Hello Fellow Tinnitus Enthusiasts!

[Jimellie]

Hi everyone!

I've had tinnitus for about 3 or 4 months now. Like many of you, I was a lurker for months and finally decided to pull the trigger and join. I'm a musician/sound tech and one night, I got a brutal blast of feedback from the PA system at about 13k for a second. Instant damage. I consider myself to be in a similar situation as the gunshot people. After I was hit, I had distorted hearing that went away within the hour, but tinnitus, ear fulness, and a weird crunching sound when I equalize pressure in my ears or sometimes when i chew have persisted ever since. At first I suspected some very high frequency hearing loss (13k+), and I'm awaiting a appointment for a hearing test, but I'm not so sure about that anymore. My hearing seems ok to me now.

After about 10 days, I went to the doctors and was prescribed mometasone nasal spray and I took that. It didnt help I don't think.

I've kind of become a bit depressed lately. When it was new, I felt a lot more confident that I would improve, but now that I'm a few months out, I think there's a better chance I'm stuck with this.

I realize that there's basically nothing that can be done for my tinnitus, but it would be pretty awesome to have the ear fulness thing sorted out. Any advice would be appreciated.

I guess I'm mostly just worried about becoming depressed and a downer for my wife and children. As someone who's passion has always been performing, recording and mixing music, this really sucks.

I've still been rehearsing with my band, it's loud, but I wear earplugs now. And its certainly not louder than blade runner 2049 was! Maybe that's not a great idea, but my wife thinks I need to learn to keep moving forward with my life, and not let my disability (?) control me. I agree with her. Besides, there are lots of musicians with tinnitus out there.

So yeah, just though I'd say hi. I visit the site enough that I thought I should participate. I'll post updates here as my inevitable 100% recovery happens

 

[Luman]

I have had occasional ear fullness for over 40 years, but it got more bothersome when I got T & H last summer. Fortunately, my awareness of fullness has reducd substantially, as of late, and I do not notice it any more. The same is true of some other annoying byproducts of Tinnitus Distress, in my case 'frequency changes'. I am not habituated yet, but there's been improvements, in my T & H, and my responses, which is the most important thing in coping. Good luck, and consider lowering the band's volume, if not switching to acoustic music.

 

[Bill Bauer]

I've still been rehearsing with my band, it's loud, but I wear earplugs now.

This forum is full of horror stories of people finding out the hard way that ear plugs will not always be enough to protect you.
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/earplugs-muffs-give-very-little-protection.21737/

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/tinnitus-much-worse-after-club-despite-wearing-solid-35-db-custom-earplugs-—-im-at-my-wits-end.15744/#post-186018

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/bad-spike-not-subsiding-after-loud-bar-—-despite-wearing-properly-inserted-earplugs.20675/#post-239000

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/thread...t-an-acoustic-trauma-shock.18964/#post-219363

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/thread...le-in-real-life-situations.19067/#post-220314

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/33-decibel-earplug-not-protecting-from-sound.22151/

I could go on and on and on (provide links to more horror stories where people found out the hard way that it was a bad idea to rely on earplugs), but you get the idea.

Even if those spikes end up being temporary, we are given a limited number of second chances. If one keeps being reckless, eventually a time might come when the spike won't go away...

Maybe that's not a great idea, but my wife thinks I need to learn to keep moving forward with my life, and not let my disability (?) control me. I agree with her.

Keep in mind that when you do reckless things like that, you might not only be reducing your chance of your T fading, but you are also increasing the chance that your T will get louder and more high pitched. You can push your T into debilitating territory.

 

[Michael Leigh]

I've still been rehearsing with my band, it's loud, but I wear earplugs now. And its certainly not louder than blade runner 2049 was! Maybe that's not a great idea, but my wife thinks I need to learn to keep moving forward with my life, and not let my disability (?) control me. I agree with her. Besides, there are lots of musicians with tinnitus out there.

Hi @Jimellie

Welcome to the forum. I don't mean to frighten you but agree with @Bill Bauer Earplugs will not necessarily protect your tinnitus getting worse if external sound is too loud. Sound can be transferred to the inner ear by bone conduction. This is when sound passes through the skull and is transferred to the inner ear. Please read the post below written by a member of this forum who's an Audio Engineer.

I wish you well
Michael


@Bill Weir

HI

I'm an audio engineer and now have T. I hate to have to tell you this but there are no earplugs that can protect you in the typical nightclub environment. The best protection will only lower the Sound Pressure Level (SPL) by about 30 db. Assuming the sound is typical, it's going to hover around 105 db A when measured using long term averaging, slow response on a meter. This means there will be peaks well in excess of 120 db"A" weighted. Weighting the scales of measurement on the sound meter gives more accurate readings. "A" weighting approximates what your eardrum is sensitive to... meaning sound with the deep bass filtered out. "C" weighting includes the bass and is generally 15-30 db higher than an "A" reading.

So, 105 db A (typical nightclub or major concert translates into 130 db "C" or more including the bass. How long do people generally stay in the average nightclub? Too long! 4 hour stay is average. A concert is generally 2.5 hours. Many people will stay in the club all night until they are "OK" to drive and be back in public LMAO. The drugs people do screws up their judgement and desensitizes them to physical sensation and people damage themselves without realizing it.

Sound levels pretty much everywhere are TOO loud IMO. Instead of the industry standard 105 db A (Live Nation SPL cap) I like to keep it at 96-98 for people. Why so loud? Above 96 db the fight or flight response begins to kick in and you get that rush of excitement you get at a concert. It's a lot of what people pay for. Deep bass goes in through bone transconductance. You don't "hear" it with your eardrum you feel it This is how it is possible to have bass with headphones. If this transconductance did not occur, the long wavelengths that make bass would not have enough distance to unfold when using headphones. So, earplugs DO NOT protect you from low frequency damage. Not even a little bit.

So, on the one hand, you're going to have 100db + peaks getting through your earplugs in the range above 100 Hz (low note on a 4 string bass guitar is 41.7 Hz) and the bass below will pressurize your cochlea like nothing is even there, straight through the bone. Some of the subwoofer arrays I have installed in places must have security grating around them to keep people from getting within ten feet of the subwoofer array because the array produces well over 150 db down at 35Hz at 1 meter distance and would make them nauseous or in some extreme cases even worse than that.

I can say this definitively from direct personal and professional experience. If you value your hearing and do not want your tinnitus to increase, avoid these places or if you must go limit your exposure considerably.

 

[Niko]

I'm saying this for your own good as I feel your are not taking this to serious and are feeling the pressure of your surrounding that don't know how you really feel about it.

Once you get T. there is a chance that you can recover or lower it significantly, especially if you try with any alternative medicines.

Just because it's a hidden disability doesn't make it less significant. You wouldn't play hockey with an broken arm as an enforcers, you would wait for it to heal. So I advice you take some time off from your professionalism and try to recover before getting back again. And even though you recover you will take a risk with what you are currently doing as your job is something that will irritate your old wound and possibly make it bad again.

If you still persist to hang on, at least get some good ear protections, I would use double, small ones and big ones on top, which activate electrically, they shut the sound when the sound goes up, and lets speech sound to be even higher when the noise is normal. Hunters use such ear protectors.

You mentioned that you have a cracking ear, I had the same issues for a year after I got T. I though that had to do with the instant wax removal, high pressure water into my ears and the flight back home, cabin pressure. Did your doc tell you why this has developed, I never asked about it once I got back, as I didn't think it was related to the acoustic damage itself.

 

[Jimellie]

Thanks for the replies everyone!

Glad to feel like I'm not in this alone. But on the flip side it's a little depressing to hear that the consensus so far is that I should just quit my band. We're a 3 peice with Bass drums and guitar. It is loud rehearsing, but not crazy. Like I never got even temporary tinnitus after a rehearsal, and we're not amplifying the drum kit like anything. I want to be cautious, but I don't wanna strangle the fun out of my life either. Jamming and showering are basically the only times in my life where i get total relief trom tinnitus and i really look forward to both. I've read about lots of musicians with tinnitus and they seem to be getting along ok.

I'm not trying to be reckless or make excuses to do what ever I want, but rather find a sustainable balance in my life between living and protecting my hearing.

 

[obutterfly]

Lumen, What are the important responses you mentioned in your post?

 

[Luman]

Lumen, What are the important responses you mentioned in your post?

I try to not think of my tinnitus in ways that will impede progress towards habituation, such as telling myself negative things like "I will never get past this!" If I find myself thinking that way, I try to substitute a more positive thought.

 

[obutterfly]

Thank you, Lumen. I keep doing that; but after a while, I relapse into fear. I'm interested in any ideas that help habituation.