It's an interesting question, to be sure! Then again, there may be (probably are) all sorts of other co-factors/influencers, since not everyone, even in the "anxious personalities" category, gets tinnitus. For some, it ultimately gets them in stomach/intestinal tract issues, and of course there are many, many other physical manifestations of stress in the body.
But for sure, the traits you describe are strongly associated in some people with the tendency to develop tinnitus.
It's curious to me, because I've been high strung but also highly functioning my entire life. And a very very very happy person despite all sorts of emotional pain I've had to endure. Mine was acoustic trauma, but I remember in college (about 35 YEARS ago), there was this fire alarm that went off in our dorms (at least a few times a year) that, all cliches aside, truly WOULD have waken the dead. It used to make me FLY off the mattress when it happened. It sounded like your head exploded from the inside and you yourself had turned into the alarm. <<--Dramatic enough description?
And it's TRUE!
And yet - no tinnitus from that. And none for well over 35 years.
So ... what gives?!? You COULD speculate that the recent event made tinnitus appear just because I'm "older," "have the typical age-related hearing loss," etc. but that completely does not take into account that here on this forum, there are TONS of people in their 20s/30s with it.
Then again, people in their 20s/30s probably have had more earbud music over their young lives than I did (since I grew up before all that).
So maybe it IS a combination of hidden hearing loss (which maybe lots of people in their 20s/30s THESE DAYS now have?) plus the acoustic event that triggers it, plus the predisposed anxious personality and amygdala issues. (Hah! I can just see myself walking into a restuarant and asking for the music to be lowered because, "Excuse me, sir? I have amygdala issues ... "
Or maybe I just need to put that on a t-shirt!!!
Anyway, I kinda just thunk out loud here.
But
@Mario martz , that's why I think the tai chi, chi kung, meditation, and other calming practices may be giving these anecdotal reports of lessened or disappearing tinnitus in some individuals who become dedicated practicers. Feeding your physiology and nervous system with a calming body and thought process is going to lay down some significant neural tracks in the brain. And maybe, these new neural tracks can beat the amygdala into amygdalian submission! Heh heh heh ...
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