For the past month and a half I’ve been struggling with this irrational fear of having rabies and it’s slowly started to ruin my life. For background, I’m 23, I’ve been diagnosed with GAD, I live in a house and I have never opened my window screens up and let unprotected air in my house, I’ve never woken up with a bat or other strange animal beside me, I’ve never seen a bat that wasn’t flying at least 20 feet away from me, and I’ve never seen an animal in my life foaming at the mouth or exhibiting telltale signs of rabies, let alone interacted with them. I mean I’ve never even been camping for gods sakes. Yet every single day I fear that my life is going to come to a horrible end because of this disease that is LITERALLY IMPOSSIBLE FOR ME TO HAVE. Like my rational brain understands this but my emotional brain doesn’t care and is gonna give me a panic attack anyway. And rabies isn’t the first impossible disease I’ve been so sure I have either. Oh no, I’ve been so sure I have cancer, or I’ve been having a heart attack, or a stroke, or deep vein thrombosis. But right now this takes the cake for the worst irrational fear I’ve ever had. I still live with my father because I can’t find meaningful employment, and I know he’s getting tired of having to tell me multiple times a day that I’m not dying of rabies, but I can’t stop worrying about it. I get a little bit of a sore throat, or a cough, or my leg feels just a teensy bit funny, and I just start to spiral. I’ve started checking my temperature at least 4 times a day and I freak out if it even comes close to 99, although it’s never been a fever at all. I just don’t know what to do anymore. Any kind words or reassurances would be appreciated.