Originally Posted by
veteranworrier
Hi all,
Really hoping you can talk some sense into me. For the past two weeks I've had a sore throat. The lack of any other symptoms (no cold/fever) is what's worrying me. I've never had JUST a sore throat for this long, and it may sound trivial but my mind is going haywire, ruining every single day, I've even had to take days off work because I keep going to Dr Google for endless paranoia-inducing searches argh.
The first three or four days, it was only sore when I drank hot tea/coffee, but since then it's become a more-or-less constant, dull ache. A kind of dry/raw/sore throat feeling. I keep having to drink water because it's so dry, and I'm also clearing my throat of mucus a lot.
I did go to my doctor, she felt my throat and inspected mouth and said there are no nasty lumps or signs of infection. She suggested it MIGHT be silent reflux, but even she didn't sound sure about that, and I don't have any other signs of reflux, so I don't want to start taking medication for that.
All I can think of is that, one day before the sore throat started, I violently cleared my throat for a prolonged period (about five minutes of clearing my throat). Could that have maybe torn/strained something? But would that really cause a sore throat lasting this long?
Help, please! My mind keeps going to throat cancer and I can't bear this obsessive mental agony. I know from reading other posts on here that throat cancer doesn't typically announce itself with a sore throat, but too much Dr Googling has made me crazy. Btw I'm 38, male. Help!