a lot of people with terribly damaged hearing dont get T and a lot of people with T have perfect hearing or thereabouts as you probably know. theres a line of thinking that 'damage' is a construct we create to try and understand the problem. i had bad noise damage and T as a teen but the T went completely and I've seen the story repeated elsewhere. imo its more about a hypervigilant brain seeeking out potential 'threat', an unmasking of natural neuronal activity already there. a lot of factors can overload or stress the brain which wasnt designed for today's tech/med world, but it can restore balance. over-focusing on 'damage' is restrictive as we're not hard-wired like a circuit board, therein lies hope.