Nice to Meet You All!

[Off-Kilter]

Hello all! I am a doctoral student and I have had tinnitus in my right ear for a few years now.

It horrifies me sometimes, and often makes me want to die when I consider my future. But most of all, it annoys me because I don't understand it. I don't know why I perceive it, and there are so many candidates for explanations.

1. I have autistic tendencies, and for a while one of my coping mechanisms was to listen to media on earbuds to drown out the world. (But then, why is it only my right ear? My earbuds sometimes were broken in one ear, is that why? But then why do I have no measurable hearing loss?)

2. I have always had problems with balance and co-ordination, so it's possible that there was always something wrong with my inner ears. (But then, why did I only notice it a few years ago? Maybe I always had it, and I've been obsessively focusing on it because of the stress of my recent life?)

3. I have been on various medications for depression and anxiety for years, and was suffering withdrawal symptoms from coming off one of them when I first started to notice it.

I can see that I will eventually habituate. But will I ever come to terms with why I have it?

You might say, "why does it matter why you have it?" And that makes a lot of sense, but the problem is that I don't make a lot of sense. I have always been too hard on myself and been sort of masochistic, and part of me wants (1.) to be true so that I can finally say that I ruined my own life. My psychological problems are definitely more of a problem than my actual T.

I hope I can come to some sort of peace here.

Thank you if you read this all the way through!

 

[Alue]

Hello all! I am a doctoral student and I have had tinnitus in my right ear for a few years now.

It horrifies me sometimes, and often makes me want to die when I consider my future. But most of all, it annoys me because I don't understand it. I don't know why I perceive it, and there are so many candidates for explanations.

1. I have autistic tendencies, and for a while one of my coping mechanisms was to listen to media on earbuds to drown out the world. (But then, why is it only my right ear? My earbuds sometimes were broken in one ear, is that why? But then why do I have no measurable hearing loss?)

2. I have always had problems with balance and co-ordination, so it's possible that there was always something wrong with my inner ears. (But then, why did I only notice it a few years ago? Maybe I always had it, and I've been obsessively focusing on it because of the stress of my recent life?)

3. I have been on various medications for depression and anxiety for years, and was suffering withdrawal symptoms from coming off one of them when I first started to notice it.

I can see that I will eventually habituate. But will I ever come to terms with why I have it?

You might say, "why does it matter why you have it?" And that makes a lot of sense, but the problem is that I don't make a lot of sense. I have always been too hard on myself and been sort of masochistic, and part of me wants (1.) to be true so that I can finally say that I ruined my own life. My psychological problems are definitely more of a problem than my actual T.

I hope I can come to some sort of peace here.

Thank you if you read this all the way through!

I don't know if it will give you peace knowing why you have it, but I get wanting to get to the root cause of things. I'm the same way. For me I 95% know what caused it, it was some idiot that set off a loud sound right next to my head. But knowing that doesn't take away anything. I'd almost rather it be self inflicted, but that's just me.

With regards to depression medications and withdraws; I have a theory about how mind altering drugs can seem to cause tinnitus when they are not actually ototoxic. Tinnitus can be seen as an inappropriate and over-reactive brain response to a loss of auditory input, a lot of people that lose hearing as they age or through injury do not develop tinnitus. I think that certain antidepressants can change the way the brain responds to this loss of input. Stress can also interfere with the normal brain reaction to hearing loss.

 

[billie48]

Welcome to the forum.

There are many causes of tinnitus including drug reaction, ear or Eustachian tube infection, ear drum injury, fluid build-up feeling pressured, TMJ, blood circulation, noise exposure or acoustic trauma, neck problems, hearing loss, Meniere's, barotrauma from flight, stress, anxiety & panic disorder, grief, etc....

Sometimes it is not easy to pin point the exact cause, like in my case too. One night I just woke up with this ultra high pitch dog whistle T out of the blue. Hearing loss? Stress? Barotrauma (I flew a week before that)? Acoustic trauma (I fixed a faulty smoke alarm a month before)? Drug reaction? Not sure which one is the culprit or a combination of those.

Anyway, the process of worrying what could have caused my T is actually creating stress and anxiety itself. So I stopped chasing the ghost and decided to focus on the right strategy to follow. I read many success stories to give me peace and hope, and learn the insight of strategies used by others. I applied some of these plus those of my own. Today I live a normal and enjoyable life again. Good life can be back. Believe it. God bless.

 

[Off-Kilter]

I'd almost rather it be self inflicted, but that's just me.

Wow, it really is interesting how different people are from each other.

I thrive on overcoming obstacles that aren't my fault, but when I consider the ways I have sabotaged myself that are my fault, I can become very emotionally unstable. My mum always described me as a "self-sabotager", and that's what I am. But truthfully, I have always wanted to be happy, I just have a personality type that doesn't fit reality so I end up doing ridiculous things that affect my life.

My favourite example is that I have a hole straight through my septum which is solely caused by when I used to pick my nose as a coping mechanism. I knew it was happening, but I couldn't stop doing it. And now I'm damaged. I feel that the T is the same sort of thing.

I have accumulated many scars like this (physical and mental), but objectively my life keeps getting better. If you had seen me years ago, you'd never guess that I could ever be in a relationship and studying at a postgraduate level. I would have seemed to have a mental disability, whereas nowadays most people just think I'm odd.

the process of worrying what could have caused my T is actually creating stress and anxiety itself

You're right. I don't want to have an answer, I want to get to a place where I don't care. The only reason I care abpout the answer is so that I can fit it into my "self-sabotager" narrative, which I don't like. I don't want to think in terms of that narrative anymore. We all make mistakes, I want to be able to laugh off my past experiences instead of letting them bring me to tears.