My Tumor is Disintegrating, So Why Am I Not Celebrating or Calming Down?

My experience with a rare disease — part seven

Rachel D Adams
5 min readMar 7, 2024

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My pic right after the last injection and scan. Selfie by Rachel Adams.

Everyone in my life has been wonderful while I deal with the ins and outs of scheduling treatments over two hours away from my home. They have been keeping my happiness level pretty high and my outlook so far has been the best it could possibly be. I’m knocking on wood as I type this.

For those of you that don’t know, in many cultures, it’s a common superstition for people to knock their knuckles on a piece of wood to bring themselves good fortune or ward off bad luck. It’s especially done after you say something about good fortune — to keep the “evil spirits” from hearing you and then doing their best to cause you bad fortune.

I knock on wood a lot. I also make fun of myself and knock on my head. It’s just a thing.

But…it doesn’t mean I wade confidently into the future once I’ve made the knock. Every few months, my insides get tied in knots, wondering if this time will bring the scan with the marker for lesions indicated. Every few months, I once again dread the preparation for and then the actual injection into my eyeball.

But you know what? It’s really not even that part that gets me the most. It’s realizing that every time I use my eye for…

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Rachel D Adams

(she/her/pan) I’m not a well-behaved woman. I am an ally, amateur photog, content creator, novelist, empty nester, traveler, wife, & friend.