Hi everyone,

Just checking in to let y'all know how I'm doing.

A capsule summary of my timeline: Cat bit me Nov 2020. I received 3 Rabavert shots in Dec 2020. I had side effects after shot 2, and more pronounced neurological, digestive, urinary, joint, and muscle problems after shot 3 and was in and out of the ER a lot. By April 2021, twhen I last posted here, the worst of my symptoms had improved, and I still had shooting nerve pain with walking more than 45 minutes or just moving around the house a certain amount and some odd sensations in my head/brainstem area.

Now it's July 2021 and lot of my symptoms are gone or lessened a lot, to the degree that most of my symptoms can't be separated from underlying medical conditions I had before the Rabavert shots.

I still get shooting nerve pain on and off, mostly sciatica related and I would periodically get that before Rabavert. One of the more annoying symptoms I get now is occasional tingling/itchiness in the wrist near the bite site, and this has been going on ever since I got bitten, so I do wonder how much of this is due to healing nerve damage from the bite versus any residual effect from the shots.

I still have an odd sensation at the base of my skull/inside brainstem area and it is more noticeable some times than others, usually when I haven't slept enough and have a headache at my temples. It's less anxiety-producing than it was months ago, because back then it felt like it came with impaired breathing.

The joint pain in my hands that really concerned me (because I am an artist and was making it hard for me to draw anything for long) is gone and that really makes me happy.

I received Pfizer shots for COVID-19 between late April and May, and I didn't even feel the first shot and only felt fatigued after it, and had about 2-3 days of side effects after shot 2 (headache, a little joint pain, a brief-lived fever, and LOTS of fatigue). My feeling about it at the time was, "Eh, that's IT? This is NOTHING compared to Rabavert!". I am relieved everything went okay with the Pfizer shots.

I have seen a neurologist and he ran a ton of blood tests for me for autoimmune factors and antibodies that affect the brain, and those were negative. I have vitamin deficiencies (B12, D3) and have been supplementing for those; I've been told if you're under a lot of stress/immune challenge those can be depleted so perhaps consider asking a doctor to test your levels to see if supplements help... because a deficiency in these can make your symptoms post-rabies vaccine worse.

I have an MRI w/o contrast on order, but haven't gotten it between feeling closer to normal and avoiding medical centers as much as possible because of COVID. I haven't decided when I will go for it.

This is all for now. My main issue overall is how crappy my sleep is, and that may be for any of a number of reasons unrelated to Rabavert. The pandemic and an anemic social life and other stressors I'm sure have played a role in my sleep being messed up and I hope it improves.