She Faked a Pregnancy with a Reborn Doll – Then It Got Worse

A gender reveal party, hospital photos, and a newborn named Bonnie Leigh – everything seemed real until someone walked into the wrong room.

Listen to “She Faked a Pregnancy with a Reborn Doll – Then It Got Worse” on Spreaker.

Someone in Scotland just pulled off a pregnancy that fooled family, friends, and her boyfriend for nine months straight. The gender reveal party went off without a hitch. Baby gifts piled up in preparation for the arrival. Then October 10, 2025 rolled around, and 23-year-old Kira Cousins from Airdrie, near Glasgow, announced the birth of her daughter, Bonnie-Leigh Joyce Gardner, born at 2:46 in the morning, weighing 5 pounds 4 ounces.

The only problem? Bonnie-Leigh wasn’t real.

The Announcement

Cousins began sharing her pregnancy news around February 2025. Her friend Neave McRobert watched it all unfold through texts and social media posts. For months, Cousins shared pregnancy updates online, including bump photos, scan pictures, and videos showing the baby kicking. Friends threw Cousins a gender reveal party complete with pink smoke, cake, and decorations.

Family and friends bought gifts, clothes, and even a pram worth £1,000. The ultrasound images looked legitimate. The growing belly appeared convincing.

Setting Up a Medical Crisis

A couple weeks after the gender reveal party, Cousins posted that the baby had a hole in its heart. She claimed her daughter had an atrioventricular septal defect and would require open-heart surgery. The posts thanked midwives and sonographers. She asked everyone to respect the privacy of both families during this difficult time.

McRobert later said she believes Cousins was setting up the story for a future announcement that the baby died during birth.

The Birth Announcement

On October 10, Cousins claimed she gave birth alone in the middle of the night. She shared pictures on social media announcing the arrival. One post featured the doll wrapped in blankets with the caption “All warm and wrapped up today, equally as cute”. She shared images of her leaving the hospital with baby Bonnie-Leigh in a car seat.

Cousins sent McRobert a video of Bonnie-Leigh strapped into a car seat. McRobert said Cousins didn’t let anyone touch the baby, not even her, but they thought she was just being an overprotective mother.

The Visit

Three days after the alleged birth, Cousins texted McRobert saying she needed to get out of the house. McRobert picked her up, and Cousins handled everything herself.

They drove to Cousins’s workplace so she could show Bonnie-Leigh to her coworkers. After that, they visited McRobert’s mother. Cousins even showed them the special underwear she had for postpartum bleeding.

McRobert later explained it was difficult to tell Bonnie-Leigh was actually a doll. Reborn dolls are handcrafted by artists to look hyper-realistic, with hand-rooted hair, weighted bodies, and painted features that mimic newborn skin tones and textures.

The Discovery

Cousins’s mother entered her room and found that the baby was not real.

In her own TikTok response, Cousins described how her mother stormed into the room, found the doll, and shouted downstairs. Family members assembled at the house, and Cousins sat against her door, refusing to come down and face them.

When Cousins brought the doll to Jamie’s parents’ house, his mother immediately pointed out that Bonnie-Leigh was a doll. Cousins insisted the baby was real and sick with mucus. McRobert said Cousins claimed this because the baby couldn’t be taken in for a DNA test if she was sick.

The Aftermath

Messages allegedly sent by Cousins to Jamie surfaced online, showing her telling him that “something happened to Bonnie-Leigh” before later stating that “Bonnie-Leigh died”. In the texts, Jamie appeared confused and demanded answers, saying he had been “left in the dark for long enough”.

In a TikTok addressing the situation, Cousins confirmed that her family and Jamie had no idea what was going on. She said she had been keeping herself away from everyone, going into her own bubble and not wanting anyone around her at all. She mentioned that her family sat her down and asked what had happened earlier in her pregnancy, which she said she would address when ready.

Online discussions revealed claims that Cousins had done this before, with rumors suggesting she faked a pregnancy and used a doll as recently as 2023, and also allegedly lied about having cancer.

McRobert’s response was blunt. She said Cousins doesn’t need help – she needs jail.

No official records of a birth or death have been produced, and no hospital or local authority has confirmed that an infant matching Cousins’ description ever existed.

About Reborn Dolls

Reborn dolls are created by artists who transform manufactured doll kits into lifelike babies. They’re meant for collectors, people coping with loss, individuals who can’t have children, or those who simply appreciate the artistry.

Full-body silicone babies typically range in price from $500 to $2,000. They’re weighted to feel like real infants. Some can be purchased with mechanisms that simulate breathing. Others have magnetic mouths that hold pacifiers.

The story spread across TikTok in October 2025, with millions of views on videos explaining what happened. Cousins has since deleted most of her videos but posted one statement attempting to clarify that none of the families involved knew what was happening. She asked people not to direct hate toward either family or specifically toward Jamie.

References

NOTE: Some of this content may have been created with assistance from AI tools, but it has been reviewed, edited, narrated, produced, and approved by Darren Marlar, creator and host of Weird Darkness — who, despite popular conspiracy theories, is NOT an AI voice.