Exactly there's no time scale. What I posted was an interesting coincidence that I stumbled upon. It's stuck with me for the last year or so and I found it quite powerful. My cousin is a carpenter/builder, and he enjoyed playing rugby for the local team. Then one day, out the blue, a nail from a nail gun deflected and went straight into his eye. His eye had to be removed and he had a glass eye installed. His life was instantly turned upside down. He could no longer play rugby, which was his passion, because his lack of depth perception made it hard to catch the ball, and psychologically he couldn't face the fact that he may get a finger in the eye, during the scrum etc, and become blind. He told me in detail of the devastation he suffered, and this is the type of guy you wouldn't expect to open up. He told me he used to sit crying in his work van because he saw no future at all; everything just seemed pointless and bleak.
This came about because I opened up to him about my tinnitus problem (it was at a point I was severely struggling) and I asked him how long it took him to get over it. He told me after 3 years he felt he had turned a corner, and nowadays he is completely fine. He is happier then ever. An interesting side note to this is that he also has tinnitus from construction noise, but he said the tinnitus never bothered him.
Again, around a year ago I was talking to 2 guys from a well known local band who are friends of a good friend of mine. We were at a party and a band was playing, and I noticed they were using the same ACS pro ear plugs as me. So, I asked if they had tinnitus to which they both overwhelmingly said "YES"; like it was a relief to see someone else who knows what it's all about. I asked how long they'd had it etc, and they said years, so I immediately told them how I was really struggling, and their reply was staggeringly simular to my cousins. They basically said it was incredibly hard, they quit their respective bands and fell into a depression. My reply was to simply tell them that's what I'd just done, and that I too was depressed about it. The one guy got real deep with me and said after 3 years he felt he'd turned a corner and that the tinnitus had no effect on him anymore, whatsoever. He had been back playing in a band for years and had had no problems (interestingly, he had 2 sets of earplugs on him). The other guy said the same thing; he felt like he'd moved on and reckoned it took about 3 years.
Another person that said 3 years, and you couldn't make this up, was a friend of mine who served in the army. He acquired tinnitus from an IED explosion. Again, I had a deep conversation with him on the phone, and I didn't even realise he had tinnitus until he asked me what was up. I told him, and he shared his story with me. He went on to say that it took around 3 years (I promise you this is all true) until he felt totally fine with it, and that he no longer even thinks about it.
I thought to myself what is it with this 3 year thing! It just really stuck with me, and actually gave me sincere hope, seeing and speaking, to real people who had walked the journey already. It was like they was on the other side of an endangered bridge, cheering and helping me on, as I walked across a part that required some insight.
From my point of view I'm nothing like how I was. I was savagely depressed and now I'm content. There is nothing on this earth I could have read back then that would have made a bit of difference to my depressed outlook. Looking back on the journey I've been on gives me perspective and that's the reason I'm sharing this. I held onto that 3 year thing in my head because it seems ludicrous, but there you go. It's not scientific in anyway but gives an insight to how we handle grief; because at the end of the day, it is grief on some level that we are dealing with. It is the grief of losing silence from our lives, and like anything else that we lose, it takes time to heal.
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I hope it stays like that always for you so you never have it have to go up.
