Musician Just Diagnosed with Tinnitus — Anyone Else & Next Steps?

I had my ENT visit and audiologist hearing test yesterday. Minor high-frequency hearing loss, but they said my hearing is "pretty good, overall" and not to worry. Life-long guitar play and been playing live shows for the last 3 years after a long break.

I wore earplugs, but sometimes they fell out or I forgot to put them back in between sets. I have been wearing the earplugs consistently the last few gigs and my tinnitus came out of nowhere 3 weeks ago. No acoustic trauma that I can recall, no ringing right after a show or days after a show.

QUESTION: Did you get a similar diagnosis and did you continue to play live music, but adjusted your setup, earplugs/IEMs, etc? What did you do or what do you do now?

Thanks.

 

Welcome to the forum. Sometimes members here list a reason for their tinnitus as 'cumulative damage' by noise exposure over a long period. At the time tinnitus shows up, it may not be right after another noise exposure event. But acoustic trauma is only one of the causes of tinnitus. Perhaps I list some of the more common causes below and see if you have anything like these recently.

There are many causes which can trigger or aggravate tinnitus including but not limited to drug reaction or side effects from ototoxic drugs, ear wax build-up, ear or Eustachian tube dysfunction or ETD, ear drum injury, fluid build-up in ears feeling pressured or fullness, sinus infection & congestion, especially with a bad cold, TMJ, TTTS, high blood pressure or blood circulation problem, loud noise exposure or acoustic trauma/shock, head trauma & injury, neck injury or muscle problems, hearing loss, Meniere's Decease, barotrauma from sudden change of air pressure such as during landing & taking off on flights especially with blocked nose causing failure to balance the pressure changes, slapping of the ears, deep grief for the loss of loved ones, untreated sleep apnea, extreme, extended stress, anxiety & panic disorder, etc., etc.

Being that the Introduction section may not have enough musician members to respond to you, you can either post another thread at the main support forum, or do a search with title like 'musician' like below link and you will see many prior discussions from musicians.

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/search/search?keywords=musician&t=post&o=relevance&c[node]=11