PENDER COUNTY, N.C.  —  Jenean LaCorte is on a mission to make breast cancer survivors feel whole again. She’s a medical tattoo artist that works with women who have had a double mastectomy by giving them 3D nipple tattoos.

Her work is an honor for her as she gives these women a piece of themselves that many feel less attractive and less confident without. She fought her own battle with cancer as a child and understands the emotional scars that go along with the physical ones. LaCorte says it’s not easy to face yourself in the mirror every day and be reminded of what you’ve gone through.

“It’s an emotional moment when people first see the tattoos,” says LaCorte. “Sometimes they cry, sometimes they laugh. They’re telling me how it’s changed their life.”

Unlike other medical tattoos, these are permanent and much more realistic. LaCorte takes extreme care in getting the original coloration and size, as well as unique features like beauty marks, accurately in place. She’s one of a handful of artists who focus solely on restorative tattoos and her clients travel from all over the country for appointments.

“The people who see me have been through a lot and they may not have had the perfect surgery or surgeries and so their expectations are kind of in the air, like ‘Will this be something that lets me down again?’” says LaCorte.

Her goal is to exceed those expectations and make the experience as easy and painless as possible. It helps that most women who have had breast tissue removed during a mastectomy no longer have feeling there.

LaCorte says winning the battle with cancer is one thing, but the mental battle remains each time they wake up.

“It’s in your face every day,” says Lisa Mickel, one of LaCorte’s clients. “You get dressed, undressed. You see everything and I didn’t feel like I was complete yet.”

For Mickel, the tattoos are a sense of closure on her journey. She beat breast cancer 10 years ago, but she doesn’t consider herself a survivor, she knows she’s a warrior. Mickel says up until now, it’s been a fight to believe she is beautiful.

“I have so many scars from so many different surgeries that they’re a reminder of what I’ve been through and my journey and that I’ve come out on top,” says Mickel.