Hey everyone,
This nightmare began for me on December 30th, 2014. I was just driving to the mall with my mother and out of the blue I experienced a ringing in my left ear. In the past I've had ringing to the extent of 3-5 seconds very few and far betweeen, then it would disappear and I'd think nothing of it.
This time though, it never went away
I remember it was so loud and different to me that I couldn't concentrate and I was almost brought to tears because it bothered me so much. It faded to a degree but later that night was with my girlfriend who kissed my ear but made a high pitched noise as she did it right in my ear that brought the ringing back to the levels earlier in the day. I freaked out again and it's not fair because she got mad at me, and will never realize what its like. The best way I can explain it is how in certain movies a bomb or explosion goes off and the noise goes silent and all you hear is that ringing. That's how my left ear was.
I went to my general doctor, who prescribed me flonase to take for 2 weeks. I had felt the week prior to 12/30/14 that I was coming down with something so I took zicam and emergenC to help me get over the sore throat I was having. Luckily I got over it, but he though maybe there was something still there.
After 2 weeks I asked for him to recommend me an ent. He sent me to Dr. Tojo at Lutheran General hospital in a suburb of Chicago. He looked at my ear said he saw some "slight redness" in my left ear. I followed up with a hearing test which showed my left ear was scoring lower than my right but both within acceptable ranges. He prescribed me prednisone for 2 weeks with a follow up in 4-6 weeks. After the prednisone I started taking lipoflavanoid plus also, and currently still am.
On 2/4/15 driving home from my grad school late at night I had a new onset of noise but this time from my right ear never before experienced. This was a super deep, low, hollow ring that lasted several minutes that put me in a panic. Eventually the next day it went back to my normal ringing. Then on 2/6/15 had yet another uproar of noise over my standard ringing butnin my left yet again. This also lasting several minutes of very loud high pitch ringing which subdued back to the normal tone the next day.
As of yesterday 2/12/15 I had my follow up visit with my ent specialist. My hearing test showed the left still scoring worse but within the ok range but no improvement. Unfortunately for me my doctor said there's nothing he can do. He told me to come back in a year and follow up with him. I asked and tried to hold on to something that he could help me with but he said there's nothing he can do. He said I could possibly have ear drum damage from a virus possibly but can't give me much more than that.
So here I am today more confused than ever more hopeless then ever. With the prednisone making minimal impact and the Lipo flavanoid making my ringing seem like it's more coming from the room next door rather then right next to me I just hope that maybe one day I can look forward to being ring free. I didn't like how my last visit ended and I'm not sure if seeing another specialist is worth it or not for him to tell me the same thing. I'm trying to do my best to cope with it and if I keep busy I sometimes forget about it but I still know its there as I constantly stop at times to listen to the ringing.
I'm scared because I'm relatively young at 25 and I do everything I can to stay healthy, exercise, ear protection, etc.
What should I do guys?
This nightmare began for me on December 30th, 2014. I was just driving to the mall with my mother and out of the blue I experienced a ringing in my left ear. In the past I've had ringing to the extent of 3-5 seconds very few and far betweeen, then it would disappear and I'd think nothing of it.
This time though, it never went away
I remember it was so loud and different to me that I couldn't concentrate and I was almost brought to tears because it bothered me so much. It faded to a degree but later that night was with my girlfriend who kissed my ear but made a high pitched noise as she did it right in my ear that brought the ringing back to the levels earlier in the day. I freaked out again and it's not fair because she got mad at me, and will never realize what its like. The best way I can explain it is how in certain movies a bomb or explosion goes off and the noise goes silent and all you hear is that ringing. That's how my left ear was.I went to my general doctor, who prescribed me flonase to take for 2 weeks. I had felt the week prior to 12/30/14 that I was coming down with something so I took zicam and emergenC to help me get over the sore throat I was having. Luckily I got over it, but he though maybe there was something still there.
After 2 weeks I asked for him to recommend me an ent. He sent me to Dr. Tojo at Lutheran General hospital in a suburb of Chicago. He looked at my ear said he saw some "slight redness" in my left ear. I followed up with a hearing test which showed my left ear was scoring lower than my right but both within acceptable ranges. He prescribed me prednisone for 2 weeks with a follow up in 4-6 weeks. After the prednisone I started taking lipoflavanoid plus also, and currently still am.
On 2/4/15 driving home from my grad school late at night I had a new onset of noise but this time from my right ear never before experienced. This was a super deep, low, hollow ring that lasted several minutes that put me in a panic. Eventually the next day it went back to my normal ringing. Then on 2/6/15 had yet another uproar of noise over my standard ringing butnin my left yet again. This also lasting several minutes of very loud high pitch ringing which subdued back to the normal tone the next day.
As of yesterday 2/12/15 I had my follow up visit with my ent specialist. My hearing test showed the left still scoring worse but within the ok range but no improvement. Unfortunately for me my doctor said there's nothing he can do. He told me to come back in a year and follow up with him. I asked and tried to hold on to something that he could help me with but he said there's nothing he can do. He said I could possibly have ear drum damage from a virus possibly but can't give me much more than that.
So here I am today more confused than ever more hopeless then ever. With the prednisone making minimal impact and the Lipo flavanoid making my ringing seem like it's more coming from the room next door rather then right next to me I just hope that maybe one day I can look forward to being ring free. I didn't like how my last visit ended and I'm not sure if seeing another specialist is worth it or not for him to tell me the same thing. I'm trying to do my best to cope with it and if I keep busy I sometimes forget about it but I still know its there as I constantly stop at times to listen to the ringing.
I'm scared because I'm relatively young at 25 and I do everything I can to stay healthy, exercise, ear protection, etc.
What should I do guys?
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