Facebook bans Rochester breast cancer survivor's photo Published duration 8 March 2011

image caption Ms Tullett said she had only intended to offer encouragement to fellow breast cancer sufferers

A breast cancer survivor's Facebook page has been blocked after she published a photo of her reconstructed breasts following her operation.

Melissa Tullett, from Rochester, Kent, put the picture on the website after she had a double mastectomy.

The social networking site blocked her page and removed the image because it said it broke its rules on nudity.

Ms Tullett said she had only intended to offer encouragement to fellow breast cancer sufferers.

"It was to show other women that after such an ordeal you can come out of it with your dignity and your womanhood again, and that it's not all frightening," she said.

She said she had not realised that she had done anything wrong and only wanted people to feel positive about it.

'Showed tattoos'

"They [Facebook] just told me that I'd uploaded a photo that violated their terms of use and that they were deleting the photo.

"But they didn't actually tell me they were disabling my account," she added.

Ms Tullett's page has since been reactivated, but she has been told not to repost the picture.

"It was showing my actual tattoos, because my nipples have had to be tattooed on," she said.

Facebook said its guidelines respected the views of a wide range of people and were designed to ensure the site remained a safe, secure and trusted environment for everyone, including children over the age of 13.

It said the image was removed because it contained nudity - not because of the nature of the nudity in question.

It said it reinstated Ms Tullett's profile as the content had been deleted.