content:
• Background
• Instagram career to date
• Boobs
• Nudity
• Hypocrisies and dishonesties
• list of ailments nelly suffers from
• Relationships
• Eating disorder
• Sartorial choices
• Friendships
• Collabs
Background
Nelly is a Brighton based body positivity influencer and runs her account in the name of ED recovery. She has labelled herself as “the girl with hip dips”.
Nelly was born in September 1993 and her real name is Helena Sameera Abigail Haycock. Her partner is semi-pro basketball player Brendan, who she refers to as “B”.
She documents her life religiously, setting up a camera to capture herself “waking up”, “spontaneously romantic moments with her boyfriend, taking baths and doing gym workouts.
Nelly seems to rely heavily on her Instagram following for validation, doesn’t appear to have many friends and her relationship seems to be very codependent. Her main hobbies seem to be pretending to do litter picking and booking photoshoots for herself.
Nelly struggles with basic concepts of influencing, she posts wrong links, forgets to label ads and has to spend 3-8 hours making simple reels. She also struggles to respond to emails in a timely manner, sometimes having to spend a full 8 hours reading and responding to them instead of a couple of minutes like the rest of the population.
As a result she is always either tired or stressed or both. When she’s not tired or stressed she makes ever-so-subtle digs at tattlers and comments made here. She has been shadow banned on multiple occasions for unknown reasons, but it seems buying followers could be the cause.
Nelly regularly filters comments that show her in a negative light and does not read DMs therefore does not allow any discussions to be opened up with followers.
She claims any caption she writes takes her multiple hours, and will often claim “burnout” if she has posted content which she feels is a lot of effort such as dressing up as Miss Trunchbull.
Instagram career to date
She began her Instagram account around 2015. This would have been around the time she had breast reduction surgery and shortly after she stopped weighing herself. She had a blog around this time but it appears to be defunct. Nelly also has a YouTube Channel and a Twitter account.
Her content consisted mainly of selfies of herself, pictures of herself in bikinis, undies and photos of her fast fashion outfits. At this time Nelly lived at home with her parents and worked for a “local” anti-bullying charity in an unspecified role (though she posted about working shifts).
Her account started gaining momentum when she tagged her underwear purchases ( usually fast fashion such as miss pap, boohoo, misguided, ASOS etc but occasionally she tagged more niche brands) Her pictures were shared on the brand’s socials, as she relentlessly used brand hashtags to be featured.
Around 2017, Nelly started blogging about her breast reduction surgery, promoting her Twitter handle and running stats on her account so she seems to have started to become more self aware of her account and her following. In May, Missguided started using her pictures in their promotional material, and she featured on an billboard of theirs which drove up her following. That summer she was invited to a Missguided launch at Bluewater, had her own Missguided code and began relentlessly posting Missguided products.
However Nelly claimed she wasn’t paid for anything she posted, and mentioned that she wished she was - so it seems that she started to consider her account as a money-maker from around this time, and branched out to other brands, attending the press day for boohoo/nasty gal at the end of that year.
Nelly had her first official photoshoot with Missguided in Nov 2017 as part of their “inclusive” “make your mark” campaign. prior to that she’d been submitting selfies.
Branching out from Missguided in 2018, Nelly started plugging a Fashionnova code in spring that year, she also did shoots for The Gypsy Shrine and began a working relationship promoting AYM studio clothing (though it’s unclear if she was paid for this). By 2019 she was doing official shoots for In The Style, attending press events for House of CB and had a Boohoo discount.
Nelly has written a blog post (under her real name, Helena Haycock) on the benefits of influencer marketing. In this post, she writes about how social media users are less aware of social media as a marketing tool, and so are easier to dupe and trick, as unsuspecting victims, with influencers being able to leverage and cultivate the relationships with users. It shows how she is savvier than she lets on, is less honest than she lets on and is consistent with her hypocrisies and dishonesty elsewhere. The blog post is here;
https://sfdigitalmarketing.co.uk/3-reasons-why-maintaining-a-social-media-presence-is-crucial-to-any-business-2/
In 2019 ASA started tightening the rules on influencer marketing and ad declaration and in April 2019 Nelly first marked a post as an Ad for Missguided - despite working with them for years. Nelly started labelling adverts from this time onwards but inconsistently. She has collaborated extensively with AYM but has simultaneously claimed that posts haven’t been sponsored.
In 2020, Nelly quit her full time job to embark on a “career” as an influencer. As a result, she began to start promoting generic products that didn’t have much to do with her initial messages, such as a collaboration with “Love Honey” and “Vush” promoting sex toys, and she began discussing women’s health issues/periods as she had begun a collab with a period underwear band.
The tone of her content changed, as she seemed to feel the pressure to keep her audience engaged with new posts whilst protecting her revenue stream, instead of posting for its own sake.
Nelly began posting deliberately unflattering photos that contorted her body, to appeal to her followers and make her relatable. It’s also when she started openly copying content from other influencers.
She began paying for elaborate and eccentric photoshoots by way of content, and began a collab with gymshark, becoming an “ambassador” for the brand. Nelly also began posting about how she’d spend “6 hours” doing emails and appeared to become self conscious about essentially faffing at home all day.
In January 2021 Nelly featured in cosmopolitan magazine.
Boobs
In 2017 nelly started blogging about her breast reduction surgery. The surgery was done privately. She has stated that it was because her boobs were too large and uncomfortable and giving her back problems, but equally she has also mentioned how growing large breasts during puberty was a catalyst for developing an eating disorder.
She subsequently had an allergic reaction to the stitches, which required several corrective surgeries
In March 2022 Nelly paid for a private procedure to improve the scar tissue and to reshape her boobs, including an implant to make them more even.
Nudity
Nelly has a view that nudity is empowering for her and she should be allowed to express her nudity as it is empowering for her, while acknowledging it isn’t empowering for everyone. She has posted about this multiple times.
She spoke about the “backlash” she faced when she posted a video of herself walking in a busy London street in underwear in September 2021, which was later discussed in a podcast by Alex Light and Em Clarkson in April 2022. Nelly seemed unaware about how her brand of female nudity and empowerment was specifically within the context of applying to a male gaze of idealised versions of female sexuality. nelly continues to adopt the stance that promoting female nudity in terms that appeal to the male gaze, as somehow being empowering. Instead Nelly was critical of anyone who disagreed on how appropriate her nudity was. Nelly tends to dismiss any criticisms or dialogue as “slut shaming”. Em Clarkson and Alex Light also faced criticism for adopting the same stance as Nelly, and for their shared lack of acknowledgement of appropriate adult behaviour.
Nelly’s nudity as an expression of “empowerment” verges into obsessive territory. To date, she has paid to have casts made of her boobs, bum and stomach. She frequently body checks, and compares herself to historical standards of beauty to validate her body.
Hypocrisies and dishonesty
Nelly has stated explicitly that her surname is “London” and her handle has nothing to do with living in London. On Facebook and companies house it is apparent that her actual name is Helena Haycock. Her Arabic necklace also reads as “Helena” when translated. Tattlers found her Facebook account under her real name and she promptly ramped up the privacy settings. Nelly has blocked tattlers who question her about this. She subsequently changed her socials to the name “sameira risk”.
Nelly frequently states that she doesn’t read her DMs but will then create content out of some of the DMs she has received and has insisted on her stories that she reads every single DM.
Nelly will frequently promote fast fashion and insist on how wonderful fast fashion products are, as well as accept freebies as part of her ambassadorship for brands… but will then post them for sale on her Depop.. surely if these products were so wonderful you wouldn’t sell them when they’ve barely been worn? To cover her tracks, nelly deletes sold items from her Depop.
Nelly claims proceeds of her Depop sales go to charity but isn’t transparent or clear about how much exactly, is donated.
Nelly has posted extensively about the permanent laser hair removal she uses, and has done since ~2015. Since she collaborated with Estrid Razors, she has avoided referencing this fact, pretending any depilation results are from razors, as opposed to the result of years of lazor removal.
Nelly advertised for Wild Deodorant and posted about how she didn’t sweat at a gym class as a result of the deodorant. Wild deodorant website states it doesn’t stop sweating, as it’s not an anti-perspirant. A patent lie from Nelly.
Height: nelly claims to be 5 ft 3 but it’s fairly obvious when looking at photos of her stood beside her boyfriend (whose height is public information since he plays basketball) that she is definitely not that height. No one knows why she is dishonest about this, Nelly has never addressed it.
Nelly has mentioned (but never been open) about getting regular Botox - weird, considering she insists she respects her body and doesn’t want to change it and this is the whole premise of her account and what she stands for.
Nelly has claimed to be T total but tattlers have caught sight of alcoholic drinks in her posts.
In January 2022 Nelly filmed herself walking to Brighton beach with B and claimed this was their usual walk, despite never having mentioned it before or since.
Nelly mentioned in Feb 2022 on comments under her posts that she doesn’t post fast fashion “hauls” and that she had “decided to stop completely a year and a half ago”- this would mean she’d stopped posting fast fashion from August 2018 direct lie, as she had posted fast fashion since on many occasions, as well as endorsing fast fashion brands. She has attended events for, and extensively promoted, both gymshark and House of CB hauls (both of which are fast fashion companies).
When a commenter under her posts mentioned that House of CB had a terrible sustainability rating, Nelly feigned ignorance and surprise. Her response was “really! Jeez. Where can I read the rating?” Several of her followers provided the relevant link. Despite having this information at her disposal she continued to wear, promote and attend House of CB events.
Nelly and B went on holiday abroad for 2 nights in May 2022 claiming it was the first holiday she’d been on in four years and had anxiety presumably because of that, but this is false as they’d been on holiday in 2019.
Nelly has promoted a candle lighter and claims she hasn’t bought matches “in years” despite posting a video shortly after, with… a box of matches in her flat.
Nelly has turned her period into content, and ha gained a collab from modi bodi period paints, but in her efforts to constantly post period related stuff, she will slip up and accidentally get dates confused. Eg she posted about how awful it was to have her period come on during an exercise class, but then posted about having period boobs less than 3 weeks later.
Likewise, in October, she posted about how sick and ill and “green faced” she was from a period that required her to stay home and bedrest. But miraculously the next day she was able to travel from Brighton to Milton Keanes to visit the Lounge Underwear HQ for a photoshoot in her undies. Nelly must’ve been aware as to how this looked, so she waited an extra day before posting anything. Unfortunately for nelly, the company uploaded the pictures on the same day it happened. Nelly was obviously trying to mislead her followers so they didn’t realise she was bullshitting and exaggerating her periods for attention. of course B also came on this trip because she is incapable of leaving the house without him holding her hand.
Nelly claims that she never recommends a product without using it first and feeling sure she likes it. Simultaneously she has also claimed that she isn’t always aware of how a product is when she’s promoting it because she hasn’t had a chance to use it.
When tattlers criticised her for only ever stealing recipes from other people, Nelly pretended the recipes were her own, even though they were easy to google or sometimes trending on tiktok, eg cinnamon swirl pancakes
List of ailments/mental health problems/neuroses and pathologies
Nelly frequently and consistently posts content relating to claimed health conditions, and she appears to desperately crave validation and sympathy and uses various ailments to garner this:
• In September 2017 she first posted about her anxiety at socialising with a group of friends.
• In March 2021 she posted about a miscarriage, which felt in poor taste to Tattlers and seemed very odd. She posted a picture of a positive
Pregnancy test alongside a negative one, which confused tattlers as it looked as though she hadn’t established if it was a false positive and she was open about not wanting or planning a baby in that moment. She posted a lot of vaguebooking stories which made tattlers feel it was all a bit too contrived.
• She claims to have dyslexia and “accidentally” generates drama by ordering home items in the wrong size and attributes it to one of the aforementioned.
• In June 2021 Nelly claimed she’d had a panic attack and seizure whilst driving, posting several stories documenting the attack and calling the police to come to her aid.
• Nelly has claimed to have been suffering mental health crises and has gone on Instagram breaks in ~June 2021 and again in July 2022. She doesn’t post during these breaks but remains active on other social media, and appears to return to Instagram shortly after. She vaguebooked when declaring her “breaks”, insinuating she is suffering a mental health crisis but will return and say she just didn’t feel like herself.
• Nelly religiously posts every time she has a period about how awful and painful it is, but this could be to help promote the period underwear she shills.
•In March 2022, Nelly was recovering from reconstructive breast surgery. Despite feeling able to film herself getting in and out of bed regularly, she went out for a short walk, started crying and had to call B to pick her up. The next day nelly was filming herself dancing around her flat. The next week she was twerking in her flat, just in time to post a razor ad. She also videoed herself handling her scars and wearing a wire bra before she was fully healed - against medical advice, despite having suffering from surgery going wrong previously. She later posted, as predicted by tattlers, about complications from surgery and having a “stitch abscess”
• Nelly goes to therapy apparently and will post about how down the sessions make her.
•In April 2022, Nelly went to a Fenty press event in London, but instead of documenting the event, she took selfies and left early because she was “scared”, “felt awkward” and “didn’t know what to do” but stated she felt “brave” for turning up
• She received a covid booster vaccination in April 2022 and proceeded to post three stories about how unwell she was alongside ambulance emojis.
• During the April bank holiday Nelly posted a tearful selfie about how miserable she was to not be out enjoying herself like other people, instead she’d been indoors napping and crying, and inferred this routinely happened to her over bam holidays but it was “fine” to feel this way. She did this again during the May bank holiday whilst also cuddling a picture of a dead family pet. She later got her boyfriend to film her looking “sad” at a supermarket pet food isle.
• Nelly filmed herself trying on jeans for content, complained about everything from the sizing to the changing rooms, then later claimed the experience made her feel exhausted and “defeated”
• She went on holiday for a few days in May 2022 and immediately posted about how “stressful” it was and how much anxiety she had over it. On a second holiday in June to Dubai, she posted about how “super fucking stressful” two holidays were along with a selfie about how difficult it was and how it was OK not to have fun on holiday, despite being fortunate enough to have multiple holidays during a cost of living crisis. She also complained about being too hot.
• “Butt surgery” after returning to Instagram after a self imposed break, Nelly proceeded to turn a fairly routine procedure and health concern, into a spiel of content. She had to have polyps removed in routine surgery, and took selfies and videos immediately before and after.
• During a Love Honey event in September 2022, B was dragged along under the premise of it being a “date” but nelly still ended up leaving shortly after arriving because of “sensory overload”. During another event for Gymshark, Nelly was condescending and negative, B had been dragged to this event too. She posted on her story about how she wasn’t happy with the event and would follow up with gymshark, but this was soon deleted and she never followed up.
• Nelly had what appeared to have been a minor skin break out which apparently required a GP trip and several days “off work” as it was “impetigo”. Nelly claims she suffers from this frequently but this was the first time she has mentioned it on Instagram, she claims it’s a result of feeling “run down” even though that’s not a medical cause for Impetigo.
• “flygate”: In December 2022, nelly appeared on her stories claiming a fly had gone into her head, whilst laughing and giggling. She then proceeded to go to A&E during an NHS crisis and during one of the busiest periods of the year. She spent two hours in A&E and instead of using that time to google for home remedies, instead she took selfies and pictures. When she was eventually triaged by a nurse, she took a selfie. The nurse told her to go home and put oil in her ear - something that a quick google search could have told Nelly from the offset. Tattlers suspect she either lied or went to A&E for attention and possibly to punish B for leaving her on her own, as he didn’t appear to be there when it happened.
• “travel anxiety” in early March 2023, nelly was invited to a PR event for Lizzo, invited by lizzo’s shapewear brand, Yitty. This involved flying to Berlin for one night. She showed messages she’d exchanged between friends, who wanted to go see Lizzo but couldn’t afford it. But since Nelly can’t go anywhere without her support pet, aka B, she dragged him alongside instead.
She proceeded to have a “panic attack” before boarding the plane, getting B to film it for her to post. She claimed BA air hostesses gave her snacks to help her, in reality it is standard in BA flights to hand out snacks to passengers.
Home account
nelly bought a flat in Brighton in January 2020. In July 2020, Nelly moved in, after ~6 months of renovation. Initially Nelly said it was affordable but then claimed to be concerned about how she’d afford to pay the mortgage and mentioned the possibility of having to rent out a room in one of her YT videos.
In May 2021 she moved into a flat she’d jointly purchased with boyfriend “B”
She responded to questions about her bizarre living arrangements and decisions:
When someone asking about her moving into the flat, she said she “lived by herself for such a long time” but in reality she had lived in her first flat for just a year.
Searching her name on companies house would suggest she never sold her old flat and she is still listed as being part of the residents association, whereas B is not.
She alluded to her parents moving into her old flat in September 2021 but the exact set up is unclear.
Relationships
Nelly had a boyfriend that she broke up with when she was 21, who was a dickhead apparently.
She met B in august 2017.
She first referenced him on her social media in a Valentine’s post in 2018.
She referenced him in other posts but he was actually pictured on her Instagram for the first time during a holiday to Dubai in September 2018. They bought a flat together in May 2021.
In august 2021 she posted about struggles with sexual intimacy related to body image issues. Tattlers noticed in December 2021 that Nelly referenced a separate bedroom for B and that only one side of her bed look slept in. Nelly later confirmed in Nov 2022 that they “sometimes” slept separately.
Examples of codependency include:
- nelly sitting at home waiting for him after baking a cake. She posted a selfie and she genuinely was just looking out of the window waiting for him
- After surgery she went for a short walk, cried and had to call him to collect her
- She got a flat tire and instead of just sorting it herself or taking herself to a café until the AA arrived, she called B to come get her.
- B has spoken about his mental health issues in the past, that combined with the weird interactions they have - make tattlers think that he gets validation from being “needed” by Nelly
- She doesn’t seem to have friends or to spend much time outside of her flat.
- During the May bank holiday B went out without Nelly and she proceeded to spend the weekend indoors crying, cuddling a picture of a dead family dog and claiming she planned to “sit in her sadness and do nothing”
- Nelly is defensive about her relationship with B and appears to post in response to what is said on tattle. Eg when she went on a break from Instagram, there was speculation she’d broken up with B. When she returned to Instagram she posted and mentioned him specifically
- Nelly dresses up PR/influencer events as a “date night” with B, but in reality it’s because she doesn’t like going to these events alone.
In July 2023, Nelly posted about how she didn’t deserve B and he was so cute because … he had her as a screensaver on his phone. She never actually talks about B as his own person or celebrates him beyond what he does for her.
this is despite the fact B seems to have a full and purposeful life outside of their relationship
https://www.basketballengland.co.uk/news/2023/i-m-proud-of-basketball-okoronkwo-representing-diversity-on-court-championing-it-off/
Eating disorder
Nelly has been open about her eating disorders.
She “stopped eating”’when she was 14 (~2007/2008) and suffered from an eating disorder for 6 years. By ~2014 she hasn’t left her house in around two years. Her body image was so poor she wouldn’t let anyone take pictures of her aged 17-18.
She suffered from anorexia and bulimia, as well as abusing laxatives. She seems to have gone through a period of underrating and then a period of rapid weight gain and laxative abuse/binge eating and then a period of underrating again.
She stopped weighing herself in 2014 and started her recovery around this time.
She wasn’t technically underweight and had to be “relentless” in order to access treatment.
Sartorial choices and fast fashion promotion
In August 2018 Nelly posted a sarky caption about messages she received telling her she wore lingerie that was cutting into her and too small. She had outgrown clothing in Nov 2019 and it would seem that Nelly’s shape had changed and she didn’t know how to dress for her size.
Nelly has built her brand and her account on fast fashion. She is aware of how damaging fast fashion is but continues to promote and endorse fast fashion brands.
Friendships
Nelly’s social anxieties seem to have impacted her ability to make and retain friends. She has referenced missing events due t anxieties, and has mentioned her circle of friends is very small.
The first time she posted a friend was a “bea” in Sept 2018 when they went to Friends Fest.
She then posted a night out with a female friend in June 2022
When tattlers had been mentioning how she didn’t seem to have friends, she met up with Max Hovey (a LBTQ body positive male influencer) in London in November. He is a friend apparently.
Collaborations
nelly has a history of hyping up collaborations, flogging them like crazy and then never mentioning them again. They are always the “best thing she has ever worn” the most “exciting” thing she has ever done and generally always a “10/10 amazing” but at the same time, she flogs the items she gets on Depop and rarely mentions these collabs after the relationship has ended.
Kalon Candle Co; Nelly collabed for “six months” on a nude candle set in Feb 2021 that were never mentioned again after
Vush: Nelly lost followers when she began advertising for Vush over a period of a couple of months, a vibrator brand that simultaneously collaborated with multiple influencers to get exposure for their product.
On the day Russia invaded Ukraine, tone def Nelly posted a vibrator ad and then complained about losing followers.
nelly dismissed people unfollowing by her as prudish and backward and “ashamed” of pleasure, instead of accepting that selling an overexposed sex toy wasn’t something most people wanted on their feed during an exceptionally dark and troubling time. Nelly claims to be progressive and open RE sexuality but only if it confirms to her ideas of what sexuality should be like, and in terms of when she has a product to shill.
She later backtracked saying it was ok to “stick around” if her followers wanted some normalcy, but “ok” if they didn’t.
AYM: nelly has a long-standing relationship with AYM and this resulted in an overpriced and poorly designed swimwear line in April 2021, which nelly claimed to have designed herself, but which haven’t been mentioned in the past year at all.
Modi bodi: In May 2021 Nelly started promoting Modi Bodi period pants and claimed to have been using them for 3 months at that time.
Estrid: since spring 2021, Nelly has plugged content for Estrid Razors, despite having used a laser removal for years, and claims the results in her legs are from razors when this can’t be true - see hypocrisies and lies.
Beauty Bay: Nelly has codes for Beauty Bay and frequently posts affiliated links under the guise of posting makeup guides.
