A tampon. That was all it took to change Lauren Wasser’s life forever. In October 2012, at 24, the American model contracted toxic shock syndrome, suffered a massive heart attack, and developed gangrene. Doctors amputated her right leg almost immediately. She managed to keep the left one for six more years, until it too was amputated in 2018.
What came next was not retirement or silence. Wasser turned her metal prosthetics into a symbol: she had them made in gold, showed them without hesitation, and built a new identity from there. She has been on the cover of Vogue, Glamour, and Harper’s Bazaar. In 2023, Glamour Germany named her Woman of the Year. And in May 2026, at 38, she made her debut at the Met Gala at New York’s Metropolitan Museum of Art in a short gold lamé suit designed by Prabal Gurung — her golden legs fully on display.
Today she is also an activist for the safety of menstrual products and an advocate for the Robin Danielson Act in the United States, which calls for research into the chemical risks in those kinds of items. The very same object that nearly killed her is now at the center of her cause.