In a video that’s already racked up 2.7 million views and counting, Ruth Codd – the foul-mouthed Irish firecracker who had the nation howling on BBC’s Celebrity Traitors – delivered the kind of health update that stops you dead in your scroll: “I’ve just had my second below-knee amputation.”

Filmed in the cozy chaos of her childhood bedroom, the 29-year-old actress propped herself up on pillows, wheelchair parked like a trusty sidekick, and cracked open the news with the trademark wit that’s made her a TikTok titan. “Good news: we’ve had a full-circle moment. I’m back making TikTok content in my parents’ house,” she grinned, her Wexford lilt cutting through the vulnerability like a warm Guinness. “Bad news: I can’t do it in front of that lovely blue floral wallpaper anymore… because that room is upstairs. And those facilities? Not available to me at the current moment in time.”

She paused, letting the weight land, then flashed her million-watt smile. “No legs, who dis?” The caption read like a battle cry: “#paralympics2026”. By the time the credits rolled – complete with a cheeky reveal of her new wheels, dubbed “Fat Tony” – the comments section was a battlefield of broken hearts and belly laughs. “Bologna amputation? Ruth, you’re killing me,” one fan typed, riffing on the auto-caption glitch that turned “below-knee” into something far less surgical. “Sorry to hear about your second bologna,” another quipped. But beneath the memes, the love poured in: “You’re a warrior queen. Cry-laughing and sobbing simultaneously.”

For Ruth, the decision wasn’t a plot twist in her already cinematic life story – it was the sequel she knew was coming. It all kicked off at 15, in a moment so absurdly mundane it could only happen to someone destined for the spotlight. “I was just messing around in school and fell over playing soccer,” she recounted in a 2022 Teen Vogue interview, her voice dripping with that signature self-deprecating charm. “Which is the worst part because I don’t even like soccer. At least I could have gone out in a blaze of glory doing something I loved – but no!”

What started as a playground tumble spiraled into a decade-long nightmare. The break wouldn’t heal. Ulcers bloomed like weeds. Eight surgeries followed, each one a temporary Band-Aid on a wound that refused to close. Nerve damage clawed at her days, chronic pain hijacked her nights. By 23, crutches were her constant companion, and the girl who once galloped horses across Irish fields was trapped in a body that felt like a prison. “My whole life revolved around trying to heal my leg,” she said. “At that age, you think you’re unstoppable… and then you learn, a bit too young, that sometimes life doesn’t really work out the way you thought it would.”

The first amputation, below the knee on her right leg, was a reckoning – and a rebirth. “It took eight years of my life, constantly going in and out of hospital,” Ruth reflected. Freed from the crutches, she dove headfirst into TikTok, her videos a riot of irreverent storytelling: ghost hunts in abandoned asylums, makeup tutorials with a side of medieval history, and monologues that blended Irish folklore with millennial angst. “I went viral for being a one-legged ghost hunter,” she laughed in a recent podcast. “Who knew disability chic was the new black?”

Hollywood came calling fast. Netflix scooped her up for The Midnight Club, where she played Anya, a terminally ill teen with her own prosthetic – art imitating life in the most meta way possible. Then came The Fall of the House Usher, Mike Flanagan’s gothic fever dream, where Ruth’s character sported a gleaming artificial leg that fans now realize was no prop at all. “Her artificial leg shown in House of Usher and The Midnight Club is really an artificial leg!” one Reddit thread exploded this week, with users piecing together the breadcrumbs like amateur detectives. “She chose to amputate after years of pain from the initial injury. Badass doesn’t even cover it.”

This year, Ruth traded horror sets for reality TV gold. On Celebrity Traitors – the BBC’s star-studded spin on the betrayal bonanza – she strutted into Ardross Castle as a Faithful, her prosthetic hidden under killer heels, her suspicions laser-sharp. Viewers watched her grill Jonathan Ross in episode four, her Wexford brogue slicing through the posh paranoia like a hot knife through butter. “You’re too smiley, mate. Traitor vibes all day,” she declared, before the black cloaks came for her in the dead of night. “Murdered” early, but unforgettable – Ruth became the show’s breakout, her TikTok confessionals (“If I survive this, I’m burning that castle down”) spawning memes that outlived the series.

But fame’s glitter couldn’t mask the storm brewing in her left leg. Years of hobbling on crutches had taken their toll: joints ground to dust, toes already amputated in a 2021 surgery she breezed past with a single Instagram post – “Sorry I disappeared, was busy getting my toes amputated and learning how to crochet.” By early 2025, the pain was a roar she could no longer ignore. “With the second one, it was just the same situation,” she explained in her TikTok update, voice steady but eyes telling a different story. “My quality of life – it’s never going to get any better from this point. They can only stop it from getting worse.”

The surgery happened last week, wielded by the same surgeon who freed her right leg six years ago. “It’s like déjà vu,” Ruth joked from her hospital bed, surrounded by the family that’s always been her anchor. Now, she’s home in Wexford, bunkered down with Mum, Dad, and little brother Luke – the same housing estate crew that raised a girl who turned hardship into horsepower. Recovery’s a grind: three to four days in hospital, a month of healing before a new prosthetic can even be fitted. “The stump has to knit itself back together,” she said matter-of-factly. “No rushing a Viking warrior’s comeback.”

Yet even in the haze of pain meds, Ruth’s humor is her shield – and her sword. She wheeled out “Fat Tony” with a flourish: “This is my new whip. Faster than any prosthetic, and it doesn’t pinch.” Fans flooded her with Paralympics jokes (“Tokyo 2020 called – they want their gold back”), custom wheelchair designs, and outright sobs. “Guys, stop being nice to me – it’s weirding me out,” she replied to one outpouring, but the emoji hearts gave her away.

For Ruth, this isn’t defeat; it’s declaration. She’s already plotting her return: a horror project greenlit for 2026, where she’ll play a double-amputee assassin (“Think Uma Thurman, but with better one-liners”). And on TikTok? Expect ghost hunts from a chair, crochet tutorials mid-rehab, and rants about why “bologna amputation” needs to be a thing. “Life’s a traitor sometimes,” she signed off her video. “But I’m the faithful one who always comes back swinging.”

In a world that loves its underdogs polished and painless, Ruth Codd is the raw, roaring reminder that true power isn’t in the legs you stand on – it’s in the fire that keeps you moving, no matter how. As she wheels toward whatever’s next, one thing’s certain: Hollywood’s got a storm coming. And her name’s Ruth – no legs required.