A New Member of the Club

[jumping jack]

Hi everyone,

While I'm as-yet undiagnosed, I believe I got a case of tinnitus over the last day.

I had my regular teeth cleaning procedure done yesterday, and while the dentist was operating with the ultrasonic descaler I felt on several occasions the vibrations transmit right into my ears, for several seconds at a time. The whine (which I can describe as similar to old-school TVs catching the wrong channel) started several hours after I was done at the office, and has continued since then.

Being a must-know-it-all I checked all possible resources online and the only conclusion I'm left with is that it is tinnitus (hence, how I arrived here). I did a pure tone check, and I think my whine is at ~11KHz. I scheduled an audiogram exam in a short while, and while I don't notice any loss of hearing I'm still apprehensive about what it'll show.

I sure hope this thing quiets down at some point in the near future. While it's not that loud (perceptively, I'd say it's of the same strength as hearing running water coming out of a tap from 20 feet away), it's plenty enough to shoot up my anxiety levels.

What do you think my chances are of the whine going away on its own? Have any of you gone through a similar experience before you got tinnitus?

Cheers and best to all,
jj

 

[glynis]

Welcome to tinnitus talk.
I think it will go quieter over the next day or so and maybe go away.
Won't hurt get your ears checked out for wax.
Also if you had your mouth open wide a while you may have had some inflammation and pressure on your jaw joint that can spike tinnitus as the joint is by your middle ear and should settle down...lots of love glynis

 

[jumping jack]

Thanks for the reply and the words of encouragement, glynis!

I just set up an appointment with an ENT doc for tomorrow. Crossing fingers it ends up being something treatable...

 

[MikeL1972]

Hi JJ,

Welcome aboard!

Hopefully, your tinnitus will vanish.

Best advice I can give you is to limit your anxiety... tinnitus does not kill people.

 

[Michael Leigh]

Best advice I can give you is to limit your anxiety... tinnitus does not kill people

Very true, tinnitus doesn't kill people. However, this condition comes in many forms and intensities. From relatively mild, to moderate, severe and extremely severe. When tinnitus is severely intrusive it can become seriously debilitating and affect a person's thoughts considerably. If this level is sustained it can drive them to do something that they wouldn't ordinarily do if they weren't under so much distress.
Sorry to sound so sobering.
Michael

 

[jumping jack]

@mike & @Michael -- Thanks for the pointers.

Yes, the mental anguish (assuming the ringing doesn't stop) is my main concern going forward. Still, I'm finding plenty of support on this forum, and have a hopeful outlook for getting this thing dealt with.

 

[billie48]

Your T is so new and it sounds mild. So have hope that if will fade over time. Don't need to panic or stress over it, as doing such will aggravate T. So don't supply the fuel for it and instead do whatever to relax and distract your mind from focusing on T. If it bugs you, consider using masking sounds such as nature sounds or you favourite music. Try to use external speakers instead of headphones for masking and try to set the volume to slightly lower than the T sound so your brain will slowly get used to the T sound without panic reaction. If you have time, read up the success stories to keep yourself positive that you will be just fine. Take good care. God bless.

 

[jumping jack]

Thanks for the kindly advice, billie!

The ringing has subsided a great deal since it started (and I'm now on corticosteroids to try to halt/reverse the physiological damage as much as possible). In the meantime, I went through several days full of anguish, which were worsened by increased stress levels unrelated to the ringing in my ears.

I read a fair number of posts here in the forum, including from those of you who responded in this thread, and am now aware how debilitating this condition can be, having experienced a number of the effects on a smaller time scale. I wish all those suffering find a way to stop it from robbing their lives of meaning and satisfaction.