Cherie Louise: Amputee model slams trolls accusing her of photoshopping images
An amputee model has shared her struggle stories and also revealed how heartless trolls call her an attention seeker and accuse her of photoshopping her photos to have an advantage over her other models. Cherie Louise is from New Zealand whose one leg had to be amputated after she was diagnosed with a rare trype of bone cancer. The 29-year-old has a huge following on Instagram with numbers over 70k.
However, some on social media think that Louise is faking her condition just to gain more name and popularity. She said, “People on social media often accuse me of faking having one leg and claim that I Photoshop my leg out of my photos for attention. I know their comments are ridiculous and easily disproved, so some might think it’s just funny when people say that … [but] for me, it’s quite annoying, given everything I’ve gone through to survive and get to a point I am now where I’m confident in who I am and what I look like.”
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Louise was just six when she was diagnosed with bone cancer — osteosarcoma. Her doctors told her that the condition made it necessary for her leg to be cut off and not just that, due to the rare and risky amputation — called an external hemipelvectomy — half of her pelvis will also be amputated, making it impossible for her to use a prosthetic leg. So as a result, crutches became her best support to move around, but they also made her feel self-conscious about herself.
Louise explained: “When I was young, I didn’t believe I would get a job, fall in love, have a family or any of those things because I’d never known an amputee who had. There were countless nights spent crying over photos of myself pre-amputation, questioning why it happened to me, wishing I would wake up one day and have two legs again. I always stood out, and that made me eventually retreat from doing things that brought me more attention, like playing sports.”
But she gained her confidence back in her twenties when she met like-minded people on the internet. She stated, “[It] actually played a big part in gaining self-confidence for me because I found the more I put myself out there on social media, the less I cared about how people reacted to me in person. I [also] found a model with the same amputation as me on Instagram … I remember seeing that she had posted photos of herself in swimsuits and even had photos showing her scars.”
Louise’s confidence and also because of the inclusivity of the modeling world, she got several offers with multiple international brands. Despite being trolled mercilessly on social media, Louise believes in its positive power. “I hope to be seen by disabled children who aren’t sure what the future has in store for them. I want to break into the industries that have forever made up stories for us, instead of letting us tell them,” she added.
Louise’s Instagram is full of her beautiful and confident pictures. She is also a big fan of Mama Cax -- an American-Haitian model and disabled rights activist. But Cax died in December 2019 and in her honor, Louise shared a picture of her on Instagram and wrote, “I was so excited when I found you. Who wouldn't be? Look at you. Radiant, flawless, always dressed extra for the occasion. I couldn't believe it, a woman doing everything I'd always dreamed of doing, or not dreamed of, because it terrified me. I remember the day I found you, I was at the gym and just laid on the floor for an hour looking at your photos, reading all of your captions, in disbelief that there was someone typing things that I thought only existed in my head.”
She continued, “I excitedly sent screenshots to my boyfriend and friends - can you believe it? Someone with the same amputation as me. Using crutches. Going to the beach. I went swimming at the beach for the first time because I saw you do it,” before adding: “Knowing what I'm sure is only a fraction of what you've been through, I felt like you were invincible. When I heard you were sick I never expected it would end in us losing you. After all, look at what you've conquered already. I was wrong. Nobody is invincible. Not even the boldest, most powerful woman I've ever seen. I'll miss you forever and the disabled community will continue to carry on your work, it won't end here. You changed lives. We love you so much.”