Saw bat in my house, woke up with red marks on face- very concerned

[Jduke]

You have a wonderfully creative anxious mind.

I know it's all unlikely but not outside the realm of possibility. This is why I continue to be anxious. It's hard for me to accept the red marks on my face are not from a bat because the probability isn't zero. I think if I noticed some kind of irritation or shaving mishap on my face before I went to bed, I'd be much more accepting of my wife's theory that I just opened something up on my face when I turned over on my pillow...but I didn't notice anything. I wouldn't be worried about this at all if I didn't see that bat in January.

[Fishmanpa]

I don't know if it's fantasy or impossibility

Deep down, you do know. You are literally saying a bat you saw two months ago and never saw again has been a guest in your home, roaming and flying around unnoticed for two months. This ninja bat took the opportunity to come into your bedroom, unnoticed, bit you on the lip while you slept and slipped off into the abyss again. You have an actual plausible explanation (shaving), which has happened to me more times than I can count, yet you're feeding the fantasy The dragon is breathing fire down your back and you're feeding him with your thoughts. Add to that there were only 5 cases in the US (which is the most in a while) in 2021 out of over 330 million people. Hope you feel better soon!

FMP

[Scass]

I know it's all unlikely but not outside the realm of possibility. This is why I continue to be anxious. It's hard for me to accept the red marks on my face are not from a bat because the probability isn't zero. I think if I noticed some kind of irritation or shaving mishap on my face before I went to bed, I'd be much more accepting of my wife's theory that I just opened something up on my face when I turned over on my pillow...but I didn't notice anything. I wouldn't be worried about this at all if I didn't see that bat in January.

It kind of is outside the realms of possibilities though. Even if a bat did manage to get in your room, why bite you? Why not your wife? Why not just find a corner to hide in?

You choose to believe that it got in and bit you over about 50 other rational reasons for you having a bit of blood on your face.

[BlueIris]

Joining in with the others here, this is completely impossible.

[Jduke]

It kind of is outside the realms of possibilities though. Even if a bat did manage to get in your room, why bite you? Why not your wife? Why not just find a corner to hide in?

You choose to believe that it got in and bit you over about 50 other rational reasons for you having a bit of blood on your face.

I think a source of much of my anxiety is a chart that I found that shows all the human rabies in the U.S. that were caused by bats from 1951-2018. There are only 69 cases so I do recognize that rabies is a rare occurrence but of those 69 cases, about 18 of them reported a bat biting them while sleeping or they did see a bat in their house at some point and/or discovered a colony of bats in their attic after the person died from rabies but there was "no known contact" with a bat . Again, I can see that it's very rare but I think to myself that people still win the lottery and bats do bite people while sleeping so why not me?

[Jduke]

Joining in with the others here, this is completely impossible.

Yes it's improbable but not impossible. I found a chart that shows all the human rabies in the U.S. that were caused by bats from 1951-2018. There are only 69 cases in that time frame so I do recognize that rabies is a rare occurrence but of those 69 cases, about 18 of them reported a bat biting them while sleeping or they did see a bat in their house at some point and/or discovered a colony of bats in their attic after the person died from rabies but there was "no known contact" with a bat . Again, I can see that it's very rare but I think to myself that people still win the lottery, get struck by lighting and bats do bite people while sleeping...so why not me? I know it's not healthy and if I didn't find red marks on my face I wouldn't even be here.

[ButterscotchLatte]

I'm so sorry that you actually did see a bat in your house. I can't even imagine how much that would send my rabies anxiety into overdrive. I know how scary this specific fear is, and I regularly freak myself out about unseen bats being the source of every random mark I notice on my body if I don't know how it got there. However, even in my own rabies anxiety riddled mind, I can assure you that in this particular instance there is no way you would've slept through a bat biting you. No matter how small it is, something with wings crawling around on your face in the night and biting you hard enough to draw blood is probably something even very heavy sleepers would wake up to. Your partner is probably right. If it IS a bite, its from something you could sleep through crawling on your face, like a spider. I know my reply is probably not going to help much, since I can't be calmed down when I'm freaking out about bats and rabies either, but I thought I should try. And believe me, you don't want rabies shots if you don't need them. I got them a few years back during one of my episodes when I absolutely did not need to and not only are they expensive and rarely covered by insurance, they can also make you feel really really sick. I was just fine before I got them, and they gave me the flu like symptoms that go along with rabies for like 2 months and just made my anxiety even worse. For your sake, do not feed into the hypochondria. It will just demand more and more from you.

[Jduke]

I'm so sorry that you actually did see a bat in your house. I can't even imagine how much that would send my rabies anxiety into overdrive. I know how scary this specific fear is, and I regularly freak myself out about unseen bats being the source of every random mark I notice on my body if I don't know how it got there. However, even in my own rabies anxiety riddled mind, I can assure you that in this particular instance there is no way you would've slept through a bat biting you. No matter how small it is, something with wings crawling around on your face in the night and biting you hard enough to draw blood is probably something even very heavy sleepers would wake up to. Your partner is probably right. If it IS a bite, its from something you could sleep through crawling on your face, like a spider. I know my reply is probably not going to help much, since I can't be calmed down when I'm freaking out about bats and rabies either, but I thought I should try. And believe me, you don't want rabies shots if you don't need them. I got them a few years back during one of my episodes when I absolutely did not need to and not only are they expensive and rarely covered by insurance, they can also make you feel really really sick. I was just fine before I got them, and they gave me the flu like symptoms that go along with rabies for like 2 months and just made my anxiety even worse. For your sake, do not feed into the hypochondria. It will just demand more and more from you.

Thank you for your thoughtful reply. I'm at this point where half of my brain is thinking just like you and the other people who have replied to me. There's no way I would sleep through such an event and there's no way a bat would just disappear afterward. The other half of my brain runs through this scenario where I'm in the hospital slowly dying of rabies with moments of lucidity thinking that I should have just listened to my instincts. Wild animals are unpredictable. I could have prevented this if I just got some stupid shots and paid the money. And then my wife has to explained what happened to the doctor and the doctor says "so you saw a bat flying in your basement, never captured it and lost track of the bat, woke up with dried blood and two little red marks on your face and decided against getting PEP? Something like that would have been considered reasonable probability" I know if it was just 1-2 shots and my insurance covered it or it was a reasonable amount of money, not thousands of dollars, I probably would have gotten PEP the day after I woke up with dried blood and red marks on my face. I've had health anxiety in the past due to an irregular heart beat but I was able to accept it much quicker when testing and cardiologist reassured me that my PVC/PAC's were benign. This rabies anxiety is more like dread and fear. It's very consuming. I'm hoping I can come to terms with it soon. But again, thank you for trying to reassure me. It's somewhat helpful to type all of this out.