A Collection of Success Stories from Around the Web

It's been a while since one of these "mega" threads were created. These are from reddit without usernames.

• My Tinnitus has gone away after a decade of having it. My audiologist said it's the negative ear pressure in my ear and caused ear drum damage. (I was a kid, and always thought you had to sniffle constantly for your ears to feel better because I had tubes and pain growing up.) I'm starting to lose the Tinnitus sound! I almost cried listening to silence. Everyone PLEASE get checked. Something so simple almost ruined me. The negative ear pressure I constantly felt was hurting my ear drums.

• I had Tinnitus for 6 months (since feb) and I found out that was due to an allergic reaction, I’m taking medication now and it’s gone. Those 6 months were the most miserable months of my entire life, I feel for people that have to live with this damn thing forever.

• So, I play drums and I really like music. My tinnitus started when I was 15 or so. At the beginnig it was fairly quiet, but over time it got louder. After a year or so I started to make my environment quieter. I bought a pair of earasers and I started using them for drumming, concerts and everything loud. Also, I cut my earbuds volume by half. Also, I started to copewith it and it got better. Now I'm 18 and I don't hear any ringing, unless I'm in a very quiet room (and even there the ringing is quiet) or a day after a concert without earasers. So, good luck everyone with your condition.

• I have had noise-induced T since the middle of this past February. I, too, cut my earbud volume in half and started wearing earplugs when I would go to parties. Then, once quarantine started, I completely stopped using earbuds/headphones and haven't partied or been in any loud places. My T has gotten way better and I do not notice it most of the time.

• My mild tinnitus is gone after 7 months. Let’s start with what kind of tinnitus I have and who I am: It’s pretty mild and I only hear it when I’m in bed or when it is silent and no one else is in the room. I’m a male between 22-25 years old. Tinntus happened because of listening music in the car on max volume.
  
  What I noticed was when I drank coffee/energy drinks that the tinnitus sound was at max volume the nights I was trying to sleep. So I quit drinking those and before a gym session I just took pre workout.
  
  The first month when I heared it I thought it never would go away, so I kinda gave up trying to ignore it. For the last 6 months I tried to surpress it and ignore my tinnitus while I was trying to sleep. Everytime I heared it I thought about things like: what exercises I can do tomorrow, which shoes I should wear to school (things that can keep you busy for more than a minute).
  
  Also having enough sleep can help, before this all I slept 4 hours a day and took naps throughout the day. Now I go to bed at 10 and sleep till 7 in the morning, I think this helped me stopping my tinnitus.
  
  I hope some of these lifestyle changes can help you guys get rid of it. I know some of you hear louder tinnitus than what I heared, but maybe it can help I don’t know for sure. Hopefully it will also leave you alone in the end.

• Just thought I’d share my experience to show that it can get better. Tinnitus totally gone after 7 months.
  
  At the end of May I went to two super loud gigs on a Friday and Saturday. We’re talking loud, like Hardcore and Death Metal blasting in crusty venues. On the Sunday morning I noticed a ringing in my left ear when sat in the living room after I had muted the tele. For the first couple days I didn’t pay any mind, I’d been to a few gigs and had dining which usually subsided after a couple days, I listened to podcasts when going to sleep so evenings weren’t a big deal.
  
  However, after a week the ringing began to bother me more and more, didn’t seem to be going away either. I had the usual month long freak out and self-loathing period of blaming myself for potentially having this ringing forever.
  
  During the following months I was really sensitive to loud sounds and made sure to look after them (no in ear headphones, avoiding bars, not going to the cinema) to prevent my ringing getting any worse. I had the usual GP advice of just accepting the ringing because it was here to stay.
  
  Over the next few months I began to accept the ringing more and take steps to try and alleviate it. I can’t say it will work for everyone but I did find that menthol sweets and antihistamines did seem to help a bit.
  
  Over the last few months the ringing has gradually faded and improved. Now my tinnitus has totally gone, sat here in bed typing this with my earplugs in and enjoying the total silence.
  
  To anyone out there who’s recently developed tinnitus or has been dealing with it for a couple months, Lee your optimism up, it can go away completely!

• I’ve been seeing a lot stories of tinnitus I figured I should post a positive one. I had posted a while ago about my tinnitus. I had it only on my left year after waking up one morning and all of a sudden I hear ringing on one side of my ear. I’ve gone to the doctors and prescribed me some prednisone and a nasal spray. It helped with other issues I had but I didn’t really get any relief from the ringing. I wasn’t able to get to an Ent because my health issue was due to end and I didn’t make enough money to pay for it. But eventually my tinnitus went away on its own. The only tome I hear ringing are in the mornings when I wake up and it’s a subtle ring then as the day goes on it is completely gone even until I go to bed.

• My tinnitus finally gone after two years. Weird weird. It didn't exactly suddenly disappear.
  
  First, I had just the ringing sound in one ear for 1.4 years. Then suddenly it went from ringing to "blood pumping" (worst one by far..). Then just last week it went from blood pumping to like someone blowing into my ear softly. Theen just yesterday when I woke up it was GONE. Waiting a day to make sure I wasn't just crazy.

• The worst of my tinnitus is gone. I lost it in the weirdest way. Blew my nose really hard and I felt like a ton of air got squeezed out my right ear. After I kept blowing my nose through two days, I felt the pressure clear out of my ears and air was relieved.
  
  I've been feeling much less ear pain and now a lot of the ringing is gone.
  
  I mean there's something remaining of course, but its turned so quiet I don't need to use a white noise machine to fall asleep anymore! Jolly day!

• ITS GONE! YES ITS GONE!
  
  I (17 m) have had tinnitus since mid September after a particularly noisy musical performance. I seated my keyboard far to close to the drummer and the volume of his playing cause a sharp but brief (two seconds) stabbing pain in my left ear, likely causing the tinnitus. It had lasted since and I tuned it out most of the time but now its gone! I will most certainly be wearing earplugs at musical performances from now on!
  
  Take care of your ears people! You only get one pair.

• I was shooting guns with my cousins without ear protection and my ear rang pretty bad for about 2 months and I recently realized it’s gone.

• I had a cold which causes it and it’s pretty much gone, been about 3 months since it started.

• My tinnitus is almost completely gone. Right now, I am sitting in a quiet room. The tinnitus is still there, but I can hardly hear it. It is wonderful to be able to enjoy silence again after almost two years of having loud, almost unbearable tinnitus.
  
  The volume gradually decreased over the course of the last months. It happened on its own. I can't think of anything I did that might correlate with the decrease in volume. Still work a stressful job with long hours. Didn't change my diet. Didn't try any miracle treatments.
  
  I have heard of other cases where tinnitus decreased in volume or went away completely for people who had it for years. Hang in there.

Please comment any personal stories you've heard. I hope this helps.

 

Thank you for these stories. Stay positive.

 

This is one of my favorite threads. I love the stories about people who recovered from acoustic trauma even after years of being exposed to loud sounds. I really hope I recover before winter sets in, my favorite part of winter is how quiet it gets right after the first snowfall.

 

I am a newbie in this (onset 11 days ago, probably acoustic trauma - I am still skeptical about it though) and a couple of days ago I had to talk to my advisor, since I do not know how this condition is going to affect my productivity in the near future (luckily I have worked my ass off for the past three and a half years and most of the work has been done).

He told me that he knows well this monster - he got it too as a consequence of an acoustic trauma in the US: he was attending a reenactment and a cannon was shot blanks without warning. He experienced depression and sleep deprivation for several months. Eventually he habituated, but it took a very long time. He has been living with tinnitus for 13 years; he told me that sometimes he checks if the tinnitus is still there - and yes, it is, but it's not among the top ten of his problems now (I am afraid to ask him if I, as his student, am among the top ten of his problems ). In all these years he managed to have two kids, climb the Ushba Mountain, complete his PhD & Post-Doc and become a professor (among other "crazy" things he did). I met him for the first time almost four years ago and since then once per week every week and I never even remotely guessed that he could have had this condition. I think this can be considered a success story; it is helping me, it might help some of you too.