6th Day Going on 7

Hi, there.

I'm a 20 year old female with tinnitus. I've had small bits of tinnitus my entire life, nearly daily. They would come and go in both ears, lasting from 5-30 seconds each time before going away. They did not bother me at all.

But 6 days ago, it didn't go away. It's loud, per usual. It is louder than the people talking around me, the cars on the street, etc. Yet, my hearing remains the same. I can hear clearly out of both ears. No loss of hearing. Just a loud, anxiety-inducing noise that never ends. I have not had any noise trauma that I am aware of. However, before and over Christmas, I had laryngitis and a nasty virus. I was prescribed anti-biotics, steroids, and an allergy medication that I ended up having an allergic reaction to.

The migraine from that lasted until the first of January. I received a new pair of headphones, but I kept the volume low and didn't wear them for over a week before the constant tinnitus began. I tried cleaning out my ears (I've had a problem with earwax my entire life) with an elephant ear. It's a spray battle with a slim nozzle used to clean out ears.

Doctors have been using this on my ears for half my life. And while it got out some earwax, it didn't affect the tinnitus at all. Even while cleaning both ears, the tinnitus persisted. No sound masks this noise. Also, as far as I can tell, it's coming from my right ear/the right side of my head. The noise never goes away or fluctuates. I've managed to forget about it for an hour or so a handful of times, but I've mostly been unable to ignore it.

Should I make a special visit to the doctor? Can he really do anything? I understand that there isn't really a "cure" per say for this. I also wonder if this will be permanent. I've tried my best to go about my day as normally as possible, but I'm suffering.

I appreciate any comments.
Thanks.

 

Welcome to the forum. Living with tinnitus it is important to keep positive whenever and however you can, as this will help reduce the anxiety and stress level which is bad for T. So if you can already forget about it at this new stage of your T, you have to give yourself some credit and think positively about it. Given time, you should be able to forget about T more for longer duration. Keep living your life as normal as you can. Try to mask your T if it bothers you. This may be a temporary step until you brain is more used to the sound or luckily your T fades over time. If you have not masked your T, these are some suggestions. Take care. God bless.

1) Mask at bed time so you can sleep better. Find whatever sounds/music that are soothing to you. You can use a sound machine or sound pillow for this, or a computer with speakers.

2) If you need masking on the go, try load an ipod with nature sounds or music using itune. If you have a smart phone, you can download free APPs for soothing or T-masking sounds.

3) If you have computer and speakers, you can try these excellent masking sounds too:

TT's audio player: https://www.tinnitustalk.com/audioplayer/

or this online sound library, particularly the self-mix nature sounds: http://mynoise.net/

or download free sound generator ‘aire freshener’: http://www.peterhirschberg.com/mysoftware.html

or search youtube with words like 'tinnitus masking sounds', 'white noise', 'rain sound' etc.

 

Welcome to Tinnitus talk.
I would go and have your ears checked and hearing just to make sure the throat infection and virus are not still in your system causing your tinnitus and make sure the was as gone and see what your doctor thinks..
As@billie48 says.
Keep sound on around you to help mask your tinnitus .
Try do what you can to reduce your anxiety like nice walks,relaxation, off load any stress and some nice treats to lift your mood and go at your own pace ....lots of love glynis