The Bupropion Blues

[Damo]

It's been about 2 weeks since I started taking Bupropion, and for the last 2-3 days I've had this incessant high pitched ringing in both ears (slightly worse in the left). I stopped taking the drug about 24 hours ago (after googling tinnitus and Bupropion), at which time I was not sure weather to laugh/cry/scream... To say my anxiety is off the charts after reading that this would be permanent was an understatement.

Currently I'm sitting here waiting for 8:30 am to roll around so that I can book an appointment with my GP and get some advice. I'm trying to drown out the noise with a cacophony of sounds, I've pretty much got everything with a noisy motor or fan inside it running... The air purifier is sucking down air (for no good reason), the pedestal fan is running (in spite of the fact its freezing), my 3D printers UV light curing station is running (even though its not actually curing anything), I've got my outdoor security cameras audio playing (because its filled with the sound of wind noise and birds chirping) and yet I can still hear it.

Last night in bed I had the dehumidifier running, the clothes dryer on, a white noise generator running on my phone... The only two things that seemed to make any real headway in masking the noise were turning on the fan heater, getting in the shower, blasting my face with hot water... and putting in my Galaxy Buds with the ambient noise setting on 'Extra High', then listening to 'The Hitchhikers Guide to the Galaxy' BBC radio drama. For some reason, that show seemed to have the perfect mix of random background music, stupid sound effects and vocals that made me temporarily forget this ringing and think about something else.

I'm trying my hardest to ignore this ringing in my head... I think at best I've managed only a minute or so before I start remind myself about the noise I'm trying to forget. My watch tells me I was asleep for a total of 3 hours 25 minutes last night, my current blood pressure is 140/90, my heart rate is 96bpm, and this anxiety has left me with this horrible feeling in my chest.

I'm 41 years old, and the thought of spending the remaining 41.9 years of my life (according to the average lifespan of a male in Australia) listening to this noise is enough to make me want to jump off a bridge (don't worry, I'm not suicidal... but I can definitely sympathise with people on here that have said they were... if this went on forever I could very easily see myself contemplating it).

 

[Luman]

Welcome, and I'm sorry to hear about this. But, the good news is that it will improve if not go away entirely especially if it was induced by meds. Do not use headphones with loud sounds or earbuds at any volume. Even if your tinnitus is not from hearing damage, you are risking permanent damage and if you think things are bad now, it can get worse from loud noises. The vast majority of those with tinnitus can tune it out, over time, and if your tinnitus remains it is highly likely that you will be able to do this, as well, with habituation which is a natural process.

Good luck with the doctor's visits and the sound management, and do not subject your ears to loud noise, even it if seems to help with tinnitus - there are ways to reduce the perception of tinnitus, without risk of hearing loss and/or worsened tinnitus.

 

[PeanutButter]

I got tinnitus while taking Pristiq 50 mg for 24 days. I didn't know what that sound was and just thought oh, that must be the drug working, then I realized this high pitched ringing sound is very loud and extremely disturbing, so I immediately stopped. It's been 9 months of constant severe tinnitus all from taking an antidepressant for 24 days and my doctor thinks it's not brain damage since it was a low dose. THEN WHY DO I HAVE TINNITUS FOR 9 MONTHS STRAIGHT AFTER, NEVER HAVING HAD IT BEFORE THE ANTIDEPRESSANT? I also told my doctor that I didn't want an SSRI and if I knew what an SNRI was I would have never taken it. But I was depressed and wanted to help myself feel better.

Well now after taking that antidepressant I have had my depression worsened by a factor of 10. I have suicidal thoughts everyday, and my anxiety is uncontrollable. Having this muffled buzz constantly is like being water boarded with noise, it's torture.

I've been to two ENTs and they have no idea what an SSRI is or how the antidepressant gave me tinnitus. They didn't help, they just told me to get used to it. My doctor who prescribed this medication doesn't think twice about how my quality of life is now dramatically reduced since I cannot sit in a quiet room without wanting to bash my head against a wall out of frustration that the ringing will not go away.

The anxiety threw me out of bed multiple times at night. I can't read a book without becoming frustrated that the ringing is now the way my brain hears sound and it will never go away. When I read that it was permanent I thought no way, this can get better, I only took the drug for 24 days. Then I kept googling, tinnitus from antidepressant, and talking to many different people, and EVERY SINGLE PERSON WHO GOT TINNITUS WHILE TAKING THE ANTIDEPRESSANT STILL HAS IT. it doesn't matter if it was for 2 days or 20 years. If you develop tinnitus from an antidepressant and it doesn't go away when stopping after 2-4 weeks, it's permanent.

There should be a class action lawsuit against SSRIs because if this is correlated to tinnitus, people with clinical depression will not tolerate tinnitus very well and will likely slip into a even more unimaginably worse depression, and anxiety. Pristiq made everything worse for me. My life sucked before taking it, and it's just a matter of time till I'm tired of dealing with people and tinnitus and can finally be free of of this.

I was never suicidal before. I actually loved my body and ate healthy, and ran half marathons, which was my way of battling depression. But now I hate the fact that this dumb doctor prescribed me a drug that I asked her not to, and never wanted to take it, only to be very depressed and desperate to feel better, taking it for 24 days hating every second of the side effects and the tinnitus is the only reason I contemplate suicide daily. Waking up and my ears are screaming EVERYDAY I punch my pillow, and try not to violently bash my head against everything, since it would help nothing, but I have so so so so much anger due to tinnitus and the doctors' neglect.

GOOD NEWS: you took the drug for 2-3 days, it's been less than a week. I think you have a very very good chance of the tinnitus fading away. But I've also talked with people who took Prozac for 2 days and had tinnitus for 1-2 years and they still have it. Basically, good luck. I hope to god your tinnitus goes away, because if you weren't suicidal before, you will be in about a month.

 

[T_Almost_Gone]

@PeanutButter, the info out there is very patchy. In any clinical papers they don't follow up x months later to see if the tinnitus is still there. But it does stop for lots of people, it's just that those people don't come back online.

Please read my thread here, it should give you some hope:

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/bupropion-induced-tinnitus-—-reduced-by-70.41536/

I'm frigging 20 MONTHS IN and took Bupropion for just 1 month.

Question - did you take any other antidepressants prior? And are you taking any now?

@Damo, wishing you best of luck too.

 

[PeanutButter]

@PeanutButter, the info out there is very patchy. In any clinical papers they don't follow up x months later to see if the tinnitus is still there. But it does stop for lots of people, it's just that those people don't come back online.

Please read my thread here, it should give you some hope:

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/bupropion-induced-tinnitus-—-reduced-by-70.41536/

I'm frigging 20 MONTHS IN and took Bupropion for just 1 month.

Question - did you take any other antidepressants prior? And are you taking any now?

@Damo, wishing you best of luck too.

You can keep telling yourself the people who are cured don't come back online. I'd guess they are pissed and don't want to waste more of their life focusing on tinnitus and have habituated enough to not come on these sites. I have no idea why I now have tinnitus after 24 days of the antidepressant. Could have been ototoxic but no doctor is competent enough to know what they did to me.

 

[Damo]

It has been a couple of months now.

The tinnitus is still present, it is ever so slightly quieter than when I first posted, but even now as I sit outside on the deck it's still there ringing away over the sound of birds, conversations people are having and the music playing inside the house.

I'm just doing my best to ignore it. The worst time of course is when I'm trying to sleep and all is quiet, I typically try and run the clothes dryer just as I go to bed and I have a dehumidifier in the bedroom that provides a bit of an ambient hum.

I kind of agree the reason people don't post more often would be they're trying to get on with their lives. When I first logged in to this site it was to research everything I could, and I quickly came to the conclusion that tinnitus is a very personal experience. Everybody has slightly different symptoms/experiences of it, and what works for one person may not work for somebody else. I'd taken other SNRI/SSRI's (Cipramil, Effexor) many many years ago (over 15 years old) and had no ill effects.

For me personally I've decided to just try to live with it and try to habituate rather than spending years chasing hopes and dreams with everything from laser therapy to herbal supplements. Science doesn't have any clear cut answers, tests or treatments, and I don't want to live my life focusing on tinnitus.

If one day something happens that magically helps my symptoms I would definitely come back and share it, but for me I see little point in posting/dwelling on something I have insufficient knowledge to help people with.

 

[PeanutButter]

It has been a couple of months now.

The tinnitus is still present, it is ever so slightly quieter than when I first posted, but even now as I sit outside on the deck it's still there ringing away over the sound of birds, conversations people are having and the music playing inside the house.

I'm just doing my best to ignore it. The worst time of course is when I'm trying to sleep and all is quiet, I typically try and run the clothes dryer just as I go to bed and I have a dehumidifier in the bedroom that provides a bit of an ambient hum.

I kind of agree the reason people don't post more often would be they're trying to get on with their lives. When I first logged in to this site it was to research everything I could, and I quickly came to the conclusion that tinnitus is a very personal experience. Everybody has slightly different symptoms/experiences of it, and what works for one person may not work for somebody else. I'd taken other SNRI/SSRI's (Cipramil, Effexor) many many years ago (over 15 years old) and had no ill effects.

For me personally I've decided to just try to live with it and try to habituate rather than spending years chasing hopes and dreams with everything from laser therapy to herbal supplements. Science doesn't have any clear cut answers, tests or treatments, and I don't want to live my life focusing on tinnitus.

If one day something happens that magically helps my symptoms I would definitely come back and share it, but for me I see little point in posting/dwelling on something I have insufficient knowledge to help people with.

Mine became more quiet after 4 months, but I was really hoping it would go away completely. So, after 10 months of tinnitus I still want to kill myself. My life wasn't worth living before, I'm completely alone 24/7 and have been for over a decade and I'm in my 20s. Now I have nothing but hatred for myself for taking that stupid medication that I knew would never help cure my depression, and I didn't know it would cause me to have permanent tinnitus that has made me so much more depressed. I mean I never wanted to kill myself before, but now I almost feel like 1 day someday in the future I'm going to break and buy that gun and never think twice.

Either way, how on earth can a drug that is prescribed to treat depression be approved when there is a risk of permanent tinnitus? Another condition that caused depression and suicidal thoughts. Its like god is laughing at me, "oh you think your sad now with depression, just wait until I give you tinnitus."

But yeah this was the last straw. I give up on life and will be a bitter asshole until my last breath because of how much I hate this society and human life.

The only way I can win a lawsuit over this is if I killed myself and my family sued the drug company and my doctors for negligence, because the whole reason I have tinnitus is because of a stupid doctor that didn't listen to what I told her. God I'd love to see her in a box under a bridge after I sue her and then spit on her cardboard box until it falls apart.

 

[T_Almost_Gone]

You can keep telling yourself the people who are cured don't come back online.

If they've habituated enough to not return here, then that's a relative win.

don't want to waste more of their life focusing on tinnitus

If you believe time on this forum focusing on tinnitus is a waste of your life, then...