If Your Tinnitus Lost Its Intensity by 80 Percent, Would You Habituate Faster?

[Hottopic29]

Mine is worse at night , I hardly hear it during the day and sometimes I listen and its gone but im always on edge and alert listening for it so I dont think I will ever get used to it

 

[nills]

After all these years I still don`t know what habituation means .. .so many people talk about it but they talk about something I can not grasp.

So does it mean you are not bothered by it anymore ... it is there but you just carry on doing what you do being happy and all?

You might think this is a stupid question but to me it isn`t ...

For myself I can`t seem to let go of the desire to have silence. I carry on business as usual, at least try to.. but this T his the root of deep unhappiness and stands in the way of it ...

Even now I just continue my life as good as possible .. I work I meet people, I avoid loud places but I carry on ... but even doing all of this T is slowly slowly causing damage to mind and this reflects in a tired body ...

@Hottopic29 man don`t bother listening for something that isn`t there ... you are so bloody lucky! ... the only time I don`t hear my T is in deep sleep ... it even penetrates my dreamstate to wake me up and keep me awake for hours. I have learned to pretend to be a corpse and not get emotional about it. I just lie there doing nothing being nothing ...

 

[MattK]

Matt, maybe you are overthinking this ... or maybe I am underthinking it. Whatever. But here's how I see it ...

Let's set the issue of habituation aside for just a minute, OK?

100% of people with LOUD tinnitus would prefer it to be less loud. Now to be honest with you, I do not have a reliable and verifiable double-blind randomized prospective placebo controlled study published in a juried scientific journal to support that statement. I'm just going to go out on a limb and say it, OK? And if anybody disagrees with me, then whatever they're smoking, I want a hit. So I'll say it again: 100% of people with LOUD tinnitus would prefer it to be less loud.

Now the reason they want it less loud is because louder tinnitus tends to be more bothersome than tinnitus that is less loud. I hope we can all agree on that as well.

On the other hand, there are people with less loud tinnitus who are incredibly bothered by it. That you will just have to take my word on. Would they be more bothered if their tinnitus were louder? I suppose so - but that really hasn't been formally studied either.

Now let's look at TRT for a minute. You don't do TRT unless you are really really bothered by your tinnitus. I mean, TRT is by and large a rather costly undertaking - you don't do it "just for kicks."

So the people who choose to do TRT are those who are really really bothered by their tinnitus - regardless of how loud it might be. And the concept of being "bothered" by tinnitus all goes to reaction, which is what TRT is 100% about - reaction.

OK. Whether you are really really bothered by very loud tinnitus or really really bothered by not-so-loud tinnitus, the success rates of TRT (i.e., becoming less and less bothered by your tinnitus regardless of how loud it is) are pretty much the same.

Would TRT take less time to be successful if you had softer tinnitus that really really bothered you as opposed to louder tinnitus that really really bothered you? I suspect that the answer is no - because the sound therapy component of TRT is the great equalizer in that regard. But as I said earlier, I do not believe it has been studied.

Should it be studied at all? Well that depends. How much money are you willing to divert from research for a cure to research that looks at whether people who have less loud tinnitus and are miserable take less time to succeed in TRT than people who have louder tinnitus and are miserable? For me, I personally wouldn't divert a dime from research for a cure. TRT, CBT, NTT, TAT, PTM, and the whole alphabet soup gamut have been studied enough as far as I'm concerned.

That's how I see it, anyway.

It took a while for me, but I think I actually understand where you're coming from. I think there is a major miscommunication with the volume discussion but I think I get it now. Thanks for taking the time to explain.

 

[MattK]

After all these years I still don`t know what habituation means .. .so many people talk about it but they talk about something I can not grasp.

So does it mean you are not bothered by it anymore ... it is there but you just carry on doing what you do being happy and all?

You might think this is a stupid question but to me it isn`t .

I don't think it's a dumb question at all. I think habituation might mean something slightly different to different people... Or perhaps there are different degrees of habituation.

Here's my personal experience at the moment: I can hear my T just about every waking minute, but it gets no real reaction from me. It doesn't cause me any more distress than any other noise. Basically it's a noise that exists. As of the last couple of months, there are times when I don't hear it because I'm into something else. But my progression looked like this: tinnitus had my primary attention but didn't bother me anymore. Then it had my secondary attention and I'd say this is where I've been for most of my habituated time. Now about 90% of the time it has my tertiary attention but every once in a while I'll notice I've gone through a chunk of time where it didn't have my attention at all.

So I'd consider myself habituated. Sometimes it can spike and cause me a moment of distress but then I just get back to what I was doing and it turns back to a neutral noise for me.

 

[Inge]

A combination of in ear masking devices, medications and dietary changes made that the volume of my T has decreased 80% gradually over the last six months. I still have minor spikes. This development has been the difference between life and death for me. I went from being in a desperate, crying, actively suicidal state to a mildly depressed, reasonably content, cautiously optimistic one. Reducing T volume reduces anxiety about T in the limbic system, which reduces overall perceived T in your conscious awareness. Remember T is a brain disease which involves different areas of your brain. Volume is a huge factor in how severe T is perceived.

 

[valeri]

@Inge
What did you change in terms of diet?

 

[Inge]

@Inge
What did you change in terms of diet?

I reduced salt and caffeine intake.

 

[Mad maggot]

I'm sure it makes a difference. Some people seem bothered by very quiet T that they say they only hear when in a totally quiet room. For those people I think T itself is not really the problem.

 

[Inge]

I'm sure it makes a difference. Some people seem bothered by very quiet T that they say they only hear when in a totally quiet room. For those people I think T itself is not really the problem.

Loud T is harder to deal with than softer T. Having suffered from both mild and severe T it is safe to say it is easier to tolerate T that is less loud. That said in the long run, even mild to moderate T can be exhausting and slowly wear you down as we never get a break from the sound. Even though my T has improved it still affects my life in a negative way.

 

[Gabrielle]

I think this guy on yuku board has very mild T.
His words: Today.... I hear it here and there sometimes during the day.


Wow....wish I could say that.!!!!!
I don't hear it 'here and there' but I hear it everywhere!!
I don't hear it 'sometimes during the day', but whole day / night !!

Eventhough I get myself distracted doin' things I enjoy, eventhough I am a Lucky woman with nice family, very good and beloved partner, work I love to do (owner fashion webshop) and eventhough I don't have panic attacks anymore like during the first 6-9 month's.
It's now, today, exactly 1 year and 5 month's since the onset.
I, the one who loved silence so much.

My T is very very loud screaming, high pitched dentist-drills and also click clack and waves and wind, etc. etc.
So if this yuky guy took 5 years.... with mild tinnitus.....
Wondering how long 'it' will take for me,... to live a life within T does not bothering me anymore.....

 

[noisebox]

Sometimes mine goes down 80% but I am still not able to habituate because even at that volume the intensity and pitch is such that it can still cut through any sound around me. Plus mine is reactive so even on a good day it will suddenly crank up if the right noise floats by.

 

[glynis]

My tinnitus has been so loud in both ears about 11 years and never stops so I am use to my own noisy world and push my self every day to have a nice day.
I'm a positive bubbly person and enjoy my life even though my Menieres and sever tinnitus is tough going and I have breathing problems .
I would love my ears to go quiet again but I don't think now they ever will .
I have to remember my tinnitus is due to Menieres but hope others reading this don't give up hope .......lots of love glynis