Hi all,
I've have had tinnitus from around 2015 but generally it didn't bother me during day to day life, only at night. However, around August 2021 it became significantly worse in my left side. On another note, I've drank quiet heavily during my 30's (41 now), a few attempts at sobriety but nothing more than a few months at a time.
Now this kinda brings me to October 2021. I'd started drinking on a evening quite regularly again and I had found that when I was drinking on an evening, I would totally forget about my tinnitus. Another period of sobriety followed in January 2022 to April 2022. During this time I made an appt to see an ENT specialist as my tinnitus was heavily impacting on my mental health and ability to live/work etc. Pretty much from my first appt with the doctor (beginning of May 2022) I had next to no issue with my tinnitus, at the same time drinking slowly crept into my life again. From May 2022 until present, I have been drinking heavily and tinnitus is no longer a problem. Until 2 days ago, I decided I needed to really try put in a good period of sobriety and within 1 day my tinnitus is just as bad as it ever was. This weirdly (or possibly not) coincided with a final appt with a hearing specialist. I had said that my tinnitus isn't really bothering me currently so we decided that CBT therapy wasn't suitable at the moment.
Am I going mad and seeing correlation/causation that isn't there? My thoughts are:
Apologies for the huge post. Any insights or suggestions much appreciated. Thanks.
I've have had tinnitus from around 2015 but generally it didn't bother me during day to day life, only at night. However, around August 2021 it became significantly worse in my left side. On another note, I've drank quiet heavily during my 30's (41 now), a few attempts at sobriety but nothing more than a few months at a time.
Now this kinda brings me to October 2021. I'd started drinking on a evening quite regularly again and I had found that when I was drinking on an evening, I would totally forget about my tinnitus. Another period of sobriety followed in January 2022 to April 2022. During this time I made an appt to see an ENT specialist as my tinnitus was heavily impacting on my mental health and ability to live/work etc. Pretty much from my first appt with the doctor (beginning of May 2022) I had next to no issue with my tinnitus, at the same time drinking slowly crept into my life again. From May 2022 until present, I have been drinking heavily and tinnitus is no longer a problem. Until 2 days ago, I decided I needed to really try put in a good period of sobriety and within 1 day my tinnitus is just as bad as it ever was. This weirdly (or possibly not) coincided with a final appt with a hearing specialist. I had said that my tinnitus isn't really bothering me currently so we decided that CBT therapy wasn't suitable at the moment.
Am I going mad and seeing correlation/causation that isn't there? My thoughts are:
- Alcohol distracts me enough to forget tinnitus?
- Alcohol has some other effect on my body that is actually reducing the severity? (I read that it's blood thinning effect could possibly improve blood flow to the ear and reducing severity of tinnitus.)
- Psychologically, because I was going through a process of getting checks on my hearing and hoping for a solution, I'd allowed myself to put it aside but now that process is over, the tinnitus it back?
- Complete coincidence?
Apologies for the huge post. Any insights or suggestions much appreciated. Thanks.