The medical world can be a scary place, but it’s not without some humor. For many couples, getting pregnant can be pretty intimidating. Hospitals, gynecologists, women’s health services, and a new human growing inside you can be a lot to handle. Like countless other couples, one British Columbia woman decided to celebrate her pregnancy with a photoshoot — with a little bit of a twist.
Nicole Cameron is due to have her first child any day now. Before the inevitable hospital visit, she and her husband Todd planned to have a maternity photoshoot. Determined to make theirs stand out, they took macabre inspiration from the sensation of the baby moving around inside her.
“Over the summer Nicole had been talking about this baby inside her, and how it was so weird to see it moving and she could feel its elbows and feet, hands moving all around her. It felt like an alien entity inside of her and I kind of put two and two together,” said her husband Todd.
The photo shoot idea? Sir Ridley Scott’s 1979 classic Alien. Specifically, that scene. The idea wasn’t set in stone quite yet. Until one day at a garage sale, as fate would have it, Todd found — and purchased — a silicone model of the baby xenomorph (Alien) from the film. He asked her if she was on board with an Alien-themed maternity shoot. Having met a few years prior at a Halloween party, she needed no convincing. The couple set to work on a photoshoot that would live in viral infamy.
“We brought some blood, splattered ourselves and basically just had a good time out there. We just put it together to make our friends and family chuckle,” said Todd.
Their maternity shoot recreation of the grisly sci-fi scene went far beyond family and friends, going viral and being shared more than 300,000 times on Facebook. Todd credits Nicole for being awesome. They’re excited about the result of the shoot but more excited about the birth of their first child. A child who, they jokingly hoped, is a human being.
Like a first pregnancy, hospitals can make some people nervous. Yet in the face of fear and medical uncertainty, there is so much life that deserves to be celebrated. Humor can be a wonderful way to cope with the completely normal stresses of life and parenthood, and we wish this creative couple the best.
You can check out the Cameron’s hilarious, if bloody, photoshoot at The Huffington Post.
