4 Days without Sleep Since Tinnitus Onset After Dental Cleaning Procedure — I'm Desperate

4 days ago, I had a dental cleaning procedure. That night, out of nowhere, I woke up 3AM with a loud ringing sound on my head. It isn't located in any side. It is high-pitched (14500 Hz?) and continuous. Since then, I'm not able to sleep. It has been 4 days without sleep. When I do manage to sleep, I wake up 1 hour later due to the sound. Every day I'm getting worse. I'm starting to feel mental confusion, difficulty walking and moving. I went to an emergency hospital. They sent me back, since they don't have an ENT. I'm home now, with this loud noise on my head, waiting for an emergency ENT clinic to open.

I'm 30/M. I never had anything like that. I don't use any drug, just some supplements (Omega 3, vitamin B and D3, Pycnogenol).

I can't connect anything to the tinnitus other than that dental cleaning procedure. 4 days ago I was perfectly fine. Now I'm living the hell on Earth. I'm desperate. What is going on with me?

 

First things first: it has only been 4 days since your onset! It can still stop. Try not to focus on it too much, create some background noise so you can focus on something else. Don't let your brain make it even bigger/louder than it is.

Go see an ENT, maybe get intratympanic steroid injections or Prednisone course prescribed.

EDIT: I hope you don't mind me doing some research but I just saw you visiting the thread about VAD (voluntary assisted dying). Your last visited threads show up on your profile page. What on earth are you doing on threads like that only 4 days after you got tinnitus?

Stop that immediately. It serves no purpose other than you overreacting.

My original comment:

What's going on with you? That one is easy: you are panicking because this MIGHT be your new normal. Your adrenaline levels, blood pressure, heart rate are all thru the roof caused by fear and anxiety for what the future holds.

I don't think I ever made it to 4 days without sleep, but I did 3 nights without sleeping at my onset.

Please listen to me, please believe me when I say: you will be able to live (and sleep with this).

I have a low pitched hum in my head, it sounds like a B52 bomber is stalled above our house.

Is it brutal? Yes. Can I live with it? Yes. Did it take me 2.5 years to get to the point of being able to sleep with the noise of a b52 bomber in my brain without masking? Yes.

Where are you located?

Please hold on, fight, tap into every single resource in your brain to try and repeat to yourself that it's just a sound, it's not harmful, it's just a sound, it's not harmful, like a mantra (a mantra needs to be repeated, even if you don't believe it in the beginning, just keep on repeating, keep on saying those same words over and over and over).

 

I am not suicidal! I'm just browsing random threads. I don't even know what thread you're talking about.

I'm in Rio de Janeiro.

Isn't Prednisone very aggressive and insomnia inducing?

I think it would be totally doable to cope with this if I could just sleep normally.

Should I just keep trying to brute-force through a long sleep? I don't think I can sleep, I just wake up 1 hour later.

It seems like taking Rivotril is a sensible choice now, even though this med is awful. All I need right now is a long night of sleep!

 

Just mask for now.

 

You need to get proper sleep, however that is possible. Some really freaky things start to happen to the brain if you go too long without sleep. I once went 36 hours with no sleep and I started to hallucinate.

You have high pitched tinnitus - get into YouTube and find a masking sound which works for you - keep it on as long as you need and set the volume at just below your own tinnitus level. Maskers do actually work quite well - I was skeptical but when I tried one that suits me it was like I was being given this soothing white noise to listen to instead of my screeching tinnitus. Maybe it will work for you.

 

For sleep try QUVIVIQ if you have access to it. Otherwise you should take Mirtazapine instead of Clonazepam, which is not sustainable in the long run.

 

Here's what works for me to be able to sleep.

Half dose of Mirtazapine + 5mg THC edible + Melatonin/L-Theanine/Valerian root tablet + an app called ReSound Relief which has a bunch of different masking noises. You can customize your own combination of sounds. I use crickets + waterfall.

 

QUVIVIQ is also not sustainable long term. You can build up a tolerance and it can cause dependence. They claim it doesn't cause a physical dependence but even in their marketing description it says it can lead to dependence. It's really not much different than Ambien. It works a little differently but it has similar hypnotic and memory effects.

Mirtazapine is much better for long term use as it's an anti-depressant. Also, one advantage of using Mirtazapine for sleep is that a half-dose actually makes you more sleepy than a full dose.

 

Well, visiting an ENT is what you should do for now. Probably a Prednisone course as well.

I believe that dental cleaning with ultrasonic cleaning can trigger/induce tinnitus. Especially if there was already some hearing loss.

Because it's only been a few days, it is most likely that it will get much lower or non-existent. But having insomnia, anxiety and fear are harsh side effects of tinnitus which in return can feed the tinnitus big time. So @Ben Winders is right.

Your ears need to recover from the loud noise exposure. So go to an ENT, get some Mirtazapine and remain hopeful. Stay away from loud places. Getting your sleep back is important.

 

It's been widely reported on this forum that Mirtazapine can cause or exacerbate tinnitus. Same with most other antidepressants. I understand it helps some without "immediate" side effects, but it's a gamble. How's a person to know beforehand whether it's going to help or hurt.

 

The problem with medications that supposedly make tinnitus worse or cause it to begin with is that if you look up lists of ototoxic medications, pretty much every single medication commonly and not so commonly used show up there. Even medications that are commonly used to TREAT the symptoms of tinnitus. One could go crazy trying to figure this stuff out.

Daily Mirtazapine of 7.5 mg at night has not made my tinnitus any worse but has helped immensely to actually sleep at night.

The only way to avoid medications listed somewhere as ototoxic (whether they really are or are not) is to essentially never take any medications at all.

 

Hi @VTae -- Have things improved for you since you last posted? I hope so!

 

Thanks for asking. I'm managing to sleep, which was my main worry, so, yes, things have improved. That said, the tinnitus is still the same. No idea what happened to me that day. Very scary and frustrating.

 

Hi @VTae -- Thanks for your reply. I'm happy to hear you're at least able to sleep, that's huge!

Like you, I still don't know exactly what happened to me that day I got tinnitus, which I got from taking a single dose of an anti-nausea prescription drug Promethazine. It's been over four years ago now, but it was also very scary and frustrating at the time. After two years, I was still struggling mightily with it, but it then began to ever so slowly begin to moderate.

In the past two years, it's gone from a persistent 8-10, to a more stable 5-7. Still unpleasant but much better than it was. I'm mentioning it to encourage you to think of your tinnitus moderating as well. You're still quite a young man, and with your penchant for trying natural things, I think your odd of improving--perhaps significantly--are good.

I believe my tinnitus slowly improved because I did a lot of little things. I don't know what helped me than others, but I'm convinced the totality of what I did made a difference. Some of the things I did was self-acupuncture, castor oil packs, castor oil applications around the ears (with moderate heat), daily massaging around my ears and auditory cortex, daily stimulating of reflexology points relating to the ears, etc.

Most recently I discovered a relatively inexpensive adjunct to my repertoire which you can read about if you're interested at the link below. -- Good luck going forward. I feel quite confident you'll improve significantly in the coming months.

Tone Pacer PRO App — Has a Very Soothing Effect on My Auditory Cortex