I Give Up. Trying a Forum.

Prefix: I joke (good and bad). It's something I've done all my life. I'm not dismissing or lessening the seriousness of this.

When filling out the field for the start date of tinnitus to be active here, I had no clue what to put. I've reached senior status (even though I think the age these days should start at 70 not 60) and months prior, my partner and I were vegging out on the couch and I asked something like, "Do you ever hear noise inside your head?" She looked at me like I had four eyes and I wasn't wearing my glasses. I attempted to explain but not well. When going to bed (that means unwinding not sleeping), it finally dawned on me that was tinnitus. For decades my own inside joke was I'd hear a sound for a moment at varying frequencies. I'd raise a finger because it literally felt like I was having one frequency from a hearing test. No one saw it and I'm okay having "inside jokes." What I didn't realize what it was tinnitus probably occurring sporadically through much of my adult life. At least my memory is raising my "clean" finger like a reflex.

It got worse. I had been taking low doses of a benzodiazipam (which I probably totally misspelled but it's late and I'm lazy right now to look for it). Stopping it had never been a problem and despite what doctors told me, they don't help (noticeably) and I wasn't sure what to do next. After briefly trying a scary one, went back to the lesser evil diaz. with a shorter half-life than most. Also take zolpidem rather than using a mallet on my head to knock me out.

Fast-forward a couple of years. I had done research on causes and help because there is no cure. But causes go on forever and they're just guesstimates. I stumbled across one viable reason - otosclerosis. Bingo. In my own laywoman's terms, it's an ossification typically beginning in the middle ear bones, so they stop moving reducing hearing. Since it's a disease, this makes sense that over time, it would branch out into the auditory canal and begin to kill off the celia preventing the fluid carrying sound to reach my brain (like the anti-King Midas turning everything into pseudo-stone). Bingo ... but who really knows.

It became and is fairly torturous for me. Just to make things more challenging, I had a cochlear implant. One of the side-effects is tinnitus. Well, I already had it. How worse would it get. Grew up hearing (with aids) and knew deafness was around the corner. I know the history of its development but I'll never know the truth. Sorry, somewhat unfocused. In the end, the other torture job I knowingly took was to research the heck out of it and go through with the implant. The ENT said do two but quickly retracted and said one. It's my belief during our rather brief meeting, he sensed two would be overload, thank goodness. So, I have a very expensive and ill-fitting mass behind an ear under my skin (the metal with mesh and screws holding it on) and the only reason I use it is because it can lower the volume of the (shortening Tinnitus to T) T. Even this gets compounded. While it effectively works by allowing sound to be processed, removing it at night with nothing to slip in and deaden the T would stop the mask-effect.

I started keeping a bedtime record of a scale and the multitude of disharmonic and counter swoooooosh swoosh low hummmmmmm battling in my brain. I don't know if not knowing music - playing it on various instruments, reading various scales, and just being blind as to what notes and keys would make it easier for me but that's impossible because I can't hear. Calling T a calcalphony (sorry, not using spellcheck) battle in my head doesn't come close to what it is others than an invention by America's enemies to make us nuts or find out how strong we are. (I'm not serious about about this but it really does seem like it could be used as a weapon of warped destruction.)

When folks say what they use at night, it's great it works for them. But one runs into a problem when you can't hear and trying using a fan or a noise to dampen the T.

I know refocusing can refocus my energy from T and place it elsewhere. It just doesn't always work.
We now own a couple of cute hooded rats (hey, they're smart animals : )). My hearing dog is along for the ride ... rather their food. They get minor trade-offs the dog who sits patiently waiting for their lettuce stalks, organic cherry tomatoes, carrots - the girls get theirs. Thank goodness he appears afraid of them (he's short, long, and a wuss).

I think my two days of getting a few hours of sleep is catching up, so I'll end this hear (yep, using hear was misspelled on purpose). I was glad to see a rather active forum. It's my last stop.

I'll be reading more manana, folks. Whoever was the innovator of creating this forum was a brainiac. I appreciate it's out here. Thanks and good night.

Ciao.

 

Hi Brinna, quite a story and introduction. I think you will fit in nicely here. Welcome to TT...
I read at Gitmo they used to torture prisoners with Rap & Metal Music 24/7/365 So you are not far off on torture....

 

I get verbose and apologize. Was a tech writer (and other things in IT for many years.

 

Hi Brianna I'm your age and wonder if you've talked to the doctor about taking a little melatonin. I've read that our body makes less of it when we age.