1 Year with Tinnitus

I have been a flight attendant for 26 years. I have high pitch hearing loss. I've tried Gingko, B12, pure magnesium oil. I have given up diet soda, limited simple sugars and tried a carb free diet. I wear a hearing aid with a sound generator to get a little relief. (I could only afford one)
I have a bite guard for TMJ, get massages and tried acupuncture once.
I use medication to help me sleep.
I don't know what else to do. Wondering if any other flight crew members are suffering with this.
I'm 50 years old. There are days I'm not sure I can go on any longer.

 

Caroll, feel for you...sounds like you're doing all the right things. Have you spoken to your work? Sounds like a work related matter, never know how flight attendants do it, my ears get blocked after one flight...can't be good for you to fly constantly. Get them to pay for your other hearing aid at least.

 

Hey Caroll,

I am sory you are dealing with this

However, you have doing it right. please try to stay busy and good sleep to be distracted.

I am acgually surprised that you guys are not wearing some sort of ear protection while on duty (well, pilots do have noise cancelling headphones lol). i am sure that most of people in that profession have T. the only way i see you could save your hearing is proper breathing technique that would keep ear pressure in norm + some sort of earplugs. this is why you can find ear protection, neck support pillow in any travel store.
P.S.

almost every single person who suffers from NIHL ( aka hidden hearing loss, sensoneural hearing loss) acquires it due to lack of knowledge/understanding what that is and what you end up with...

 

Hi Caroll,

Hang in there!

To echo what was said above, you should consult your company's HR department. Check their website or call an HR rep and see what their policies are. Do they have something written down about occupational safety? You may also want to consider a consultation with an employment lawyer about this just so you have some leverage.

Best of luck!

 

Hi Caroll,
Welcome to Tinnitus Talk.
Try sound therapy throughout the night to help sleep when you can and can take a few nights to adjust to it.
I agree with the above posts and hope you get the help and support off them and hope over time you can adjust and stay in your job or maybe on the ground airport post.
Good luck and keep us posted on how you get on.
I'm due back work Monday after a few weeks off....lots of love glynis

 

Thank you for your responses. I work for a major carrier where flight attendants are not represented by a union. Protective ear equipment is only required of ground personnel who work out on the ramp. It would be hard to serve passengers wearing headphones or earplugs (although I would welcome it.) I really have not come across any coworkers who complain of this problem. Thank you Glynis, I will try to wear my sound generator to sleep. I hope you feel better as well.

 

Hey Carroll,

Well, thing us - tinnitus is like Volan De'Mort from Harry Potter, nobody likes to talk sbout it. i bet you walk around and see if somone has T to some extend, you will find quite a few. Hearing loss on normal levels does not required to be empired. i.e. you can hear great but suffer T since your loss is on very high frequencies (if we are talking about T not caused by desease). by the way, there are special earplugs that are almost invisible + you hear conversations absolutely fine. even with foam plugs you will hear fine - i do.

Hope you are feeling better by now!

 

Hi Caroll!

I also work for a major airline where we (flight attendants) are not protected by a union. Sounds like we may be working for the same airline! I am 24 years old and have been working as a flight attendant for 2.5 years.
Last year, somewhere after the summer time, I started experiencing high pitched ringing in both ears, which has kept me constant company for just over a year now.
I'm confident that this is from exposure to the noises we experience in the galleys, doors, drains, etc.
I'm going for the first time to visit an ENT later this month, and I'm interested to hear what they have to say. Nevertheless, there are several coworkers with which I have spoken that are dealing with ringing, as well.

 

@Gillian23 ENT are completely incompetent, guess my first doc gave me atibiotics the second and the therd said it will go alone and they even not advise me to avoid loud sound!
@Caroll which drug do you use for sleeping?

 

I am now at 2 years with tinnitus. I have to say that I am completely frustrated that there is no effective treatment for this. Always happy to hear when new research is starting. Any time I read about a possible method for relief I try it. This past year I have tried the anti-inflammatory diet, essential oils, meditation and eliminated every one of my medications 1 at a time to see if they could be making it worse. My tinnitus level changes with sleep buts it's always there in some capacity. @Gillian23 please contact me any time at carollcoleman99@yahoo.com I am sorry you are dealing with this. If this is your first ear appointment maybe the ENT will be able to shed some light on this. If your summer flying has been insane with IROPs every time it rains we are at the same!

 

I work as a pilot. I have almost 15 years to retirement (well, supposedly). I am starting to hear high pitch tones and I am suspecting that ANR headsets might increase, rather than decrease tinnitus. I have now read a lot of posts where people just got ANR equipment (example: Bose SleepBuds), and shortly after they start using it, develop tinnitus.

I know the cabin crew can't really use earplugs, or they need special ones, that will still allow them to hear passengers across a line of seats, mumbling in various dialects. Since there is no cure (yet?) for neither hearing loss nor tinnitus, this is a very serious matter.