Hello to all on this great forum.
This is my first post. I've had tinnitus since nearly 6 months now. It is no better so far. Maybe it was stress related, maybe because of noise trauma (I was on very loud concert one week prior to onset of my tinnitus, the only one in years....). Two months before that during flight I experienced very painful ear fullness which lasted even some hour after landing. I also have moderate hearing loss at 8 kHz (-40) in my left ear. My tinnitus is very high pitched and fluctuates daily from like a dentist drilling, buzzing, cicada, hiss... sometimes all of them. Sometimes it feels like all my head vibrates. I would label it on 6-8 out of 10. Many times I hear it over the car driving, speaking, tv, radio, it's almost impossible to mask it. I sleep without masking therefore. Few times in that 6 months period I had days with tinnitus level only 2 to 3, but it only lasted one day and the next day it went to top again.
I think I also have hyperacusis. Some sounds like dishes, phone ringing, cutlery, are very uncomfortable to me. But some voices, like other peoples speaking, especially high tones somehow resonate in my ears and are a bit painful too. I need to tell them over and over to lower their speech down. It doesn't necessary depend so much on how loud the voice is but more what kind of voice it is.
What I didn't read here about (or maybe I just didn't come across to) is the fact that even my own voice makes me problems, especially the words with sh, ch, j, … (like fish, chocolate, journal etc.). Those sounds vibrate and cause very high discomfort (a bit of pain too, but not too much) in my ear, nose, sinuses, but only in my left ear, nose. Is that hyperacusis too?
Besides that all my hearing is somehow changed, like all the sounds are somehow glassy, or like if I have a tinny, broken speaker in my ears which produces such changed voices. The more there is background noise, the more distorted hearing is and the more the music or speech is very high frequency and somehow metallic (for example in a car – it is almost impossible to listen to music in a car). Beside that it seems that sounds on high frequencies are more amplified so I sometimes hear only those high pitched tones (e.g. I hear birds very very loud, or in music some instruments are heard more loudly than others)….
This problems started one month after tinnitus and since then the things didn't improve (except maybe cutlery and dishes are not annoying so much anymore, and keyboard typing doesn't bother me right now, but all other things are the same or sometimes even worse than at beginning). I went to only one opera night concert since then, but it was outside in a park and I sat far away with concert plugs in (labeled 25 dB). I just don't know why things doesn't improve with time as i read here happened in most cases. I can't avoid all noises in my everyday's activities, but I don't think they are too loud. I don't go to clubs, cinemas... I don't use earphones at all, almost never did. But I wonder anyway if maybe car driving to work on highway (30 min each way) is too much? Or staying some 5 mins on a very busy street waiting for green light to cross the road is too much (I work in a building next to very busy road, but have windows closed because of all that noise outside, inside is therefore just around 45-50 dB).
I tried pink noise but just can't tolerate it. It seems like my tinnitus goes up a lot or maybe I just hear it more…. I live alone, but I have radio on all the time (very moderate level). At work is much harder, I am alone in my office, not allowed to listen to music (government job), only with papers and phones. Very hard on my tinnitus as I hear it all the time, the work is not very interesting, but I have 5 years left to retire so no chance to change it…
I hope I explained it clearly enough, English is not my native language.
I would like to hear if someone else also have or had such problems, how long did it take for you to get better. Are all above explained problems signs of hyperacusis or also something else. What shall I do to promote healing…
I would appreciate any advice a lot. It's getting hard as I see no improvement at all.
This is my first post. I've had tinnitus since nearly 6 months now. It is no better so far. Maybe it was stress related, maybe because of noise trauma (I was on very loud concert one week prior to onset of my tinnitus, the only one in years....). Two months before that during flight I experienced very painful ear fullness which lasted even some hour after landing. I also have moderate hearing loss at 8 kHz (-40) in my left ear. My tinnitus is very high pitched and fluctuates daily from like a dentist drilling, buzzing, cicada, hiss... sometimes all of them. Sometimes it feels like all my head vibrates. I would label it on 6-8 out of 10. Many times I hear it over the car driving, speaking, tv, radio, it's almost impossible to mask it. I sleep without masking therefore. Few times in that 6 months period I had days with tinnitus level only 2 to 3, but it only lasted one day and the next day it went to top again.
I think I also have hyperacusis. Some sounds like dishes, phone ringing, cutlery, are very uncomfortable to me. But some voices, like other peoples speaking, especially high tones somehow resonate in my ears and are a bit painful too. I need to tell them over and over to lower their speech down. It doesn't necessary depend so much on how loud the voice is but more what kind of voice it is.
What I didn't read here about (or maybe I just didn't come across to) is the fact that even my own voice makes me problems, especially the words with sh, ch, j, … (like fish, chocolate, journal etc.). Those sounds vibrate and cause very high discomfort (a bit of pain too, but not too much) in my ear, nose, sinuses, but only in my left ear, nose. Is that hyperacusis too?
Besides that all my hearing is somehow changed, like all the sounds are somehow glassy, or like if I have a tinny, broken speaker in my ears which produces such changed voices. The more there is background noise, the more distorted hearing is and the more the music or speech is very high frequency and somehow metallic (for example in a car – it is almost impossible to listen to music in a car). Beside that it seems that sounds on high frequencies are more amplified so I sometimes hear only those high pitched tones (e.g. I hear birds very very loud, or in music some instruments are heard more loudly than others)….
This problems started one month after tinnitus and since then the things didn't improve (except maybe cutlery and dishes are not annoying so much anymore, and keyboard typing doesn't bother me right now, but all other things are the same or sometimes even worse than at beginning). I went to only one opera night concert since then, but it was outside in a park and I sat far away with concert plugs in (labeled 25 dB). I just don't know why things doesn't improve with time as i read here happened in most cases. I can't avoid all noises in my everyday's activities, but I don't think they are too loud. I don't go to clubs, cinemas... I don't use earphones at all, almost never did. But I wonder anyway if maybe car driving to work on highway (30 min each way) is too much? Or staying some 5 mins on a very busy street waiting for green light to cross the road is too much (I work in a building next to very busy road, but have windows closed because of all that noise outside, inside is therefore just around 45-50 dB).
I tried pink noise but just can't tolerate it. It seems like my tinnitus goes up a lot or maybe I just hear it more…. I live alone, but I have radio on all the time (very moderate level). At work is much harder, I am alone in my office, not allowed to listen to music (government job), only with papers and phones. Very hard on my tinnitus as I hear it all the time, the work is not very interesting, but I have 5 years left to retire so no chance to change it…
I hope I explained it clearly enough, English is not my native language.
I would like to hear if someone else also have or had such problems, how long did it take for you to get better. Are all above explained problems signs of hyperacusis or also something else. What shall I do to promote healing…
I would appreciate any advice a lot. It's getting hard as I see no improvement at all.