Frightening Spike — Movement Detector, Loud Metro, and Going Through a Flu

Here I am again.

After one and a half month of being able to completely ignore my tinnitus (and it is a really severe one) it has spiked again. It seems to do it randomly from time to time, then go back to its baseline. Spikes tend to last a week, two or even a month. They leave me guessing what could have triggered them.

This time I felt bothered by one of those movement detectors at the entrance of some shops (deee daaa sound). It was really loud and high pitched. It sounded five or six times before I left the place. Even a customer there complained about it. Then two days later I was going to stick my earplugs in my ears being in a loud wagon of a metro and earplugs fell to the floor. They got dirty and I preferred not to use them. Spent 10 minutes there.

Tinnitus has been LOUDER since then. I am also going through a flu now. May those events have caused me a permanent worsening?

I couldn't feel more worried now.

I've been here before and all my spikes have always resolved but this sounds like a more complicated one.

 

Hello El Buzz,

I had a flu 1 month ago and my tinnitus has just began to come back to its baseline level.
Flu + loud noises from outside at the same period are typically the worst combination to have « quiet » tinnitus because of massive inflammation.

I had terrific spikes during this month with flu and loud noises from outside and I began to think my tinnitus would never decrease anymore but fortunately it was not the case.

Don’t panic, you need a complete recovery from your flu to have the inflammation in your ears and sinuses reduced.

Sorry for my bad English, I hope I am understandable!

 

Thanks for taking your time to answer.

Thing is exposure to loud sounds and the flu haven't happened at the same time. Noise happened first, then the flu for three days now and my spike started last Saturday. I've had spikes before coming from nowhere which lasted a week or even a month. They always left me with that useless need of tracking the triggering factors, then always resolved by themselves. Don't know if this happens to many more members here. I am constantly scared of having a permanent worsening as my baseline tinnitus is already a really loud one.

 

@El BUZZ, same for me, my tinnitus (I call them « monsters » are extremely loud and when I have spikes I want to bang my head against the wall so I understand perfectly what you are going through.

The matter is that you had a first inflammation with loud noise few days before plus another one with the flu which maintains your tinnitus at its worst level.

So, maybe as you didn’t have time to recover from the first one, the second one created a massive reaction. I don’t know if I make myself clear...

 

Yes. Thing is that I've always considered it a waste of time to track the triggering factors as this is a really complicated condition. Just hope to go back to my normal as soon as possible as this takes a lot of energy to be ignored.

 

@El BUZZ, how do you feel today ?

 

Hey! Thanks for asking. I woke up to the closest I've been to silence since onset... Weird. Let's see how it is tomorrow.

 

Great!! I am so happy for you! Fingers crossed .
Tinnitus is quite pervert because each time you have spikes you think you will endure it forever and each time you have an increase you think it could not last... So we never feel at peace.

 

These are basically some answers for various messages I received in another thread.

DMs not working so since these people have been kind taking their time giving me their input, here I go with my answers for them.

@alex1975
Thanks for taking your time for answering. It's very kind from you. One of the things I did the first weeks I perceived this new loudness was to play some white noise mixed with some other soothing sounds from the Resound Tinnitus Relief app. Always at a volume in which I could still hearing my tinnitus. Never tried to drown it. Always set the timer in 30 minutes. I experienced weird things going on in my ears while doing this. Some clicking (like an insect trapped there) and relative minor fullness. I was concerned about it being producing further damage to my ears so I stopped using it.

@UKBloke
100% right. All this Lenire thing has caused me a lot of stress in terms of monitorizing my tinnitus and getting obsessed about it. In fact I was handling it quite well and mysteriously enough this worsening started the same day I received the e-mail with my appointment. Other things were going on, to be honest. Christmas reunions with its loud features, got exposed to a few loud beeps of those movement detectors in the door of a shop (I doubt it could have been that what aggravated my tinnitus but who knows).

Thing is I've been literally obsessed, very worried and anxious over my tinnitus for the last two months. This could make things worse but I think there's an objective factor which is my tinnitus having worsened for real

@ChrisBoyMonkey
I am really glad Lenire is helping you a bit. I've decided to stay away from the idea of trying Lenire at the moment. Mine has been really bad for two months now with maybe six good days in total and I think they occur more because of my mood being boosted by something than a real decrease in volume (it's hard for me to be objective in this part).
I am lost, desperate, deeply tired and depressed. Completely fed up with what's going on in my head and really sad there's nothing which can help me/us.