Mum gets trolled for her baby's 'zombie' first birthday shoot
But the shamers didn't realise the heartwrenching reason she chose to do it...
Celebrating your baby's 1st birthday is a big deal for lots of us: there'll often be a party, there will almost definitely be cake, and some of us might even rope in help from a pro photographer to capture the whole thing on camera.
That's exactly what Brisbane mum Amy Louise did when she called Amanda Queen Photography in to mark son Phoenix's 1st birthday bash.
But there was a bit of a difference from the usual requests - Amy went for something zombie-themed ???
The resulting pics show Phoenix, zombie-like, in a forest eating 'bloody brains' cake...
There's no doubt it looks artistic, if a little unusual, right?
Still, Amy admits she got some pretty nasty comments when she shared the pics on Facebook - with people telling her she was a bad mum and that she was negatively affecting her son's mental health.
What they didn't know, however, is that there was a very special reason Amy had gone for this particular theme.
You see, Phoenix was born on Halloween - and was immediately taken away from his mum as he had no heartbeat.
"I knew he was dead, I knew he was gone," Amy recalls, talking to the Daily Mail.
"He was lifeless and there was nothing we could do. When the doctor sat next to me, I just said, "He's gone isn't he? He's dead."
"The doctor squeezed my hand to try and show his emotion but it was a mess. It was awful. I just kept seeing this tiny white coffin flashing through my mind as I started to process what had just happened."
Miraculously, however, after 13 minutes, Phoenix came back to life. He and his mum were kept separate for 4 days as both were too ill to be near each other (Amy had to have a blood transfusion).
And, as Phoenix's first birthday approached, Amy knew she wanted to do something to mark the special circumstances of those early days.
"What better than a zombie-themed cake smash for the tiny baby boy who was pronounced dead and then miraculously came to life on Halloween,' she said.
"I've always been a really different and creative person, and I knew that I couldn't just do a "naked baby with a blue cake in a studio" type shoot.
"It had to be big, special and meaningful. We always called him our little zombie because he was brought back from the dead on Halloween so I thought let's have him eating a brain.
"The ideas just kept flowing from there and we decided a walking dead style shoot with a gross brain cake would be a perfect shoot to showcase our emotion and our story."
Images: Amanda Queen Photography on Facebook
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Tara is mum to 1 daughter, Bodhi Rae, and has worked as Content Editor and Social Media Producer at MadeForMums since 2015
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