Hi all,
I'm new to this forum. I thought I would let some people know you can live with tinnitus and loud tinnitus at that.
I had a little ringing in one ear in my twenties; I'm now sixty-three. As the years past by, I got it for a longer duration and more often until finally, I had it all the time and in both ears.
At times, I could actually hear four different sounds in both ears. One ear had three distinctive sounds. In my thirties, I started having vertigo, fullness in my ears, and loss of hearing.
As for the vertigo, I had about one vertigo attack a year and had a number of visits to ear, nose, and throat doctors.
One doctor had mentioned Meniere's Disease back then, but didn't take it any further than that. These attacks continued for years until finally in 2007 I was experiencing vertigo every other day.
I was finally diagnosed with Meniere's Disease and was treated for that with Gentamicin injections to my eardum. This stopped the vertigo for six years.
To make a long story short about Meniere's, the vertigo came back in 2014 and right now I'm suffering with it every other day.
I lost my job of ten years due to it and have since retired after a period of disability. I'm trying to see if less caffeine, salt, and sugar lessens the symptoms.
I wanted to let you know about the disease because tinnitus is part of it. In 2007, when my vertigo got worse, my tinnitus was at what I told people I called, "suicide levels." I cried daily and couldn't imagine living with such horrid, daily torture.
So now I knew what was wrong with me the vertigo and the tinnitus being the worst thing I ever had to deal with in my entire life.
Because this forum is focused on tinnitus, I won't go on about Meniere's, even though my guess is that a number of people here have it too. Tinnitus is extremely difficult to live with at first. It took me some time to be able to do that.
At first I was focusing on getting rid of it and that became not only my mission, but also my problem. To put it another way, when my husband passed at a very young age, I somehow kept thinking maybe I could change that, maybe somehow he will walk through the door. I wanted things to be so different. I wanted him back, period. Then I thought about my tinnitus and how I was fighting to end it completely. Now I know this may sound strange, but finally I learned the key-acceptance. I began to think of my tinnitus as part of me, as who I am. I am someone who has tinnitus, and I have to accept it-for now. I can tell you with 100% certainty, the more I did that, the less anxiety I had about it.
Also, something else happened. The less I focused on it, the less I heard it. Please don't get me wrong. I would never say that even though I've been able to do that, that I don't have times where it doesn't get to me. I do. As a matter of fact now is one of those times.
I'm only human and lately the sound has been excruciatingly loud, for a few weeks. If you can imagine having this plus vertigo every other day, then you can imagine it would get to the best of them! In this case, I do everything I can do to help myself out of what could be a very depressing situation. I call some close friends who know my situation and we go out to restaurants (I am almost deaf and wear two hearing aids now), I try to get out everyday for a few hours or even a short amount of time. I need to lose weight so I started to watch my salt, sugar, and caffeine intake which will hopefully help my vertigo too, and tinnitus (caffeine). I'm exercising more and trying not to isolate myself as I live alone. Living alone makes all this worse as there is no one at home to chat with or help me keep my mind of myself.
Thankfully, I have some great friends and wonderful family members and all my friends understand my situation and are not bothered by it. I can't have friends who are bothered by my deafness or vertigo. Of course my tinnitus doesn't affect them. No one can see tinnitus and if someone has never had it at all or a lot, they couldn't fully appreciate the treacherous feelings it causes within oneself. I have it very loud often and when it gets that bad, I try to quiet my thoughts and make myself busy.
It does help to know you are not alone by any means. There are thousands with tinnitus and many who have it like me, very loud.
All I can say is hang in there; you can do it. I live with depression and have to fight that all the time. People always ask me how I do it. I think it's mostly from inner strength I've developed from living with it week after week, year after year.
I need sound around me all the time to help mask the tinnitus; when I go to bed I turn on the fan or in the summer the air conditioner helps. I'm still here.
Being my age now, I know I still could have another 20 or so years on the planet and I can tell you one thing. If I'm going to live, then I certainly don't want to let tinnitus get the best of me. It never will-ever.
Good luck to all who suffer. We're in it together and you are not alone.
I'm new to this forum. I thought I would let some people know you can live with tinnitus and loud tinnitus at that.
I had a little ringing in one ear in my twenties; I'm now sixty-three. As the years past by, I got it for a longer duration and more often until finally, I had it all the time and in both ears.
At times, I could actually hear four different sounds in both ears. One ear had three distinctive sounds. In my thirties, I started having vertigo, fullness in my ears, and loss of hearing.
As for the vertigo, I had about one vertigo attack a year and had a number of visits to ear, nose, and throat doctors.
One doctor had mentioned Meniere's Disease back then, but didn't take it any further than that. These attacks continued for years until finally in 2007 I was experiencing vertigo every other day.
I was finally diagnosed with Meniere's Disease and was treated for that with Gentamicin injections to my eardum. This stopped the vertigo for six years.
To make a long story short about Meniere's, the vertigo came back in 2014 and right now I'm suffering with it every other day.
I lost my job of ten years due to it and have since retired after a period of disability. I'm trying to see if less caffeine, salt, and sugar lessens the symptoms.
I wanted to let you know about the disease because tinnitus is part of it. In 2007, when my vertigo got worse, my tinnitus was at what I told people I called, "suicide levels." I cried daily and couldn't imagine living with such horrid, daily torture.
So now I knew what was wrong with me the vertigo and the tinnitus being the worst thing I ever had to deal with in my entire life.
Because this forum is focused on tinnitus, I won't go on about Meniere's, even though my guess is that a number of people here have it too. Tinnitus is extremely difficult to live with at first. It took me some time to be able to do that.
At first I was focusing on getting rid of it and that became not only my mission, but also my problem. To put it another way, when my husband passed at a very young age, I somehow kept thinking maybe I could change that, maybe somehow he will walk through the door. I wanted things to be so different. I wanted him back, period. Then I thought about my tinnitus and how I was fighting to end it completely. Now I know this may sound strange, but finally I learned the key-acceptance. I began to think of my tinnitus as part of me, as who I am. I am someone who has tinnitus, and I have to accept it-for now. I can tell you with 100% certainty, the more I did that, the less anxiety I had about it.
Also, something else happened. The less I focused on it, the less I heard it. Please don't get me wrong. I would never say that even though I've been able to do that, that I don't have times where it doesn't get to me. I do. As a matter of fact now is one of those times.
I'm only human and lately the sound has been excruciatingly loud, for a few weeks. If you can imagine having this plus vertigo every other day, then you can imagine it would get to the best of them! In this case, I do everything I can do to help myself out of what could be a very depressing situation. I call some close friends who know my situation and we go out to restaurants (I am almost deaf and wear two hearing aids now), I try to get out everyday for a few hours or even a short amount of time. I need to lose weight so I started to watch my salt, sugar, and caffeine intake which will hopefully help my vertigo too, and tinnitus (caffeine). I'm exercising more and trying not to isolate myself as I live alone. Living alone makes all this worse as there is no one at home to chat with or help me keep my mind of myself.
Thankfully, I have some great friends and wonderful family members and all my friends understand my situation and are not bothered by it. I can't have friends who are bothered by my deafness or vertigo. Of course my tinnitus doesn't affect them. No one can see tinnitus and if someone has never had it at all or a lot, they couldn't fully appreciate the treacherous feelings it causes within oneself. I have it very loud often and when it gets that bad, I try to quiet my thoughts and make myself busy.
It does help to know you are not alone by any means. There are thousands with tinnitus and many who have it like me, very loud.
All I can say is hang in there; you can do it. I live with depression and have to fight that all the time. People always ask me how I do it. I think it's mostly from inner strength I've developed from living with it week after week, year after year.
I need sound around me all the time to help mask the tinnitus; when I go to bed I turn on the fan or in the summer the air conditioner helps. I'm still here.
Being my age now, I know I still could have another 20 or so years on the planet and I can tell you one thing. If I'm going to live, then I certainly don't want to let tinnitus get the best of me. It never will-ever.
Good luck to all who suffer. We're in it together and you are not alone.
Member
