What Is Habituation Like with Really Loud Tinnitus?

[Jkph75]

So, I have super loud T which is becoming more unmaskable by the day. I couldn't understand how this was possible given that my hearing is still apparently "normal" in my T ear. My neurologist said that is because I am not getting any sound input from my deaf ear so the T is louder. Well, that makes sense. I am wondering what habituation would look like under these circumstances. People who have habituated say that their T just fades into the background. It isn't really possible for an alarm to fade into the background. It still scares the crap out of me when I first hear it in the morning or hear it in the middle of the night. I keep reading that habituation is always possible but I can't imagine what that would be like with loud multiple noises that are always changing.

 

[dan]

I don't think its possible.

 

[Sound Wave]

I experience and view habituation as not noticing your T even though it's still there. The volume stays the same. You most likely have brief moments in your day, whether they last seconds or minutes, when you do something that requires your full attention and at that moment you don't remember / notice your T. This is habituation, when these moments start to become longer and longer.

 

[Sam Bridge]

I thought habituation was where you just stop focusing on the noise?

 

[Telis]

There are a lot of heros here with devesating T that don't even notice it anymore! Most of them have T louder than a jet engine and don't even hear it anymore. All true stories!!

 

[joseph Ghass]

Forget about Habituation.

Put it this way, your T will reduce in intensity with time to a degree where it will not bother you anymore.

Habituation is a myth.

I had severe T, now it has been reduced to a degree where it doesn't bother me anymore and THAT doesn't mean I habituated to it.

 

[Sam Bridge]

Forget about Habituation.

Put it this way, your T will reduce in intensity with time to a degree where it will not bother you anymore.

Habituation is a myth.

I had severe T, now it has been reduced to a degree where it doesn't bother me anymore and THAT doesn't mean I habituated to it.

What?

Going by what Telis and Alue say( can't think of others top of my head) you are absoultely wrong!

 

[stophiss]

Forget about Habituation.

Put it this way, your T will reduce in intensity with time to a degree where it will not bother you anymore.

Habituation is a myth.

I had severe T, now it has been reduced to a degree where it doesn't bother me anymore and THAT doesn't mean I habituated to it.

or...rather does mean you have habituated to your T and hence it is now more tolerable.
Btw, I share your disdain for the term. I am trying to think of a good analogy to an equally gag me, trite and offensive term used in other vernacular but nothing worthy come to mind.

Taking the controversial concept of habituation further...one concept is...habituation runs to the core of the very existence of tinnitus. It defines our hearing...a filter or lack of filter of background noise everybody has in their hearing track. One notion is...everybody has tinnitus but those of us are bothered by it have lost their habituation to it and hence it bothers us. This partly contributes to the sliding scale of up and down intensity. Of course habituation isn't conscious and probably depends on how much we focus upon it aka consciously as well thereby giving it veracity and acknowledgment in our minds which creates memory and repetition. Of course we all want to reverse the cycle of how it was created...that is our goal but this chronic cycle likely based upon memory and neuroplasticity is very difficult to reverse. I have had great hearing all my life and just turned 62. In fact, I still have excellent hearing only now it has the backdrop of a bothersome high frequency hiss. Years past, every once in a while, I had what sounded like a gong would go off in my head and I was never bothered by it. I didn't pay it much mind and it always went away in seconds. But, without explanation, one day what sounded like raging crickets or locus showed up in my head....about 3 months ago or so. Since time...I have had this scourge as it goes up and down in intensity...without explanation....not stress related...independent of food and drink etc. Exercise aka intensive cycling seems to ramp it up for a hour or two afterward. Some days the volume is up, others down. At some level I am so called ha-b#tch-u-ated to it i.e. I am growing used and excepting more its ebb and flow. Still sucks tho...just some times more than others.

 

[PaulBe]

I had severe T, now it has been reduced to a degree where it doesn't bother me anymore and THAT doesn't mean I habituated to it.

You know I think what you say is by definition habituation in action. Maybe that is as good as it gets, and that's what learning to live with it is about. On the other hand, would those who "habituated" not bother with a treatment if one happened along? I bet they would. I think habituation is basically about surviving and moving on with life, knowing and accepting that you have to drag this beast around with you. Parts of me are there, parts aren't and probably never will be.

 

[dan]

I think habituation is basically about surviving and moving on with life, knowing and accepting that you have to drag this beast around with you.

I think that's the best definition of habituation for loudest type tinnitus - thank you.

 

[dan]

One notion is...everybody has tinnitus but those of us are bothered by it have lost their habituation to it and hence it bothers us.

Ridiculous. Yeah, we all grow up with a noise in our ears but somewhere along the line some of us realize it and we are like wtf is that noise lol. Sounds like something from the Matrix.

 

[stophiss]

Ridiculous. Yeah, we all grow up with a noise in our ears but somewhere along the line some of us realize it and we are like wtf is that noise lol. Sounds like something from the Matrix.

so you dismiss my thesis and don't subscribe to any sort of audible range of habituation. How about a firecracker going off in your ear every second? Think you can habituate to that?...lol.
Reality is...every single person on the planet has background noise to their perception of sound. So do $10K audiophile amplifiers. The sound threshold of perceiving sound does affect ability to habituate. Its easier to habituate to lower levels of T than raging T. Those with extremely low level of T....the majority of the population never hear it.
So what you write is ridiculous. One size doesn't fit all when it comes to habituation. You are being simplistic.

 

[dan]

so you dismiss my thesis and don't subscribe to any sort of audible range of habituation.

I never said that, like you said, lower ranges of T are possible to habituate fairly easily.

How about a firecracker going off in your ear every second? Think you can habituate to that?...lol.

Nope....can you?

 

[Telis]

Forget about Habituation.

Put it this way, your T will reduce in intensity with time to a degree where it will not bother you anymore.

Habituation is a myth.

I had severe T, now it has been reduced to a degree where it doesn't bother me anymore and THAT doesn't mean I habituated to it.

hope you are right and people are mistaking reduced volume with getting used to it or habituation. I don't know though, it's been almost 3 years for me and it's still out of control loud as f//k. maybe wishful thinking but it's all I've got. There is no way in hell I get used to it at this volume, it's not normal to walk around with a smoke alarm and drills blazing in my brain so loud that they hurt the head. I feel you would have to be brain dead to get used to my T and think it as a normal part of life. When people talk of habituation it scares the fuck out of me, I need this to actually calm the hell down to survive.

 

[stophiss]

hope you are right and people are mistaking reduced volume with getting used to it or habituation. I don't know though, it's been almost 3 years for me and it's still out of control loud as f//k. maybe wishful thinking but it's all I've got. There is no way in hell I get used to it at this volume, it's not normal to walk around with a smoke alarm and drills blazing in my brain so loud that they hurt the head. I feel you would have to be brain dead to get used to my T and think it as a normal part of life. When people talk of habituation it scares the fuck out of me, I need this to actually calm the hell down to survive.

Sorry to hear you are in such agony. In your shoes, I would pull out the stops and start experimenting with different meds and every possible known therapy. I hope you are trying different things to try and knock down your noise level.
Take care Telis

 

[Telis]

Sorry to hear you are in such agony. In your shoes, I would pull out the stops and start experimenting with different meds and every possible known therapy. I hope you are trying different things to try and knock down your noise level.
Take care Telis

Thanks . Yeah tried the usual stuff like acupuncture, neurofeedback, antidepressants, supplements etc. I also have really bad H so makes it hard to get out and be normal. I don't know, it calms down slightly in the morning (still really loud though) and ramps up as the day goes on. By the evening (6ish) I feel totally paralyzed by it. Really hoping to get a quieter day, just one would give me some hope that it can turn around.

Hard to know where to start when it comes to trying things. I would even go the stem cell route but I don't know, at the same time I don't want to go around pissing money away at every so called treatment. I haven't had income in three years, kinda forced retirement so I have to watch the dollars if I'm going to be like this for the next 40 years (if I make it that is).

Anyway, thanks again for the message.

 

[PaulBe]

There seems to frequently come up a confusion between physiological tinnitus and pathological tinnitus. I don't know why this still gets a mention.

One notion is...everybody has tinnitus but those of us are bothered by it have lost their habituation to it and hence it bothers us

I've seen this said before, one poster even described hearing it coming from the mouth (mockingly) of an "eminent" medical practitioner lecturing in the UK (who clearly thought little of his patients). The statement reads as though the tinnitus we experience was always there, fully formed, then one day we happened to notice and off we went. I assume you are just posing the idea as others do because it does get floated here and elsewhere from time to time, but it doesn't really fly (float?) in the same sense that everyday aches and pains aren't equal with a broken bone that just needs a little noticing. Were this viewpoint viable then it would follow that psychiatry would be the correct front-line of treatment, not ENT/Audiology.

 

[Jkph75]

There are a lot of heros here with devesating T that don't even notice it anymore! Most of them have T louder than a jet engine and don't even hear it anymore. All true stories!![/QU

At first I thought you were serious b/c I so desperately wish that was true.

How much hearing loss do you have? Can you mask your sounds at all?

 

[Vaba]

snippp

 

[joseph Ghass]

hope you are right and people are mistaking reduced volume with getting used to it or habituation. I don't know though, it's been almost 3 years for me and it's still out of control loud as f//k. maybe wishful thinking but it's all I've got. There is no way in hell I get used to it at this volume, it's not normal to walk around with a smoke alarm and drills blazing in my brain so loud that they hurt the head. I feel you would have to be brain dead to get used to my T and think it as a normal part of life. When people talk of habituation it scares the fuck out of me, I need this to actually calm the hell down to survive.

I am. How the HELL someone can habituate to like 6 sounds ranked 8/10 in both ears? Habituation is a myth. I am really frustrated with the T community how they handle people with new T. They give them false info. NO common sense man, no common sense

 

[Telis]

I hear okay up to 8khz, couple of 30-40 db dips but have lost almost all hearing above 8khz.

 

[joseph Ghass]

Start a Fasting protocol to increase your body ability to repair itself.

Control your blood sugar, this will help your T.

Don't listen to anything else.

 

[Vaba]

I can't believe I just spewed out that much hate at 5 AM. Look what this has done to me. I'm not gonna post it... for the second time today. Goodbye, 2 hours, crafting devilish & factual responses to this thread.

snip

T has taken quite a lot from me, but it will never take my conscience. Saving it in notepad...

 

[Sam Bridge]

I hear okay up to 8khz, couple of 30-40 db dips but have lost almost all hearing above 8khz.

Totally lost above 8khz or dips?

 

[stophiss]

Thanks . Yeah tried the usual stuff like acupuncture, neurofeedback, antidepressants, supplements etc. I also have really bad H so makes it hard to get out and be normal. I don't know, it calms down slightly in the morning (still really loud though) and ramps up as the day goes on. By the evening (6ish) I feel totally paralyzed by it. Really hoping to get a quieter day, just one would give me some hope that it can turn around.

Hard to know where to start when it comes to trying things. I would even go the stem cell route but I don't know, at the same time I don't want to go around pissing money away at every so called treatment. I haven't had income in three years, kinda forced retirement so I have to watch the dollars if I'm going to be like this for the next 40 years (if I make it that is).

Anyway, thanks again for the message.

I sometimes think if I had T at a torturous level, I would heed that Tim McGraw song and live each day like I was dying. This may include more high risk behavior...packed with adrenaline to distract from this GD scourge.
This would include high speed Ducati motorcycle riding thru the canyons...surfing big waves and cliff diving and jumping out of airplanes. Anything to distract me and F the outcome. I know a cure or at least a therapy is out there or will be in the next five years to help you Telis. Hang in there. Meanwhile, live life like you are dying. Perfectly healthy people living in the cocoon of safety and risk avoidance and dying of boredom is as bad as living with T.
Cheers bro.

 

[stophiss]

Start a Fasting protocol to increase your body ability to repair itself.

Control your blood sugar, this will help your T.

Don't listen to anything else.

Interesting perspective. I have T and my blood sugar is perfect...just had a complete blood panel and its pretty flawless. I do believe the fasting suggestion is viable and worthy of a try.
As to listening to others, if that were good advice, why should we listen to you.
Kidding...I like your posts and believe you are a thoughtful guy.
Cheers

 

[zeroday]

Speaking of my T, it is unmaskable and constant high pitch ringing...have I habituated? Completely...after 20+ years with T it is not an affliction but as much of me as my own thoughts...

It is my friend and my companion...it is a comfort and relaxing state for me...I can not imagine my life without T and it doesn't interest me to "cure" it...

I know I can not speak for others as T is unique to each of us but it is "Me" and and my mind has embraced it as its own...

 

[Sam Bridge]

Speaking of my T, it is unmaskable and constant high pitch ringing...have I habituated? Completely...after 20+ years with T it is not an affliction but as much of me as my own thoughts...

It is my friend and my companion...it is a comfort and relaxing state for me...I can not imagine my life without T and it doesn't interest me to "cure" it...

I know I can not speak for others as T is unique to each of us but it is "Me" and and my mind has embraced it as its own...

That is awesome, inspiring!

 

[Telis]

Totally lost above 8khz or dips?

Ski slope not dips

 

[John G]

Habituation. I hate that word so much. Does it come in pill form?. Kidding