1.When did your T start? (Some people know a specific date, while others seem to have had it forever.)
At 4am on 6th April 2012 - woken up by violent, frantic, screamingly loud electrical buzzing darting from side to side inside top of head.
For a few days before I had asked my son whether he could hear tiny 'electrical type' noises in the new house - he couldn't. He switched off the whole electrical supply, brought more people round & they all listened. None of them could hear anything. I assumed that I could hear better than all of them - I've always been able to hear a certain frequency of sound (eg. ambulance sirens etc.) before anyone else.
2.Do you have any idea where it came from?
- Purchased house in Cornwall 3 weeks before it began - very thick granite walls meant complete silence at night (am in UK).
- Overhead electricity cables at new house.
- New superhub router.
- Change of altitude, air pressure, humidity.
- Allergy or congestion in eustachian tubes due to new convector heaters (dust?).
- Possibly neck or wisdom teeth problem / TMJ.
3.How have you tried to treat it or make it tolerable? (Meds, sound generators, Neuromonics, music, foods, etc.)
- Initially prescribed doxycycline, betahistine & a nasal spray by GP. I don't like taking drugs. They made my head foggy & I was scared because I was shaking horribly (could have been the fear rather than the drugs). The GP hadn't made it sound as though they were going to really help anyway so I finished the doxycycline & stopped taking the betahistine. Convinced the spray made me shake so hardly used any.
- Weeks with constant hot steam generator filling the room & using steam inhaler did no good at all
- Consultation & hearing test (normal) with ENT consultant who told me that it would eventually go away but it would take a long time.
- Spent months in France with friend to try & retain my sanity (almost didn't!) .
- Sold house in Cornwall & moved back to Hampshire (at immense expense & leaving area where my son lives - did not want to!); thus getting rid of complete silence, high altitude, high humidity, overhead electricity cables etc.
- Got rid of new superhub router.
- Distraction rain sounds playing almost all the time until recently (not masking).
- Gave up drinking tea as it definitely made it go crazy (tried to replace this with decaff black coffee but it had the same effect - cappaccino with real coffee does not make it go crazy so it's not the caffeine!).
- When tinnitus very loud I have some kind of rain / noise playing near ears to mask the noise.
- Booked hospital appointment to have wisdom tooth extracted under general anaesthetic (neither lidocaine nor combinations of similar local anesthetics work for me - once I had eleven injections at the dentist.. nothing!).
- Efforts to clear eustachian tube congestion, that I'm not even sure I have, by recently eating spicy food & inhaling menthyl.
4.How have those efforts been working out?
- Pressing thick tin foil over both ears in the first few weeks stopped the tinnitus completely but it came back when removed. Suggested by friend when I mentioned electricity cables. Eventually I realised that I couldn't live with tin foil constantly on my ears.
- Tinnitus level changes all the time & has periods of not being there at all for hours at a time. But it's been like this for ages so probably not due to anything I have done.
- Tinnitus now feels more 'distant' but there are still days (and nights) when it's loud.
- I think I still believe that it will stop eventually.. it seems to be trying to stop & I don't get an echo sound when tracing fingers down side of neck below ears anymore.
- Hyperacusis has almost gone, far less severe than before.
- Still get the 'full feeling' in ears but not as often.
- Have retained sanity (mostly).
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