It’s been almost ten years since Selena Gomez first broke onto the scene in Disney Channel’s Wizards of Waverly Place, but since then, the brunette beauty has collected an impressive amount of tattoos.
The 24-year-old started out relatively tame, getting a simple music note on her right wrist in February 2012. “I was named after a singer [Selena Quintanilla-Pérez] and music obviously is a big influence for me. And there’s music stuff with my mom that means a lot to me too,” she told E! of the ink.
But she’s gotten a bit more bold as she’s added artwork. In 2014, the actress debuted a back tattoo that reads “love yourself first” in Arabic. “[She] already had it written out how she wanted,” tattoo artist Bang Bang revealed. “[It’s] about 4 inches, and didn’t take too long, probably about 30-45 minutes.”
And for her latest project, the Netflix series 13 Reasons Why, Selena went under the needle again for a very sentimental reason. The executive producer and two of the show’s stars got matching semicolon tats in honor of Project Semicolon, “a movement dedicated to presenting hope & love to those who struggle with mental illness, suicide, addiction, & self-injury.”
As actor Tommy Dorfman explained it, “The ; symbol stands for an end of one thought and a beginning of another. Instead of a period, authors use the semicolon to continue a sentence. For us, it means a beginning of another chapter in life, in lieu of ending your life.”
Selena has opened up about her struggle with anxiety, and how therapy has helped her. “I was depressed, anxious. I started to have panic attacks right before getting on-stage, or right after leaving the stage,” she told Vogue in March. “[Getting treatment] was one of the hardest things I’ve done, but it was the best thing I’ve done.”
Scroll through the gallery below for an in-depth look at Selena’s tattoos!
The music note that appears on the side of the singer’s wrist was her first tattoo in February 2012.
Her second tattoo is a Roman numeral on the back of her neck, which translates to the number 76. It is believed to be in honor of her mother, who was born in 1976. She got it done in September 2012.
Selena has a tattoo behind her left ear of a lower-case “g” for her sister Gracie, who was born on June 12, 2013.
On the top of her right foot, the actress has the word “sunshine” for her grandmother. It was first spotted in April 2016.
Selena has the words “love yourself first” in Arabic on her upper back, which was first seen on the red carpet in June 2014.
The former child star got a semicolon tattoo in honor of her latest TV project, 13 Reasons Why, which deals with teen suicide. Project Semicolon is “a movement dedicated to presenting hope & love to those who struggle with mental illness, suicide, addiction, & self-injury.”
