I have a this irrational fear of rabies for a simple petting of a stray cat. Very long story, work was stressful and long. I work at a warehouse and pretty much had to stay for overtime. After work I went to get a snack at a convenient store and after I got the snack I immediately saw a stray cat by the entrance. Since I was pretty much stressed, I wanted to pet the cat for fun and the cat was more nervous of me than anything else. It jerked a bit when I approached it and sniffed my hand, but I I started to pet it. It jerked again but stood still, and I I pet the cat with the back side of my right hand, using the index, middle, and ring finger to pet the top of it's head. I stroked it for like 5-7 times and then went to my car. I have a scab on my right pinky but didn't used it for petting. As I was going for my car I grabbed a bite of my snack, a taquito with my right hand. I realized it immediately and thought of the word rabies. My anxiety came in full force and I started to panic, I made the small error of reading anything off the internet and came across nonbite transmission with including the mouth so I got worse. I studied a bit more and learned a few more things, that rabies are extremely rare in the US and that cats actually have almost zero threat of being rabid. I asked for opinions and I got a lot of similar results, my interaction had an extremely low risk. Reasons because IF the cat was rabid even in its pre symptoms days, I can ONLY contract it through its saliva. When I pet the cat, I the hair was rough and dry meaning, it had no saliva so I'm perfectly ok. But my anxiety made it worse thinking of the impossible happening and it's scaring me. Honestly need comfort, I have all then data and proof that says I'm fine but my fear is making me believe that the extremely low case is the most probable case. It's straight up mind breaking.

tw: nsfw 17f I have a real even ocd from a sexual event with an animal (my cat) from where I was younger. Remembering it ruined my life and made it a living hell. It was bad. It's not one of those innocent events people always assume because I have ocd and then they get all surprised when it was actually bad and sexual. (animal wasn't harmed though) So basically I developed I fear of interacting or even looking at animals after I remembered so I was avoiding my cat like crazy, but then I realized that it's cruel to ignore an animal who wants love and attention, so I forced myself to overcome it kinda. I basically downloaded a habit tracker where I mark when I was able to pet my cat cause while it's triggering I want to give my cat love and I'm trying to pet her everyday So yesterday I was petting the cat. And she was extremely enthusiastic about it. Like she was almost throwing herself on me to get more pets like kinda agressive at this point to get pets. I started thinking how animals go in heat in spring. But she is like sterilized so I wasnt sure its possible for her. Like maybe they are just more active in spring? But what if the pets are somehow sexual for the cat? Then I thought maybe I shouldn't pet her then cause that's wrong. But then I thought like who cares and also then it will be like this the whole spring should I just not touch her the whole spring and ignore her again? I was also tired a bit so I wasn't thinking it all through that much Now I'm freaking out so bad. Like I knew there was a possibility that it was sexual for the cat and still continued petting her I didn't stop. It's so bad. Like I thought its whatever since it's not sexual for me but now I'm freaking out. Like the whole me being a better person and learning on my mistakes after that one earlier event was for nothing if I was able to do something like this I'm freaking out so bad

I've been hyperfixated on worrying about abuse and harm to my cats, and as a result i spiraled into some bad compulsions, and I know I'm a bad person for that. I feel horrible. Some time ago my male cat went to sniff my other female's cat bum and i know it's normal but i instantly reacted and bumped by hand to his face and I believe I accidentally used a bit too force. I got scared that I did it too hard. And I felt the urge to replicate the same move to check that it didnt hurt him and i shouldn't have done it I should have ignored the call of uncertainty, and I bumped my dorsal part of the hand on his face repeatedly to check any sign, i was replicating similar "force" to make sure I didn't hurt him going one slight step above of a gentle tap. It was like a slight stiffer tap, but not hard, but still stiff... Like I would feel the compulsive urge to try to bump my hand slightly harder to his face and that would make me feel horrible and wanting me to check it again... My cat wasn't hurt, but I think he had a confused face, my brain is telling me that he ran away and that he had a hurt face, the first thing i dont think so and the latter I believe it. I felt so guilty I thought I was an abuser. And I checked the same thing on my other female cat but she was just annoyed, she didnt feel hurt. This has been on my mind for a long time and I've been obsessing abt. Just now I compulsively tested "abuse" on my cat. i started tapping on her head lightly with my fingers. it didnt hurt her, she didnt react at all, but the first time she lowered her ears but not in a hurt way more like she was a bit annoyed by my antics, or i think it's just the nervous area because cats generally lower their ears when someone touches their head. I started tapping from her back like people do to their cats because the cats enjoy it and i used the same "energy" and slowly went to her head to see if it hurt her. and a medium tap (not hard) that didnt hurt her triggered me a lot, felt like i had done already something that was too hard. and i spiraled and kept doing the same thing to see if it hurt her. like if i do it to myself it doesnt hurt at all. and my cat didnt react at all she didnt move an inch and didnt even meow. she didnt care. i increased the power a slightly to hear more the sound of the tap and I got increasingly worried. but i kept tapping her too much. i couldn't stop. i had to check continuously that the tap before didnt sound as harsh like it did. like she didnt flinch or hiss or move at all. her ears lowered a bit probably because it was unpleasant. i would try to go above one slight step above gently tapping to see what would happened because i couldn't stand uncertainty and i couldn't believe that it could hurt her. it was never hard, but the medium taps felt abuse. when my cat headbutts she uses more strenght than i used to tap her head... to describe the tap it would be like similar to when your friend taps your shoulder to say "good job" or to encourage you. probably a bit less then that...

I’ve been really struggling with obsessing on the though that I somehow got exposed to rabies without my knowledge. I live in an older home and my mind keeps telling me somehow a bat got in without my knowledge, even though I have no reason to believe so. I also own a cat and I’ve also been struggling with what if he got exposed because of this “bat”.