headache getting worse after other flu/viral symptoms get better

Hello,

Last Thursday I had a mild sore throat, which for me is usually a sign that I'm catching a cold. The next day I felt achy (arms, legs, head), and was very fatigued, so I figured I had a cold or flu. After a couple of days my throat felt fine, and I have never had any other sinus/nose/throat-related symptoms, no a temperature higher than about 98.0 F. By the end of the weekend, my arms and legs barely ached, and I wasn't as fatigued as I had been the first couple of days (I'm still kind of tired during the day, but it feels more like a general tiredness that a cold/flu related fatigue.)

However, my head still hurts, and it's getting a little worse every day. The headaches started out very mild, and the slight pain was towards the back. Now I would rate my head pain as moderate, and it comes and goes in all parts of my head, all throughout the say. One minute I feel no pain, but then the next I feel some pain in a random part of my head (though more often in the back or top). Even if I'm busy doing something to distract me, I can feel the pain a little bit. The pain is relatively dull, and over the past week there has never been a moment of "severe" pain, or any extremely serious symptoms, such as dizziness or blacking out. I guess that most of the pain would be along the lines of a tension headache, but the past day or so there's been some numb or tingling sensations too. Since I've been really worrying about this the last couple of days (with my head feeling progressively worse while my other symptoms have faded away), that may explain the anxiety-related sensations (the numb/tingling stuff).

However, I'm still worried about the actual tension-type pain, and why that's getting progressively worse, and whether or not it will keep getting worse. Also, I am concerned since I don't know what exactly is causing this. I know headaches are common symptoms of the flu or a similar minor viral infection. But since my past symptoms don't exactly match up with the flu, I'm concerned that something else may be going on.
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Here's some added info: I am a 29 year old male who's basically in good health, although I do have insomnia and had some anxiety attacks last month, which I'll detail shortly. I had a physical earlier this month, and my bloodwork  showed nothing wrong.

Around the middle of last month, I did have anxiety issues, which had slowly gone away for the most past, until the last few days. Around the middle of last month, 3 bats came into our house over the period of a little over a week. Rationally speaking, I am pretty much 100% sure I never came into contact with one (I never made physical contact with one, and I checked my room extensively every night before sleeping during and since then, plus several medical professionals assured me that I hadn't been bitten). I was really messed up the next day, after not sleeping all night. Then I had a hot forehead, but no fever, and my arms felt funny (later ruled to be anxiety-induced numbness). The one night I had a (slight) fever, I went to the emergency room, and they ruled out any medical problems. Another trip to the emergency room the next week (after huge anxiety problems) resulted in me being given an appointment to a psychologist, who kindly assured me that I was suffering from a very typical anxiety attack, which had faded away until my recent illness.
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So, in conclusion, I'm wondering about a few things:

-Is it common for to catch the flu, but only suffer from the more neurological-type symptoms?
-Are there similar viral infections to the flu that better match what I have been going through?
-Are any of these possible illnesses (the flu or other viral infection) potentially causing something worse, like encephalitis?
-How concerned should I be that my headache is slowly getting worse (though at this point it's not severe, and I have had no other "severe" symptoms that would point to a serious illness)
-Can anxiety cause (or worsen) a mild-to-moderate tension style headache, and does it seem more like my increased head pain is a result of anxiety rather that a serious viral infection? Also, is it possible/common to have an anxiety "relapse", like the horrible way I felt in the middle of last month, when I somehow thought I had caught rabies and was going to do die?

Thanks for any help with my long and possibly nonsensical problem(s).

[jrg2222]

*note: after doing a little research on this site, and another, I see that many of my symptoms now, and stuff that happened last month, match up with the symptoms and causes of chronic fatigue syndrome. Would that be a possibility?

[Dr. Kokil Mathur]

Hi
Welcome to the MedHelp forum!
Any upper respiratory infection can cause sinusitis which can worsen a headache. Take steam twice a day and see if the pressure or headache is relieved. If it is then it could be due to sinusitis. Sometimes an Eustachian tube (tube connecting ear to throat) block can cause these pressure symptoms. Try valsalva maneuver (take a deep breath and blow while pinching your nostrils shut and closing your mouth). This will help clear the secretions in the tube that connects the back of your throat with your ear. Anxiety and stress can also worsen the headache. Consult an ENT to rule out sinusitis.
Hope this helps. Take care!

[jrg2222]

Thank you for your input. The majority of my head pain is towards the back, or at top of my head. There is little or no pain near the front of my face, where the sinuses are. Does sinusitis typically cause pain in the sinus areas, or anywhere in the head? Plus, when I had those minor flu-like symptoms, I didn't have any nasal or sinus congestion, though it seems like I had a little extra mucus in my throat (I had a very mild sore throat for a couple of days).

Thanks