“The past 11 months have been a blur. Thankfully, Lochlan [Rachel’s baby] wanted to come early and we had a very easy induction so I could get on the medication I needed. I had to take a cancer drug and get blood work done every two weeks to make sure I wouldn’t go into renal failure. In addition, I had to put chlorohexidine/PHMB into my eye every hour around the clock for 3 months. My parents moved in with us to help with the drops and our precious Lochlan since he was just born,” she shared.
“For months, the most sleep I got at a time was 30 minutes. I had 5 different around the clock drops, that had to be taken 5 minutes apart. My infection (which turned into a disease) was so bad, I was in danger of losing my eye. Had my parents and Cameron [Rachel’s husband] not been fully committed to getting me through this, I would have without a doubt lost it. I wasn’t able to do any drops myself as I was blind (and have been since June 2023) and in excruciating pain. The pain that comes with Acanthamoeba Kerititis makes giving birth look like a walk in the freaking park. The pain was absolutely unreal. I try not to remember it,” she reflected.
“In September, I got much worse, and we began seeing Dr Tu in Chicago as he is one of the only doctors in the US who really knows how to treat this. Him and my wonderful doctor here in Austin have tagteamed my recovery and I feel so blessed to have such a dream team of doctors helping me. My disease has such a bad outcome usually no doctors will touch it. I always say doctors who treat AK are saints,” insists Rachel.
“In November, I noticed the pain begin to subside and asked to get off all the pain meds I was taking. I weaned myself off of them and the pain never came back. I had to continue hourly drops to continue to kill this amoeba. In January, we noticed the tide was turning in my favour. I had an open defect on my eye (you can see it in the first picture) and my wonderful Austin doctor recommended doing an Amniotic membrane in my eye to help heal it. That’s actually a part of a placenta – how amazing right?! After three of those, my eye fully healed and things started to get much, much better. I had FINALLY turned the corner,” she explained.
“A few months ago, my doctors decided it was time for the test of my eye – to actually prove the amoebas aren’t there. So they took me off the Chlorohexidine/PHMB drops and watched me very closely for signs of their return. Every weekly doctor visit proved over and over that these amoebas are gone. I’m still blind – the damage the amoebas did to my cornea is irreversible – but the amazing thing is that underneath my cornea, my eye is healthy,” Rachel said.
As for her cornea transplant, the future is looking optimistic. Rachel explained “my vision should slowly return. But, she implores, “please send this to every person you know who wears contacts. I had no idea this was even a remote risk.”
For more from GLAMOUR’s Senior Beauty Editor, Elle Turner, follow her on Instagram @elleturneruk
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