To those who went through PAM (Brain eating amoeba) fears, help please.

[HelloPanda23]

Okay, I've been going through PAM fears for about 3 weeks now, and it's honestly so problematic. I know you know if you have PAM or not about 12 days after you have been infected, and so each time, I've monitored myself. I first thought I had PAM because I snorted in a bit of pool water, even though that's practically impossible (chlorine). My second time was through tap water, someone was using a hose to wash away dirt on the floor, and some of it got onto my forehead. I assumed I didn't feel it and some got under my nose, and I snorted it in again. That proved to be wrong again, obviously, and so yesterday, I swam in my pool again, and even though I didn't snort in any water, I accidentally forgot to plug my nose while doing so. It was only one instance, and the pool is chlorinated so my chances are again, zero. Obviously, this isn't enough and so my "what if" thoughts have come into play. "What if the chlorine wasn't enough to kill the amoeba?" "What if...What if....What if..." It's terrible, and so I want to know how people got rid of this fear? Each time water gets close to my nose, I assume it has an amoeba in it, and that it went up my nostrils and is going to kill me soon. My only way to ensure I'm fine is to completely avoid getting water anywhere near my nose, and I want to know if that's the only way to stop being afraid. Any help will be appreciated.

[MyNameIsTerry]

I think it's great that you swam in there again rather than avoided doing so out of fear. Avoiding getting that water near your nose will only reinforce irrational beliefs that this is a legitimate fear.

Counter the "what ifs" with positive "what ifs", usually 3-5 of them.

"What if the chlorine wasn't enough...?"

Counter along the lines of...

"What if the chlorine was enough..."
"What if the water is completely safe"

Etc.

[HelloPanda23]

I think it's great that you swam in there again rather than avoided doing so out of fear. Avoiding getting that water near your nose will only reinforce irrational beliefs that this is a legitimate fear.

Counter the "what ifs" with positive "what ifs", usually 3-5 of them.

"What if the chlorine wasn't enough...?"

Counter along the lines of...

"What if the chlorine was enough..."
"What if the water is completely safe"

Etc.

I know, that's the exact reason I got in the pool in the first place. I'll try out the positive "what ifs", hopefully they help out a lot. Also, a thought that helps me is the fact that after swimming, I can still smell the chlorine on my body, and that my eyes hurt and get red when I open them underwater. That means there is a decent amount of chlorine. Thanks a lot though, I appreciate it.

[HelloPanda23]

Swam again today and even ended up snorting in a bit of water, lol. I’m going to stop letting my fears run me, and hopefully, this stupid thought that I can get a deadly infection through chlorinated salt water will leave me. I did a bit of research too, and it takes 4 hours for salt to kill amobeas, and my pool has a filtration system that runs around 9 hours or so a day; this filtration system adds in more chlorine and salt when necessary. Considering this, it’s absolutely impossible for me to get a brain eating amoeba from my pool. I’m so happy right now...

---------- Post added at 02:40 ---------- Previous post was at 02:39 ----------

I think it's great that you swam in there again rather than avoided doing so out of fear. Avoiding getting that water near your nose will only reinforce irrational beliefs that this is a legitimate fear.

Counter the "what ifs" with positive "what ifs", usually 3-5 of them.

"What if the chlorine wasn't enough...?"

Counter along the lines of...

"What if the chlorine was enough..."
"What if the water is completely safe"

Etc.

Honestly, thank you so much. The positive counters helped me a lot. Feeling much happier than I was yesterday, and I even swam today and got water up my nose. I really appreciate your advice.

[MyNameIsTerry]

Brilliant!

Not everyone can get positive affirmations, countering, etc to work for them so if you can that's a good sign you would be receptive to therapy.

Use of positive language is interesting and I've read where the stronger the negative the more positives are needed to counter them. There is some interesting information out there about study of these areas.

So few of these brain amoeba threads seem to follow through into beating them and I hope others see what you are doing and how you are getting through it.

[HelloPanda23]

Brilliant!

Not everyone can get positive affirmations, countering, etc to work for them so if you can that's a good sign you would be receptive to therapy.

Use of positive language is interesting and I've read where the stronger the negative the more positives are needed to counter them. There is some interesting information out there about study of these areas.

So few of these brain amoeba threads seem to follow through into beating them and I hope others see what you are doing and how you are getting through it.

The thing is, I feel as though the sufferers onyl have this fear for 2 weeks. It takes 2 weeks for the infection to completely start, and so people wait and if nothing happens, they move on to another fear. I just don't understand how they still aren't super afraid of getting water near there noses. I read one about someone being scared of aquarium water getting in their nose, and so they probably avoided getting near the water again, and bam, what's there to be afraid of? Another was afraid of getting it from a pool, and so now they probably either wear a nose clip, or plug their nose each time they go underwater. No more fear. The thing with my fear is it that it's insanely irrational. When my fear first started, I got afraid of pool water again, and once that was done, I revolved around getting it from tap water. I live in LA, and the water is very well treated and checked on a daily basis. It'd be impossible for it to lead towards my death, and so even though i knew it was stupid, I still feared it. I don't know it's weird. My mind is so afraid of this brain eating amoeba that regardless of whether I know for a fact I don't have it, I'll still fear it. My only other way to lose this fear is to move onto something else, and frankly, nothing scares me more than a amoeba eating my brain and killimg me; at least as of rn. Oh and yes, I was surprised as well. The positive affirmations really helped out a lot, idk out. Affirmations never really worked super well for me, so I was very amazed by the fact that it helped. I even used subliminal messages a while back and they weren't even as helpful. Either way, thanks once again and I'll try and keep this thread updated to help others going through the same thing as me.

[Fishmanpa]

As totally irrational and unrealistic as this fear is, I've been around the boards and have seen this fear manifest itself in many members. It's up there in irrationality with rabies and SFI. The numbers just don't lie nor do the facts. What DOES lie is your anxiety and you're being taken for a ride here.

Do you believe those emails that say a Nigerian Prince left you $10 million dollars? It's ridiculous right? This is just like that. Will someone get scammed? Yep... Will someone, sometime, somewhere in the world get this? Probably. Will it be you who swam in a chlorinated pool or uses chlorinated city water? NOPE!

Unfortunately, beyond that, I don't know what anyone could say to put this fear to bed. This is something that a real life mental health professional can help you with.

Positive thoughts

[KK77]

Do you believe those emails that say a Nigerian Prince left you $10 million dollars?

Who be this so-called "Nigerian Prince" and where be the $10million?

[HelloPanda23]

Thank you FishManpa for the reassurance.

UPDATE:
Today, I was taking a shower and instead of avoiding getting water near my nose, I didn't care and even got a bit inside of it. I sneezed in the shower and cleaned it off with water, and so I'm stopping my fearful behavior of avoiding water getting near my nose. Before this fear started, I'd always clean my nose in the shower, and nothing happend for 5 years, and so I doubt anything will happen now. Especially since I use chlorinated city water from LA, which is checked daily. I really think this fear will be put to bed as long as I keep using exposure instead of avoidance. I truly think that avoiding water getting near my nose was the reason that regardless of how much logic I put into it, I still thought I was in danger of PAM. If I'm not in danger, why would I avoid getting water near my nose? Exactly. I'll keep you all updated.

[MyNameIsTerry]

You are doing really well.

Avoidance only ever builds fear when we avoid out of irrational fear. In therapy we are taught to change avoidance into healthy adaptive behaviours.

How do you feel before, during and after? Is the anxiety always there or does it come at certain points in the process?

Exposure therapy is incredibly hard so be proud of yourself for facing your fears and continuing to challenge those irrational beliefs that have been built. It takes time to change or adapt core beliefs as the fear system is meant to build lasting fears so it responds more slowly to "oh, that's a tame bear, I think I'll stroke him" as opposed to "where's my spear, CHARGE!" or "argh, ruuuunnnnn!"