Hello everyone, I come here looking for knowledge and advice. I have never had ringing in my ears until 7 days ago when I was stupid and ignorant enough to be using q-tips in the morning to clean earwax from my right ear. Ringing in the right ear, and not my left ear, began noticeably later that day and has persisted for the last 7 days and gradually increased in volume over that time. The day after it started, I noticed a lot of fluid in my ear when I woke up in the morning.
Certain factors lead me to believe this is earwax related and I hopefully did not damage my inner ear, but of course that is why I am here, to seek knowledge from everyone here so please educate me if I get something incorrect. First I have always had excessive earwax and sinus activity for the last 15+ years, second I had numerous ear infections from swimming as a kid, third I have been showering less frequently recently, and fourth over the last 7 days I have up until now, ignorantly been sleeping mostly with my head right ear facing up so that fluids would not drain at night. I have begun to shower multiple times per day over the last 48 hours and lay on the right ear down side after showering and at night as well.
My question is what are my options for treatment? I do not want to rush any quick earwax removal as to avoid further damage, instead I would like to continue showering daily. Before this all started, I was showering very infrequently over the period of about 1-2 weeks for various legitimate reasons and this infrequent showering continued into day 5 of the ringing. When I recently started taking multiple showers a day, I could start to physically feel what to me feels like earwax whereas I could not feel this sensation before day 5. This sensation of a large earwax blockage has increased noticeably every 12 hours. On day 1-5 there was no feeling of blockage at all, and to me it feels like the wax is getting closer to outside of the ear. However my ringing has increased atleast 20% from day 1 to now and the majority of that increase has been in the last 2 days.
In the first 1-5 days I could sometimes sit still and turn off all noise and listen for the ringing and hear nothing, but almost always when I would walk around/turn on the fan/consciously focus on the ringing, it would become unavoidably obvious and annoying. When I turn on a medium volume fan in my room, the ringing becomes very loud comparatively to it being totally quiet in the room. Which leads me to wonder whether I have hearing loss leading to sensitivity to certain high pitch noises made by the fan. The ringing itself is very high pitch like a dog whistle, I can not hear it over music and actually most of the time after listening to music, I stop the music and the ringing is perceived as much lower intensity.
My questions are to everyone interested in offering their advice which is very much appreciated: What treatment plan should I take, is showering often as I described above a good and sufficient plan? Is this most likely earwax blockage, and how long can the physical blockage last? What are the chances I damage my inner ear and have tinnitus outlasting the earwax? I have a friend who took certain pharma which gave him lasting tinnitus, so I have a ton of sympathy already for this community. I am just hopeful that I did not damage my right ear or anything like that would give me long lasting ringing and may be one of the lucky ones that will have this clear up along with the earwax. Thanks to everyone in advance.
Additionally 2 more pieces of information: I had a very high fatty diet when this ringing/hissing started and it is also a very dry climate. Thanks again everyone, all opinions and advice is welcome. It physically feels like I have small sized earplugs in both ears, more so in the right ear. As of today I noticed that if I gently push on the base of the ear or gently tug on the bottom lobe of the ear even for 5 seconds, then the hissing/ringing noise quiets down for about 10 seconds maximum until I can unavoidably hear the sound again. However I will not do these "exercises" often because less physical pressure applied is probably best right now. It is a very faint hiss with a dog whistle high pitch ring, definitely mild case for now. My main goal is to avoid further damage and clear up what feels like earplugs. I don't want to be putting olive oil or hydrogren peroxide (again) in my ears if hot shower mist is a safer alternative. Last night I put a few drops hydrogren peroxide in the right ear with the effect of intense fizzing for a good while. Dont want to try it again because if steam works, then that is better for harm reduction I think.
Certain factors lead me to believe this is earwax related and I hopefully did not damage my inner ear, but of course that is why I am here, to seek knowledge from everyone here so please educate me if I get something incorrect. First I have always had excessive earwax and sinus activity for the last 15+ years, second I had numerous ear infections from swimming as a kid, third I have been showering less frequently recently, and fourth over the last 7 days I have up until now, ignorantly been sleeping mostly with my head right ear facing up so that fluids would not drain at night. I have begun to shower multiple times per day over the last 48 hours and lay on the right ear down side after showering and at night as well.
My question is what are my options for treatment? I do not want to rush any quick earwax removal as to avoid further damage, instead I would like to continue showering daily. Before this all started, I was showering very infrequently over the period of about 1-2 weeks for various legitimate reasons and this infrequent showering continued into day 5 of the ringing. When I recently started taking multiple showers a day, I could start to physically feel what to me feels like earwax whereas I could not feel this sensation before day 5. This sensation of a large earwax blockage has increased noticeably every 12 hours. On day 1-5 there was no feeling of blockage at all, and to me it feels like the wax is getting closer to outside of the ear. However my ringing has increased atleast 20% from day 1 to now and the majority of that increase has been in the last 2 days.
In the first 1-5 days I could sometimes sit still and turn off all noise and listen for the ringing and hear nothing, but almost always when I would walk around/turn on the fan/consciously focus on the ringing, it would become unavoidably obvious and annoying. When I turn on a medium volume fan in my room, the ringing becomes very loud comparatively to it being totally quiet in the room. Which leads me to wonder whether I have hearing loss leading to sensitivity to certain high pitch noises made by the fan. The ringing itself is very high pitch like a dog whistle, I can not hear it over music and actually most of the time after listening to music, I stop the music and the ringing is perceived as much lower intensity.
My questions are to everyone interested in offering their advice which is very much appreciated: What treatment plan should I take, is showering often as I described above a good and sufficient plan? Is this most likely earwax blockage, and how long can the physical blockage last? What are the chances I damage my inner ear and have tinnitus outlasting the earwax? I have a friend who took certain pharma which gave him lasting tinnitus, so I have a ton of sympathy already for this community. I am just hopeful that I did not damage my right ear or anything like that would give me long lasting ringing and may be one of the lucky ones that will have this clear up along with the earwax. Thanks to everyone in advance.
Additionally 2 more pieces of information: I had a very high fatty diet when this ringing/hissing started and it is also a very dry climate. Thanks again everyone, all opinions and advice is welcome. It physically feels like I have small sized earplugs in both ears, more so in the right ear. As of today I noticed that if I gently push on the base of the ear or gently tug on the bottom lobe of the ear even for 5 seconds, then the hissing/ringing noise quiets down for about 10 seconds maximum until I can unavoidably hear the sound again. However I will not do these "exercises" often because less physical pressure applied is probably best right now. It is a very faint hiss with a dog whistle high pitch ring, definitely mild case for now. My main goal is to avoid further damage and clear up what feels like earplugs. I don't want to be putting olive oil or hydrogren peroxide (again) in my ears if hot shower mist is a safer alternative. Last night I put a few drops hydrogren peroxide in the right ear with the effect of intense fizzing for a good while. Dont want to try it again because if steam works, then that is better for harm reduction I think.
