SQL count limiting results

SQL count limiting results

I'm having an issue with following query:
SELECT
badge.name AS badge_name, badge.description, badge.type, badges.time,
user.name AS user_name
FROM
badges LEFT JOIN badge ON badges.badge_name = badge.name LEFT JOIN user
ON user.id=badges.user_id
WHERE
user.name IS NOT NULL
ORDER BY badges.time DESC
LIMIT 5
Now, I'd like to check that the amount of results is not 0, so I check
like I always do with by adding this after the SELECT: count(1) AS
counter. However, this influences the results.
How it should be.
How it is with the count.
I've seen that this might be an issue due to also having a LIMIT, but
what's the most efficient way to circumvent this? I just want to check
whether there are any results returned or not, to display a proper message
it there are no results. I'm using PDO, but since it's a SELECT i can't
use the ->rowCount() to check the amount of rows returned.
EDIT:
I want to determine whether there are any results, yes or no. My normal
way of doing so is using count(1) AS counter, and checking the value of
the counter as follows:
while($row['counter'] = $STH->fetch()){
if($row['counter'] == 0){
// Error message
}else{
echo $row['badge_name'] . "etc...";
}
}
However, this seems to mess up the results due to the LIMIT (check the
SQLFiddles).
So: how can I check this, preferably in a single query?