Hello!

[SuedeFan]

Hi folks,

I am so glad to have found this place. For the past eight and a half years I have been suffering from what I now know are anxiety symptoms. I do not wish to bore you with all the details, but to cut a long story short, in 1997 I was scratched by a cat while on holiday in France. On my return to England I had a dose of the 'flu. I went to the doctor and learnt that rabies could be transmited by a scratch. Since I was a kid I have had a phobia about rabies.

Bingo! For the last eight and a half years I have been convinced that I had the most improbable of diseases. I even 'phoned the Gite owners in France and got them to confirm that the cat was still alive. It was. But that did not help. As I learnt from the dreaded Google, symptoms of rabies include tingling around the sight of the wound, in my case my right foot, and muscle twitching. I have had all of this, and more, including "head zaps". I now appreciate that these are symptoms of general anxiety. My doctor told me this eight and a half years ago, but did I believe him?!

I only wish I had found this place many years ago ...

Andy

PS. Apparently, the maximum time from exposure to the rabies virus to death in a human patient is seven and a half year, but you never know ;)

[nomorepanic]

Andy

Welcome aboard.

Ok so let's put this in perspective. You do not have rabies. You would have had loads of symptoms before now.

Head zaps - read these ....


Head Shocks! (http://www.nomorepanic.co.uk/showthread.php?t=2754)
Weird Head sensations and Panic (http://www.nomorepanic.co.uk/showthread.php?t=3547)
Shocks in head (http://www.nomorepanic.co.uk/showthread.php?t=5897)

Health anxiety read this ...

Health Anxiety (http://www.nomorepanic.co.uk/NMPcms.php?nmppage=healthanxiety)

You have to accept that you are not going to die after 8.5 years ago and you must move on or it will drive you mad.

Hope we can reassure you anyway.

Nicola

[seh1980]

Welcome aboard!! :D

"If life were simple, word would have got around"

[trac67]

Hi Andy,

Welcome to the forum, you will get a lot of good advice here and make some new friends.

take care

Trac xx

'Live your life with arms wide open, today is where your book begins, the rest is still unwritten'

[jackie]

well done for finding it now andy. i found it weeks ago and feel the same as you. you will get lots from the people here, just hollar if you need help, jackie

[Karen]

Hi Andy

Welcome to the forum.

You'll find a lot of help and support here.



Karen



Happiness is not a state to arrive at but a manner of travelling.

[clickaway]

Hi Andy and welcome to the site.

Maybe, like me, you have various symptoms that "rotate" in shifts. And guess what the latest one is? Yep, tingling in my right foot :D

I train myself to realise that it is only anxiety in various ways.

1. It tends to come on at set times of the day
2. Since I've had it, my muscle spasms have reduced so it seems to have taken the place of them
3. They intensify even when I have a 'niggling' thought
4. They have not got any worse.
5. When I go out and enjoy myself, they go away.

Try to accept that it is anxiety and that will help you in your recovery.

Take Care,


Ray

And when you get the choice to sit it out or dance, I hope you dance.
~Mark Sanders and Tia Sillers

[feege]

Hi Andy

Welcome to the site - you are in the right place! So many helpful and positive people and ideas - it helps so much to know you are not alone!

Good luck xxxx

fee
xx

[tracyp584]

Hey Andy,

Welcome to the site!

Take care,

tracy x x



Every time you avoid your fears they become stronger,every time you face your fears they become weaker.

[jill]

Hi Andy

WELOCME TO THE SITE :D

There are lots of nice people here who will help and suport you.

TAKE CARE

LOVE JILLXX


When you fear something,
learn as much about it as you can.
Knowledg conquers fear.

[Ma Larkin]

Hi Andy, I don't know much about Rabies, wouldn't something have happened by now? Eight & a half years is such a long time & now you know the cat is still alive has that not eased the worry a bit? Isn't it awful that something like this can happen & we spend the rest of our lives worrying about it, even though it could be really trivial & no harm has been done at all. I suffer from health anxiety in a big way, it brings on panic attacks but I went to be assessed for CBT & the counsellor said "Les, if there was something wrong with your heart, you'd be dead by now" Even though I know this is true, I still think there is something wrong, which makes me worry, then panic & i'm back to square one again. I was doing really well & then suffered a setback last night. I know its easier said than done saying please try not to worry about it but you'll find loads of good information on this site which will make you realise that its more common than you think. A problem shared & all that!

Take care, Les

[SuedeFan]

Thank you all for your kind words,

I am now 100% confident that I do not have rabies - for at least 99% of the time. As anyone suffering from health anxiety will know, one can be rational for most of the time, but every now and then something will happen to throw one off kilter.

Within two weeks of returning home from France I called the gite owner to ask about the cat that scratched me. Using my best schoolboy French, I even described it as a "grey kitten". They told me they had a "grey kitten" and that it was alive and well. Moreover, they told me that rabies simply does not exist in the south of France. They were most put out by my distress, and even sent me several Christmas cards afterwards, bless them.

All of this satisfied me for a few weeks, until I had my next panic attack, at which point a little voice inside me said "Well, Andy, what if it was not their cat that scrtached you?", "What if it was a stray that just looked the same", "What if rabies had somehow broken out in the south of France, previously undected?".

Writing all this down, I realise how foolish was my behaviour at the time. I think what did for me, and what (occasionally) does for me still is that the disease is very hard to detect before death. I just have to accept that after all this time, I cannot have the disease, and never have had the disease. The only time I doubt this is in a few moments of darkness, that usually occur in the early hours of the morning.

I hope the recounting of my experience can be of some help to others suffering any kind of health anxiety. I like to think of myself as a reasonably intelligent person. Nevertheless, for around eight years I knew 100% that I had a most improbable disease and would die within the next few weeks, despite what my GP told me. Only after reading the experience of others here am I staring to realise that my symptoms - absolutely all of them - are caused by nothing other than anxiety.

Thank you again for your support,

Andy

[nomorepanic]

Andy

Glad that you are slowly coming to terms with this and know that you are safe and are not going to die from rabies.

It takes time to get reassurance but I hope you have found some now.

Nicola