lot. Jessica asked if some of the other girls could party instead of her.

His Property

“He smashed my head into the dashboard and told me I WOULD do it, because I was his property. He promised to kill me if I didn’t,” she remembers. “I wanted to be dead.”

Later that night, Jessica asked, “Can I just go home? I promise I won’t say anything.”

He replied, “Yeah, you can go.”

However, once they were back at the house, he dragged her by the hair to an upstairs bedroom. She doesn’t remember anything after he choked her.

Ran to the Salvation Army

The next morning she asked if she could use the bathroom. He agreed but said, “If you try to leave, I’ll shoot you.”

She pretended to go into the bathroom but ran down the stairs and out the front door instead. The Salvation Army across the street was where she ran.

A volunteer there let her use the phone to call her grandmother and then the police. “The police helped me get my car keys, car, wallet, and personal belongings. They warned me not to come back to that area.”

Went into Survival Mode

The six months in that horrible environment were finally over.  Jessica stuffed her emotions and the pain. “I went into survival mode. I was so afraid of the trafficker coming after me.”

To numb and drown out her pain, she began using drugs. “I moved back in with my parents. I also ran dope across Atlanta to support my habit.”

Three months in jail for possession of meth and a 30-day rehab when she was 22 didn’t convince her to stop using drugs. “The day I got out of rehab, I got high with a friend.”

Gift of Sobriety

That same friend dropped her off at her parents’ church. Little did she know that God was weaving together a plan for her.

That very night, at that very church, a young man was there who would later become her husband.

Jessica knew she needed to get clean. “I decided to give myself the gift of sobriety for my twenty-third birthday, because I was done with the games, the chase, the homelessness, and the broken relationships. I cried out to God to take the desire for drugs from me. And He did.”

Jessica and AJ, the young man from church, were married in 2011. “My husband has helped me stay clean and accountable.”

After having several miscarriages, they were told they wouldn’t be able to have children. But God! Their beautiful daughter was born two years ago!

Represented My Redemption

One night in 2014 while watching a story of a tattoo artist named Chris doing cover-ups in Chicago for gang members, an individual had a tattoo from their past covered up. Jessica witnessed the healing he experienced.

Two years later, a woman paid to have Jessica’s exploitation tattoo covered. “It couldn’t take away that horrific period of my life, but my new tattoo represented my redemption.”

Jessica KNEW she had to coordinate cover-up tattoos to help others experience redemption. She decided to name her ministry Atlanta Redemption Ink (ARI). They provide tattoo cover-ups and removals wherever there is a need – be it in Georgia or another state.

To date, ARI has coordinated over 150 tattoo cover-ups and removals.

Redeeming a Person’s Life

“I’ve seen God redeem my life 110%. He is restoring relationships and giving me such a passion for the brokenhearted, the hurting, and those in recovery.”

Below are before and after pictures of two ARI clients. Every time Jessica posts one of these on the Atlanta Redemption Ink Facebook page, I marvel at the difference a little ink can make in redeeming a person’s life.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Recently, Jessica and the ARI team hosted Survivor’s Art, an event supporting the artwork of the survivors she works with. It was a huge success! Fellow overcomer Dianne and I were excited to see all the incredible artwork and support Jessica’s ministry.

Learn more about this AMAZING ministry at atlantaredemptionink.com.

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When I asked Jessica to describe what overcoming is to her, she said, “Overcoming is a continuous process. It takes time, and you have to put effort into it daily. The Bible says we overcome by the word of our testimony (Revelation 12:11). Each time I get to share where God has brought me, it’s a chance to overcome in the moment and bring hope to others.”

If God has redeemed your life, are you overcoming by the word of your testimony?