Noise-Induced Hyperacusis and "Reactive" / Sound-Sensitive Tinnitus 80% Gone

[Tara Lyons]

@LilSass

I'm not sure what truly caused my tinnitus. I had been an earbud user and lived in loud NYC for five years, but in the 2.5 months leading up to the onset of tinnitus, my life was very quiet as I moved to a rural area and was not listening to loud music. I was under more stress than ever before in my life, and had a couple of (very short) use of power tools, so who knows, maybe that was the straw that broker the camel's back.

I've been going to physiotherapy for three weeks now in the hopes that may help as neck movements do seem to quieten the tinnitus quite a bit.

Though, my audiogram from the ENT shows a 20/25 dB R/L notch at 3-4 kHz which indicates hearing loss. At this point I think I have to give up on finding what the cause could be. It's coming up to three months and my only hope is that in time, it will fade to the point of "can only hear it in a quiet room."

How are you doing @tbuzz89? You lived in NYC? I'm from CT. I love the city

 

[Tara Lyons]

@Tara Lyons I know. A nightmare is absolutely what it is but it will get better. There will be many ups and downs, don't get me wrong. What I do remember is that in my early months, I had decided one day to not focus on the T. I stopped trying to listen if it was still there. This gave me some kind of calm and it was really a step forward in my habituation process.

I can't really tell you why it's gotten louder, I feel like it's connected to my H and since that's gotten worse, the T has as well. T fluctuates wildly though, so sometimes it's more bearable. Funny thing is that when you have H, you suddenly care a lot less about T, at least that's my experience.

Hang in! It's still your early months and there's a real good chance it will get a lot better. One more thing and I know this is so hard: try to keep the stress about it low as I really feel when I stressed so much about it in the beginning, it actually made it worse.

I can't hang out with a bunch of people in a room. It kills my ears. It's so horrible. I feel like everything about this is becoming very reactive. I just listened to a song and I feel like my ears are shaking!

i don't know what to do because I feel like the less noise I'm around my tinnitus is better but what about the sensitivity? I can't even think about holidays and not being able to spend time with my family because of this.

The first few times I was around a bunch of people in a small room, their voices just seemed loud and I was cringing. I had dinner with my 2 aunts and cousin a few weeks ago - their voices hurt my ears, I didn't say anything. I had to leave.

yesterday hung out with some girlfriends and had my ear plugs in. Even had a few drinks and my ears have been pretty mellow all day, but I haven't been exposed to much.

I don't know what to do
I want the tinnitus to go away but I don't want to flare up the sensitive. I work in an open office. Phones, speakers, doors, music, voices. Idk if I should do ear plugs all day, I think it would be best for my ears so they don't get aggravated but how do I become sensitized to every day sound again?

@Michael Leigh
@aot @Greg Sacramento

 

[tbuzz89]

How are you doing @tbuzz89? You lived in NYC? I'm from CT. I love the city

Hey @Tara Lyons, today has been a fairly good day. I can still hear my T over everything but it seems softer and I'm starting to mentally handle it a bit better. Thanks for asking, how are you doing??

I technically still live in NYC and have an apartment downtown, but keep extending my time away due to COVID. My parent's moved to VA a couple of years ago from New York and I've been here since January due to some life events which I described in my introduction post.

I love CT! Have some friends with a place in Rowayton right on the water and summers there are amazing.

 

[Tara Lyons]

Hey @Tara Lyons, today has been a fairly good day. I can still hear my T over everything but it seems softer and I'm starting to mentally handle it a bit better. Thanks for asking, how are you doing??

I technically still live in NYC and have an apartment downtown, but keep extending my time away due to COVID. My parent's moved to VA a couple of years ago from New York and I've been here since January due to some life events which I described in my introduction post.

I love CT! Have some friends with a place in Rowayton right on the water and summers there are amazing.

Hi there glad you're feeling better. I had a good day as well actually, mentally trying to be a bit stronger and trying to realize im not the first person going through this, And it will take time, but definitely missing my old life. I just don't feel like myself since this started. I don't know if I ever will again.

Downtown? Greenwich Village area? My favorite part of Manhattan!

 

[tbuzz89]

I just don't feel like myself since this started. I don't know if I ever will again.

@Tara Lyons I completely understand that feeling. It's difficult to accept but realize this is going to be a huge journey of mind over matter.

All the way downtown right in South Street Seaport. But I agree, the West Village is my favorite all-time neighborhood!

 

[Tara Lyons]

@Tara Lyons I completely understand that feeling. It's difficult to accept but realize this is going to be a huge journey of mind over matter.

All the way downtown right in South Street Seaport. But I agree, the West Village is my favorite all-time neighborhood!

I know, all I can do is let this run its course I guess. I don't know. Can't do much else...

Ever go to Employees Only? On Hudson? One of my favorite bars, pretty loud so doubt I'll ever be going there again when this settles, or without ear plugs!

 

[tbuzz89]

Ever go to Employees Only?

YES! Also one of my favorite places. I love the Art Deco atmosphere. Spent many Thursday nights there after work over the years followed by some of the best Mexican at Ofrenda a couple of blocks east on 7th Ave.

Memories like this make me sad because like you said above, I feel like with T I'll never be able to go back to EO, all of the W Village jazz clubs, speakeasies, etc. for fear of making this beast even worse. I also stopped drinking after New Years -- it just feels like my old life is gone.

 

[Vassili]

@Michael Leigh

Hello, Michael!
I have a little question. I am 7 months in with my hyperacusis and tinnitus. I believe that H is almost gone (I still have noise sensitivity with mild pain in my ears, allover the head, neck and even back sometimes). I do not feel that everyday sounds are louder than they actually are anymore but I still have mild pain and hear my tinnitus. I want to ask is it a good sign that my tinnitus is turning more and more into a gentle hissing sound. Other different tinnitus sounds like firecrackers in the distance, the whooshing sound etc. are slowly becoming more and more quiet. I feel that soon my main sound would be similar to an old TV signal, or a gentle hiss, something like that. Is it a good sign to have such changes? Also, I've reached the phase when I usually do not hear my tinnitus outside but noisy traffic and especially motorcycles are still a problem for me so I plug my ears with professional musician's earplugs.

 

[Hotspur2931]

I just don't feel like myself since this started. I don't know if I ever will again.

You will. I remember this exact feeling – for a few months there I barely recognised myself, and I didn't know how to connect to my old life any more.

I remember as I started to slowly get back to my life I went to an exercise class that I used to really enjoy, and I could hardly keep from crying. That little glimpse of normality was overwhelming for me. I was standing in a room of "normal" people and I couldn't imagine ever feeling normal ever again.

Seems weird now, a year later, that I ever felt like that. The "I don't feel like myself" thing is temporary, and won't last more than a few months. Seriously. Eventually you remember that life is still there for the living, and you are still you.

Lizzy
Xxx

 

[jordan chis]

Hi all,

I have not been visiting this forum much anymore, my apologies. I have basically been going on with life, and I often find it best not really to think about this chapter of my life anymore. But still I try to visit from time to time, in the hope that I can help others. So I will try to answer as best I can the questions recently posted here. I am still doing very well, my symptoms are practically gone (only very mild sound sensitivity and tinnitus, barely noticeable).

- @TLion The TTTS thing still popped up from time to time, but now that I think of it I have not really had this symptom for many months. I still strongly believe that this is related mostly to stress/anxiety/fear regarding sound. As far as I am aware, TTTS is generally harmless and will improve a lot when other symptoms improve and when anxiety drops.

- @Ace I did not manipulate the pink noise much, but I made sure to use high quality pink noise covering all frequencies and I used open-ear headphones with a full frequency response (from 20Hz to 20.000Hz, i.e. the full range of human hearing). It was a Sennheiser headphone, but I would need to check the exact type. I think in general, it is just important to continue to exposure your ears to a variety of sounds within safe levels, of varying frequencies, intensities etc. and to slowly build it up.

- @Phat Tuna I did experience some set backs from time to time, and overall it was sometimes difficult to really notice progress because it was so slow. It helps to have your LDLs checked from time to time.

- @Capstan I suppose you could call it 'reactive tinnitus' but that term is also used to simply describe tinnitus that gets louder from time to time due to sound exposure. In any case, I had the weird phenomenon that I heard a sort of chiming sounds that overlayed the actual sound, but it is much better now. I still hear it on rare occasions with certain static noise sources, but it does not bother me.

- @serendipity1996 I suppose it took me about 1,5 years to get back to normal. I had to deal with the hyperacusis, reactive tinnitus, and feelings of depression, anxiety and fear that related to it.

- @Tara Lyons I did most of it on my own. I visited an audiologist from time to time for the LDL tests and for some general tips etc., but they did not really offer a full treatment program. Regarding your question, I believe it is generally recommended to use the pink noise during the day, but to have some relaxing ambient sounds at night. Personally, I did not really use much sound enrichment at night, it made my ears feel fatigued the next day.

Hey, I am glad you are doing better! May I ask how many hours of pink noise you listen to a day?

 

[CAgirl]

@tbuzz89 Just found this and could have written it myself (except I haven't had any quieter days yet). The music part really hit home yesterday. Yes, I can hear music just fine but it's accompanied with the piercing hiss. It occurred to me that I may never hear a song again without the intrusive tinnitus and it made me sad and angry. I am still hoping and praying this will go away. So hard to accept. I am such a positive person usually but this is difficult to cope with. I hope we both see improvements soon!!

 

[Gordon Steinberg]

Hi @Coffeebean
Thanks for coming on here to respond to people's queries - it means a lot!

I have a question - did/do you have any lingering anxiety about sound etc and any advice as to how to overcome this? My hyperacusis setback is pretty much gone now and I'm not really having any issues with day-t0-day noise so I guess it's reverted to a milder form of noise sensitivity as it has been for most of the past 4 years.

However, this has been by far my longest setback, taking approx. 6 months to properly resolve and I've realised I have a TON of residual anxiety about dangerous noise levels that I fear will prevent me from enjoying life. At the height of this setback back in January/February I was in a near-constant state of discomfort/pain with burning ear symptoms etc which really decimated my mental health.

Tbh I feel a bit 'scarred' (trying not to sound melodramatic) and have this pervasive fear of being one accident away from further catastrophe - one of my particular worries is fire/smoke alarms - in my head I'm already concocting future hypothetical scenarios in which I start a job at a workplace where the fire alarms are constantly tested or move into a new place with an easily triggered smoke alarm. I've been referred to CBT by my ENT which could definitely be useful with regards to the phonophobia aspect of all this. I don't know, I just felt so pleased to finally be 'out of the woods' lately but my brain can't cope with not having something to worry about it's so incredibly frustrating.

Hi Serendipity,

Would you be open to speaking about your experience a bit more? I am three weeks into something very similar for the first time, and the reactive tinnitus / distortion thing is so rare I am trying to seek out the very few people who have gone through the same thing.

If not no worries!

Gordon

 

[serendipity1996]

Hi Serendipity,

Would you be open to speaking about your experience a bit more? I am three weeks into something very similar for the first time, and the reactive tinnitus / distortion thing is so rare I am trying to seek out the very few people who have gone through the same thing.

If not no worries!

Gordon

Of course!

In my case, I suffered a setback at the end of last year so I'm about 8 months in now... and definitely substantially improved. Not totally out of the woods yet but I had all sorts of weird and scary symptoms such as facial numbness and pain in response to sounds and also in silence - this has all but gone and doesn't even react to artificial audio any longer. With regards to the distortion etc, I still have some issues with artificial audio sounding quite 'sharp' but again this has improved. For example, I used to find the creaking of a door unpleasant and very high-frequency - this is no longer an issue. I'm now having good weeks and the bad days are less frequent.

There's still a fair bit of up and down but I find the good days are outnumbering the bad - I also find the good days tend to be some of the best I've had, whereas the bad days, whilst deflating, don't tend to regress past a certain point. I've been having a few days of slight ear tenderness but it's quite mild so I've just accepted it's part of the ebb and flow of this condition. The general trend is the most important thing.

 

[Gordon Steinberg]

Of course!

In my case, I suffered a setback at the end of last year so I'm about 8 months in now... and definitely substantially improved. Not totally out of the woods yet but I had all sorts of weird and scary symptoms such as facial numbness and pain in response to sounds and also in silence - this has all but gone and doesn't even react to artificial audio any longer. With regards to the distortion etc, I still have some issues with artificial audio sounding quite 'sharp' but again this has improved. For example, I used to find the creaking of a door unpleasant and very high-frequency - this is no longer an issue. I'm now having good weeks and the bad days are less frequent.

There's still a fair bit of up and down but I find the good days are outnumbering the bad - I also find the good days tend to be some of the best I've had, whereas the bad days, whilst deflating, don't tend to regress past a certain point. I've been having a few days of slight ear tenderness but it's quite mild so I've just accepted it's part of the ebb and flow of this condition. The general trend is the most important thing.

That's great to hear! Someone else said the same thing - that we can't measure progress day by day but rather weekly or monthly given the healing time. May I ask, did any of your distortions completely go away? That's currently the hardest thing for me to deal with by far - multiple times worse than the tinnitus. I have no hyperacusis currently which I am thankful for as well.

Really appreciate you sharing!

 

[serendipity1996]

That's great to hear! Someone else said the same thing - that we can't measure progress day by day but rather weekly or monthly given the healing time. May I ask, did any of your distortions completely go away? That's currently the hardest thing for me to deal with by far - multiple times worse than the tinnitus. I have no hyperacusis currently which I am thankful for as well.

Really appreciate you sharing!

I'm still not 100% but the tinnitus, hyperacusis, distortions, and reactivity have all improved significantly. I think for most people the distortions do tend to improve. Try keeping a diary so you can track your progress - day to day it can be really hard to see improvement. I've also found that improvement tends to come in fits and bursts - I'll have a month or so of steady gradual improvement but then I'll have a week of quite dramatic improvement.

 

[GBB]

I'm still not 100% but the tinnitus, hyperacusis, distortions, and reactivity have all improved significantly. I think for most people the distortions do tend to improve. Try keeping a diary so you can track your progress - day to day it can be really hard to see improvement. I've also found that improvement tends to come in fits and bursts - I'll have a month or so of steady gradual improvement but then I'll have a week of quite dramatic improvement.

Also suffering distortions and praying they improve. They are worse than my tinnitus on some days...

Glad to hear you have made a large recovery!

 

[Zaccq]

Try keeping a diary so you can track your progress - day to day it can be really hard to see improvement.

My audiologist recommended not to do this for some reason.

 

[Michael Leigh]

My audiologist recommended not to do this for some reason.

@Zaccq

Tracking progress using a diary may suit some people others is may not. It can make a person focus more on the tinnitus and hyperacusis and it's possible this can induce stress especially in the early stages which you are in, as they are known to fluctuate a lot. You may have a few good days then suddenly things change that can cause worry.

Although on your Avatar is reads cause of tinnitus unknown, this is not usually the case especially if you have hyperacusis, or an oversensitivity to sound which is an indication of noise induced tinnitus. Prior to the onset of the tinnitus, if you were a frequent user of headphones, earbuds, headset or listened to loud music in the car, home or attended clubs, concerts regularly then your tinnitus is probably noise induced. If this is the cause then you might find my posts in the links below helpful.

All the best
Michael

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/new-to-tinnitus-what-to-do.12558/
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/hyperacusis-as-i-see-it.19174/
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/tinnitus-a-personal-view.18668/
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/acquiring-a-positive-mindset.23969/
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/tinnitus-and-the-negative-mindset.23705/

 

[Zaccq]

@Michael Leigh, thanks.

Actually, I write in my avatar as "unknown" because for me, there is possibly a number of causes and I don't really know which one it is. My audiology report was okay, not perfect, but they said I had good hearing (0-15dB) to 14kHz.

This is the first serious "spike" I've had, it's hard to understand what caused it to spike. It does appear to be improving.

The spike could because of noise trauma, ototoxicity, ear infection, TMJ, or stress. My thoughts change on this frequently.

But rather than mislead people, I have put "unknown".

Absolutely, I think that years of noise trauma has had a role, and I think my Doctor and Audiologist agree on that.

Currently I am trying to focus on improvement.

 

[Michael Leigh]

Actually, I write in my avatar as "unknown" because for me, there is possibly a number of causes and I don't really know which one it is. My audiology report was okay, not perfect, but they said I had good hearing (0-15dB) to 14kHz.

@Zaccq

Many people with tinnitus have a good audiology report with no hearing loss including me.

This is the first serious "spike" I've had, it's hard to understand what caused it to spike. It does appear to be improving.

A spike is usually caused by sound or exposure to it and the sound doesn't have to be loud. From what you have described and based on my experience with noise induced tinnitus and hyperacusis, I believe this is what you have. Noise induced tinnitus is one of the most common causes of the condition.

Please follow the advice in my posts and things will hopefully improve with time. My advice is not to use any type of headphones even at low volumes.

Michael

 

[Zaccq]

Will do, thanks.

 

[serendipity1996]

My audiologist recommended not to do this for some reason.

That's so odd. For some people it could perhaps mean they're overly focused on it but I have seen improvement over the past 2 months of keeping one.

 

[Tara Lyons]

Hi all,
I've been reading this forum for over a year now but hadn't made an account myself. Today I made one to post my story, in the hopes that it will benefit those of you who are still struggling.

I've been suffering from noise-induced hyperacusis and tinnitus for about a year. I might post the entire background story another day, but in summary I was exposed to a very loud noise at a music festival. I'd always been quite careful with my hearing, wearing earplugs at concerts etc., but my ears might neverthelss already have been weakened a bit by years of headphones use. And, I suppose, sometimes its also a bit of bad luck.

The day after the incident I woke up with ringing in my ears, almost like an electric hissing, and I became extremely sensitive to sound. Music sounded shrill, harsh and distorted, and it was like I had two megaphones permanently glued to my ears all day long. I also got pain in my ears, pain in my face and jaw, TTTS, hearing distortion, and tinnitus which was very 'reactive' / sound-sensitive: whenever I would hear a sound, the tinnitus would beep over it almost as if it was trying to overlay the original sound and compete with it.

When I first got these symptoms I became very scared and depressed, as the symptoms were very debilitating and limiting my life. I went to various doctors and ENT's who couldn't help and who told me that there was no cure, and that I would just have to 'learn to live with it' and 'wear earplugs'. My audiogramms were fairly normal (between 0 and 15dB on most frequencies), but showed that I had some noise-induced hearing loss which created a 20db "noise notch" on the 2k-4k frequencies. An extended audiogram showed that I was extremely sensitive to high frequencies, sometimes even scoring into negative decibels.

I had always loved music more than anything in my life, and because of the hyperacusis and tinnitus I could hardly listen to any music anymore. I became very scared and depressed, to the point were I genuinely started to feel like life wasn't worth living anymore, having suicidal thoughts on a daily basis.

However, the impact that this had on my life also made me determined to find a solution, so I started looking for one myself. I quickly learned that many people with hyperacusis and tinnitus tend to overprotect their ears, but that this actually makes the symptoms much worse as depriving the auditory system from sound actually caused the auditory system to 'turn up' the volume in an attempt to hear something, thereby increasing the hypersensitivity. I read about 'TRT', which as a treatment uses wearable sound generators in the ear to produce broadband noise all day long, in order to slowly stabilize the auditory system again. Since TRT was not available in my country, I decided to try if I could do it myself by using 'pink noise', which is broadband noise with less energy in the high frequencies, so that it is gently on the ears.

It took me a while to find a suitable form of pink noise (i.e. one that did not make my symptoms worse, and one that addressed the entire frequency spectrum) and a suitable headphone (as I could no longer tolerate most headphones/earbuds). I started out with a low level of pink noise each day, slowly increasing the length and volume over a period of months, and tweaking the frequencies to address my specific challenges. It took many months before I noticed a little bit of improvement, but I decided to stick with it as I was convinced that an overly sensitive auditory system needs to be desensitized, rather than kept in quiet.

There were a lot of everyday sounds that caused me trouble, such as the clanking of dishes. Again, I tried not to avoid these sounds, and instead I purposefully tried to clank them a bit louder every time to improve my tolerances. I also learned that 'reactive' tinnitus is a poorly chosen term, as it is actually a symptom of hyperacusis, which can decrease as well as you build your tolerances to sound.

Of course, I still remained careful around loud sounds, but I learned that it is very important to only use hearing protection when you are in a place in which the sound is actually too loud (i.e. so loud that it could also be dangerous to someone with normal hearing), and that you only make your symptoms worse if you start wearing hearing protection in everyday situations.

Many days were - literally - quite painful, but I soon started to view the sound exposure and pink noise as a form of exercise, like training your muscles: at the end of the day you will be sore, but when you recover you will be a bit stronger next time. The same applies to your ears. The trick is to push yourself a little bit each time, but not so much that you injure yourself. I realized that because of my experiences, I had also built certain fears and anxieties around sound that I needed to address. For that I used EMDR therapy, which is a form of psychotherapy of which I believe that it would actually deserve its own topic here on TinnitusTalk, as it was very effective in reducing my distress and effectively moved the hyperacusis and tinnitus from the foreground of my perception to the background.

After a year I would say I am about 80% better. I am not entirely cured as I am still a bit sensitive to certain frequencies of sound, but I have faith that I will continue to improve as I work on desensitizing. Improvement can sometimes take many years and I am still in my first year. I have a little bit of hearing loss, which makes certain music sound a little different, but it is nowhere nearly as bad as when the hyperacusis and tinnitus were at their worst. I no longer use the in-ear headphones, and I avoid very loud situations such as very loud rock concerts, but for the rest I live a normal life. I do not overprotect, but wear custom earplugs whenever things get real loud (live musics, loud bars, using power-tools, snowmobiles etc.). I still have a little bit of T, but as it is no longer as reactive as it was it is much earlier to live with. Sometimes I have to struggle to hear it at all.

I hope that anyone who reads this who is suffering from hyperacusis and/or tinnitus which reacts to sound and/or the other auditory symptoms I describe, will find some hope and confidence in my story that it really is possible to improve. It takes a lot of hard work and there will be setbacks, but a slow and purposeful desensitization to sound will help you in the long run. I would also like to take this opportunity to thank @Michael Leigh , whos many posts on TinnitusTalk regarding T&H were very valuable to me during my darkest days, and provided me with a lot of information and insight.

Feel free to ask me any questions!

@Coffeebean where did you get the custom ear plugs? I need some! Do they really work at protecting your ears well?

 

[GBB]

That's so odd. For some people it could perhaps mean they're overly focused on it but I have seen improvement over the past 2 months of keeping one.

If you actually improve it's not an issue - I think people recommend not keeping one because many don't improve and it can be disheartening, and it also makes habituation harder as you're expectantly searching for silence instead of becoming accustomed to the demon in your head. Proponents of habituation want you to forget about silence.

It all comes down to whether you believe habituation is a path worth taking or not. For me personally, my tinnitus / distortion is so intrusively high pitched, habituation seems akin to a lobotomy, but your mileage may vary...

 

[GBB]

this post cames at a perfect timing. I suffer of the same...
except that I don't have pain, just the distortion, the tinnitus competing with certain sounds, that get louder for microsends when I hear them.
my strategy since as two or three days ago has been to just live my life normaly and just avoid situations that get too loud.
will increase volume in my pc slowly over time, right now it is at 6...

stopped using earphones when my tinnitus started, and dont plan to resume using it.

at first used a sound generator to sleep but only made my tinnitus worse... will let the ears rest during the night as it seems to have a positive effect on the tinnitus. they suffer enough during the day as at my job it is constant 45-55db.

I use earplugs for shower (just because of the water not getting in the ear and also it is the type of sound that my tinnitus competes with when I hear it) and for long car travels (more than 10 minutes), my car is as loud as 70db.

Did this change for you? I have the same thing - little blips or pings of noise constantly overlayed over what I'm hearing.

 

[twa]

HI @Coffeebean

Thank you for your very kind comments and I'm so pleased that you have found my posts helpful. As you know I once had very severe tinnitus and hyperacusis. The hyperacusis was completely cured in two years using white noise generators, and the tinnitus reduced to a very low level. The hyperacusis was so severe, during a conversation with anyone, I had to ask them to please lower their voice as my ears were in so much pain.

Your well written post mentions all the salient points, one needs to take if they want to try and reduce their tinnitus and hyperacusis with self help. I commend you wholeheartedly with your improvements and I'm pleased that you have been able to use headphones, to administer pink noise to your specific needs without making your symptoms worse. It is clear, you have taken time and researched this matter at length. Well done and I'm sure your hyperacusis will improve further.

Take care and wishing you all the best
Michael

How are you doing Michael? I noticed this post was from 2018.

 

[Michael Leigh]

How are you doing Michael? I noticed this post was from 2018.

I am still doing okay and managing my tinnitus quite well. How are you doing since the onset of your tinnitus 2017?

 

[twa]

I am still doing okay and managing my tinnitus quite well. How are you doing since the onset of your tinnitus 2017?

Glad yours is doing well. Mine has been very low level for the last 3 years. So much so that I don't see it mentioned but one time in any of my journals. I was living life normally, thinking it may disappear over time. Recently, in quarantine I was under great stress with homeschooling and living with 2 loud family members and a loud dog for 7 months. One day, about a month ago I noticed high pitched changes. The tinnitus was louder and very noticeable. I've had some headaches, nausea, ear pain and anxiety. I thought I had an ear infection so I went to the ENT, he said nope clear and wanted to fit me with hearing aids with maskers. He said I have mild hearing loss in one ear. My ears feel like there's some pressure and sound seems muffled.

 

[Michael Leigh]

Glad yours is doing well. Mine has been very low level for the last 3 years. So much so that I don't see it mentioned but one time in any of my journals. I was living life normally, thinking it may disappear over time. Recently, in quarantine I was under great stress with homeschooling and living with 2 loud family members and a loud dog for 7 months. One day, about a month ago I noticed high pitched changes. The tinnitus was louder and very noticeable. I've had some headaches, nausea, ear pain and anxiety. I thought I had an ear infection so I went to the ENT, he said nope clear and wanted to fit me with hearing aids with maskers. He said I have mild hearing loss in one ear. My ears feel like there's some pressure and sound seems muffled.

I am pleased to hear that things have improved for you and hope this continues.
Take care

Michael

 

[SadMan]

I've been suffering from noise-induced hyperacusis and tinnitus for about a year.

I've been suffering from noise-induced hyperacusis and tinnitus for about 3 months.
After how many months did the ringing sound begin to fade?