Lauren Wasser Details Her Emotional Journey to Embracing Self-Love and Acceptance

The 2024 SI Swimsuit rookie and toxic shock syndrome survivor is a proud women’s health advocate.

Lauren Wasser was photographed by Derek Kettela in Belize. / Derek Kettela/Sports Illustrated

Lauren Wasser experienced the unimaginable in 2012 when she contracted toxic shock syndrome. After using a tampon as instructed, the way she always had, she developed flu-like symptoms, which led to her suffering kidney failure and two heart attacks. Since then, Wasser has been using her platform to advocate for women’s health issues and educate people on the intricacies of feminine hygiene products.

This month, the 36-year-old is featured as a rookie in SI Swimsuit’s 60th anniversary edition, which is marked with the tagline “Be Legendary.” The magazine features longtime brand icons, and while this is Wasser’s appearance in the issue, her story certainly is legendary.

Losing her identity

Wasser grew up as an athlete, playing basketball her whole life: it was her “first love,” she says. After contracting toxic shock syndrome, the Los Angeles resident was given less than one percent chance of survival. When she woke up in the hospital after having been put in a medically induced coma, she developed gangrene and made the difficult decision to have her right leg amputated. Six years later, having suffered constant pain, she also had her left one removed.

“It’s been a journey, losing my identity, the entire person that I was before this,” Wasser says while on location with photographer Derek Kettela in Belize. As the daughter of models Pamela Cook and Robert Wasserburger, Wasser grew up seeing beauty and perfection in “only one way.”

Losing her legs felt like the end of not only her love for being active but also for her modeling career—which began when she posed for Italian Vogue with her mom at just 2 months old.

“I’ve [lost] something I can’t hide. I can’t just cover it up. It’s something that I need,” she says. “And then to be able to come from that darkness and make it cool and badass and futuristic and swaggy, I think is definitely [influenced by] God. It’s something that I can’t explain, but it’s taken a really long time to get here.”

Lauren Wasser was photographed by Derek Kettela in Belize. Swimsuit by Svn Swim. / Derek Kettela/Sports Illustrated

Regaining confidence and independence

Wasser is candid about the fact that she was in a “dark place” for a very long time, and it took a lot of inner work and reflection to pull herself out of that hole. She explored prosthetics and decided they were key to regaining her independence. 

Over the past few years, Wasser has posed for Giorgio Armani, closed a runway show for Louis Vuitton, graced the cover of CR Fashion Book and been named “Woman of the Year” by Glamour Germany. The last several years of Wasser’s career have been surreal, to say the least, and she’s accomplished goals that her 24-year-old self never imagined being possible.

“I put in a lot of f - - - - - - work on myself, inside and out, and that’s what a lot of people don’t do. They don’t do the work. They just expect the results. That’s not how things actually happen,” explains Wasser about learning to love herself and her body again, while simultaneously reworking her definition of beauty. “You gotta really work out, and motivate yourself, and want better for yourself, and really believe in who you are, and [know that] there’s only one you, and that’s what makes you unique and special.”

Being active

Being able to exercise and resume her favorite activities like running, swimming and Pilates was a game-changer for Wasser. She is also aware that it’s a huge privilege to be able to have the use of prosthetics (shiny gold ones, inspired by her favorite rapper A$AP Rocky’s gold teeth). She gives a special shout-out to Össur Prosthetics and Peter Harsch Prosthetics for helping her return to the athlete she once was. “Rediscovering” that side of herself has been an incredible and “beautiful journey,” she shares.

“I don’t know what I would do if I couldn’t be active and be who I am,” she says. “Hiking, Pilates, running,  swimming, everything and anything I can do. There’s nothing off-limits and [I have to] definitely credit my team that gives me that. Being an athlete is so important to me. Because being able to move your body [is] being able to feel free.”

Read more about Lauren Wasser’s 2024 SI Swimsuit photo shoot here.