True Blood actor Joe Manganiello is leaving very little to the imagination in his newly released book, Bloodlines.
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One of the things that the Hollywood star opens up about in his new memoir is his battle with a mysterious autoimmune illness that nearly took his life.
Manganiello Details Story Behind Dragon Tattoo
On Monday (October 19), Manganiello took to social media to give his followers a more detailed look at the dragon tattoo he had done to cover up his surgical scars.
In the photos, the actor shows off the process of getting the three-foot tattoo, which stretches down his right side from his abdomen to above his knee, and how it relates to one of the excerpts from the new book.
"In chapter four, I related my struggle with the illness to my body sending out knights to fight a (western) dragon that didn't exist," he wrote in the caption of his Instagram post on Monday (via PEOPLE). "The soldiers would then punch holes throughout my body when they couldn't find an enemy."
The Spider-Man actor also said that the tattoo was his way of taking back control of his life after being hospitalized with the illness.
"The idea to cover my surgery scars with my first tattoo, a three-foot dragon down my right side, was my effort to take back what little agency I felt that I had," Manganiello added. "And to signal to my body to stop attacking the dragon... because the (eastern) dragon was me."
Earlier this month, Manganiello told Entertainment Weekly that he still has to live with some "remnants" from the surgeries. But he is ultimately grateful to have come out on the other end of it.
"There are remnants from the surgeries and procedures that I have to live with, but I don't complain about them because life is manageable," Manganiello said.
"I weathered that storm and came out the other end, and I say it in the book, but life began again for me. So the answer is healthy, happy, peaceful — which is quite a difference from what I went through in the book."
