One-legged builder who lost his limb to cancer spreads hope to other amputees with joyful TikTok dance videos

An inspiring builder who lost his leg due to cancer has become a source of hope for hundreds of thousands of people after sharing joyful dance videos on TikTok.

Builder Jack Wells, 32, from Canvey Island, Essex, is now cancer free after beating the condition twice – and though he uses a prosthetic left leg while working on site, he mainly “hopples around” at home and shares that with his 250,000 followers.

First struck with leukaemia at just seven years old, when he faced chemotherapy, full-body radiotherapy and a bone marrow transplant from his brother, Jack seemed in the clear until at 28 a biopsy of tissue taken from his aching left knee showed he had cancer again.

This time, all but four inches of Jack’s leg was amputated in January 2019 because it was the quickest and easiest way to remove the cancer.

Jack, who is married to Jessica, 30, a one-to-one support for special needs children, said: “It was definitely worse the second time around.

“I was a lot more aware of what was going on.”

He added: “When I was seven and had the leukaemia, my parents took on the role of listening to the doctors and kind of fed back information to me.

“Whereas obviously, once you’re an adult, you have to take on that information and make the decisions for yourself.

“Mentally, to get your head around it – it was a lot harder.”

But when Jack heard he was going to lose his leg, his strongest emotion was relief.

He said: “By that point, the cancer had spread up my leg more, hence why I’m now left with not much more than a stump.

“Before they told me, I already had a gut feeling that that’s what is going to happen, so I was more relieved than anything. I was so ready to just eliminate the pain.”

Six weeks after the amputation at the Royal National Orthopaedic Hospital in Middlesex, Jack got his first prosthetic leg fitted.

“I didn’t really know what to think and I struggled more with the physical appearance to start with.

“When I first saw myself in the mirror, it was quite a shock to the system of what was looking back at me,” he said, adding: “It wasn’t a bad image but you were used to seeing yourself with two legs rather than one.”

But Jack didn’t dwell for long.

“I was out of bed quickly, trying to walk again, so there was always a lot going on to keep my mind occupied,” he said.

“I don’t ever remember feeling too down about it, I was always quite positive and just focused on getting back on my feet – or foot.”

Several physiotherapy sessions a week for three months helped him with his recovery but learning to use his prosthetic leg was tough.

He said: “It was ridiculously hard. It’s extremely painful to start with and allowing yourself to put weight on the prosthetic leg and gaining the resilience as well as confidence and balance to walk on it was really hard when I first got given the leg.”

By June 2019, Jack was walking again unaided.

Soon after, in August 2019, he went back to work as a general builder, doing domestic property extensions – a job he had been doing since he was 16.

Jack said: “At work, I’ve been really fortunate that they were very accommodating.

“The idea originally was for me to go more into an office role, but that wasn’t what I wanted to do – soon after, it was very hands on again.”

He added: “It’s all domestic stuff we do, so we work on people’s houses, rather than actual building sites.”

At work, he found it “quite awkward” to get in certain positions like kneeling down for long periods of time, or carrying building materials while walking on crutches with one leg.

Hence he decided to use his prosthetic leg during his 8.5-hour shifts from Monday to Friday.

But at home he found it better to take it off and “hop around”, use crutches sometimes to move from room to room, and go up and downstairs on his bum.

“I find it a lot easier to do things for a longer period of time without the leg on, as it’s quite tiring to wear it. So usually when I take my shoes off, I take the leg off as well,” he said.

During the first lockdown, Jack and Jessica, who he has been married to for nine years, discovered TikTok and enjoyed watching videos together while shielding at home.

And when Jessica filmed Jack doing a 15-second TikTok dance to Blinding Lights by The Weekend, the video got over half a million views within a day.

Jack said: “It made me feel good, getting that sort of level of likes and all that comes along with it, like a lot of positive comments.

“People said ‘this is incredible’ and ‘well done’.”

For the next two years, Jack mainly posted dance videos and, as well as giving himself lots of enjoyment, he realised he was spreading hope to others.

“The longer I did it, I slowly was getting messages from other amputees that have lost a limb or some that were due to lose a limb, who were finding some form of comfort and advice through talking to me,” he reflected.

“I realised I can actually make a real difference with my TikTok account. I seem to be putting a positive spin on it for a lot of people.”

Earlier this year he decided to start uploading snippets from his daily life too, filming himself digging holes and sharing a video compilation of pictures showing his recovery.

He said: “The amputation hasn’t altered my life that much, not as much as some people might think.

“I feel the same as I did before. Yes, there are certain things I have to adapt, like moving around the house or hopping around without spilling my cup of tea, but generally I’ve gone semi back to normal.”

Jack said he is a big believer in things happening for a reason.

“I think the more I discovered how using my TikTok potentially helps other people, I kind of feel in a strange way that losing my leg was something that was meant to happen to me.”

Cancer-free since the amputation, Jack is now dreaming of starting a family with Jessica, who has been his “biggest support” through everything.

He said: “We’ve always said the whole experience of losing my leg and my cancer has made us so much stronger.

“My leukaemia when I was younger left me infertile and we are potentially looking at going through some IVF treatment – that’s yet another sort of journey we want to go on together.”

To follow Jack’s life, visit: www.linktr.ee/1legdancer