Sudden Inexplicable Tinnitus and Hyperacusis — Now 4 Months In

I just stumbled across Tinnitus Talk and figured I'd dive in.

In late August of this year, I suddenly developed tinnitus and hyperacusis in my left ear. By "suddenly," I mean it was as if someone flipped a switch and I went from being basically normal to having both problems. Bam. Just like that. I also experienced a loss of physical sensation (numbness) around my left ear and in the side of my face.

My initial thought was that I was having a stroke. I'm a 36-year-old healthy, lithe, veggie-eating, sugar-avoiding runner who doesn't drink or smoke (anymore), so the idea that I'd be having a stroke seemed strange; however, what I was experiencing was WEIRD... and scary. So I had my wife drive me to the emergency room. We sat there for 7 hours without seeing a doctor and finally figured we may as well go home since I wasn't dead.

Four months, eight doctors, an MRI, various drug regimens, and a few dietary restrictions later, nothing I've done has helped. The tinnitus and hyperacusis are still going strong in my left ear, and I do register modest low-frequency hearing loss on that side. At some point, I developed much less noticeable hyperacusis and tinnitus in my right ear as well. It may have happened at the same time as the left ear, but there's no way to really know. The ringing in the left ear is much louder than the right ear, so it's hard to notice on the other side. The numbness in the side of my face comes and goes. Shortly after this began, I also started having random spasms in my face (mostly on the left side, but some on the right).

I've received a diagnosis of cochlear hydrops (Meniere's disease without the vertigo, essentially) from a sub-specialist ENT, but I'm a little suspicious of the diagnosis because:

• It doesn't explain the numbness
• It doesn't explain why this happened so suddenly
• It doesn't explain the frequent spasms

When I questioned the doctor about this, he became very defensive about his diagnosis. In any event, I am taking a prescription diuretic and eating a low-salt diet (I already was eating a low-salt diet... now it's just even lower) to test the theory that excess fluid is being retained in my cochlea. So far, these efforts have done nothing whatsoever. I feel exactly the same.

I finally got an appointment with a neurologist for later this month. We'll see what he or she says.

There's more I could say. I'm also a musician, although I don't have much reason to think my condition is noise-induced. I've been out of the live music game since COVID-19, so it's not as if I'd recently been abusing my ears with loud sounds. I've also been good about wearing earplugs at band practice and at venues over the years. And besides, music/noise-induced tinnitus would, I suspect, be more of a gradual thing than the suddenness of my symptoms. I was sitting alone in a quiet room when it started. Anyway...

The worst part of all this is how depressing it all is. I have a 6-year-old son, and his high-pitched voice is truly painful to listen to because of the hyperacusis. I also hear distortions in my left ear and can notice the frequencies I'm not hearing when I sing or play music. If anybody actually reads this, I think the main thing I'm looking for is some guidance for not dwelling on this problem and somehow accepting it and moving on. I know that's what I have to do, but I don't really know how.

Thanks.

 

Welcome to the forum. Have you done an MRI to rule out the rare occurrence of an acoustic tumor? Your symptoms seem to be related to hearing loss or acoustic trauma because of having some degree of hyperacusis.

Anyway I am not a doctor so I cannot give professional opinion on your conditions and why you have those other unexplained symptoms. Hope you can find the root to those symptoms. But as for coping with tinnitus, for brevity, perhaps I can share my success story "From Darkness to Light..." which you can find in the first page of the Success Stories. I share many helpful strategies there, some from myself and some from other members. Please check it out.

Take care. God bless.

 

The way I coped with it was to allow myself to grieve for the loss of silence. This can take months or even a year.

By then the noises etc are the new normal. At that point push yourself to do things that you used to enjoy but think you can’t now.

You may find that you can actually enjoy things unexpectedly.

Hopefully then you can habituate.

It worked for me. I had noises still but they just weren’t important as I could still do the things I loved.

 

@Heathen, I’ve just read your post. How are you now?

Sending prayers.

 

I know what this was and it was SSHL.

The first doctors you saw were uneducated fuckwits. And I mean that in the kindest way possible.

I wish you had stayed in the ER for a little while longer. And told them that you had lost all hearing, not just have distortion. They would have given you steroids and referred you to an ENT for further management.