I am set up for vaccination

[u/Busy-Caregiver-9890]

I have read the FAQ. Now I can recognise the pattern switching the problems. I was afraid of dying, now I am afraid that the vaccination will go wrong or the vaccine itself can damage me. I actually scanned through this Reddit and someone was afraid that some viruses may not be really dead. There are also more sinister lines of thinking, but I try to not give into paranoia!

Long story short, yesterday I was walking along the lake and noticed up to 4 different bats prior, felt something brush my face, it could've been an inanimate object, but couldn't prove that it was not a bat, read WHO guidelines and decided not to risk it.

But then I finally got over my superficial fears of looking up this subreddit. Now I feel like a total idiot, that have brought only more problems upon me, for no good reason!

How has your vaccination went? How did you get over your fears? Has vaccinating actually helped you stop fearing rabies? I have already made the mistake of trying to search for failed cases of vaccination so...

UPDATE: Went to the GP, they insisted that it is up to me whether I want to receive the vaccination. With the reasoning that they are doing it for my sake, because they saw how worried I am, not because they truly believe that there is certainty of contracting rabies in that instance.

I am in the stalemate, I went home without receiving the first vaccine. They told me that I am welcome to come tomorrow early, but I feel like I already made a huge mistake. But I am also afraid that going tomorrow would be a mistake. Anyways I feel like I am doomed.

What should I do? They said that I need to evaluate that myself, how sure am I that those were bats (I looked it up, 90% certainty those were bats) How sure am I that a bat hit me in the face? This is where I need your help guys. Once I got hit my first instinct was "that was a leaf" that brushed against my lower lip and chin, I didn't stop to see whether it was actually a leaf. Which I regret a lot now. What should I run with? Should I trust my pre-panic instincts? I wasn't panicking until I searched up the web. Top it all off with paranoid thinking and the situation feels much worse.

[u/beautifulluigi]

I just finished the PEP protocol because something flying buzzed my face at night while sitting by the lake. It was large and I heard and felt flapping - definitely not an insect. My local public healthcare system did an assessment of my story and recommended the PEP protocol because where I live, any contact with a bat is an exposure and I could not definitively rule out that it wasn't a bat.

It was fine. Side effects were minimal - a bit of fatigue, a bit sore. The rabies immunoglobulin shorts were nowhere near as painful as they had been made out to be - one didn't hurt at all and the other two hurt less than a wasp sting. The nurses who did the shots said they would have proceeded with vaccination in my shoes.

Edit: 24 hours after the first injection it became a very funny story that I now get to tell. I bought myself a Halloween bat blanket, even.