Afraid My Tinnitus Will Turn Into Hearing Loss

Hi everyone, I still have this ringing in both of my ears. I'm afraid that it will turn into hearing loss. Still have trouble sleeping even with a fan on as white noise. Can't get it out my head this fear that I'm feeling, I'm not sure what to do anymore.

 

I'm worried my ringing is permanent after ear infection

 

Did you also recently get the ringing in your ears?

 

yes

 

Is it on both of your ears? Has the infection gone away?

 

You need to give it time (as in 6-24 months)...

 

its in my left ear and yes I went to to get it checked and the infection has cleared

 

Hopefully your hearing will go back to normal since your infection went away.

 

I understand that it make take time. I just dont know that I'm strong enough. It just came out of nowhere and I have no idea what caused it.

 

Tinnitus doesn't cause hearing loss but it usually means you do have hearing loss

Think of it like this, in a healthy person the brain and the ear are having an active communication. The cochlear hair cells send sound information to the audiotory brain and the auditory brain makes sure the information goes to exact channel associated with that frequency.

When hearing is suddenly lost (even very insignificant) the ear provides less feedback to the brain then the brain wants, this literally means part of the brain associated with hearing specific sound information become vacant, the brain doesn't like this and generates it's own phantom sound to make up for hearing loss.

sometimes but not (that's why not everyone with hearing loss has tinnitus)

Nothing known will make the tinnitus go away guaranteed, but in cases where tinnitus is caused by an ear infection there is a good chance it will go away once the infection resolves.

 

my ear infection has gone but I still have the ringing in my left ear

 

Ears take forever to heal, so once the infection is gone, there is a chance that T will follow after several months pass.

 

it may take a month or a bit more after the ear infection resolves to go away.

 

but it has gone but the ringing is still here

 

I don't want the ringing to stay

 

T never turns off the next day after you discontinue taking an ototoxic drug, or after your infection clears. After a month or two, it will hopefully begin fading. It might take 3 or 6 or 12 months for it to fade.

 

There is still a good chance that it won't (or that it will at least become a quiet hiss that you will hear only in quiet rooms if you listen for it).

 

My ear still hurts but no tinnitus. Hope for the newcomers, I say.

 

HI @rdz

Tinnitus does not usually appear out of nowhere as something usually causes its onset. The most common cause is exposure to loud noise. At the top of the list of culprits are "Headphones" followed by attending venues where loud music is played: clubs, concerts etc. If you have been using headphones on a regular bases most probably (a certainty) this is the cause of your tinnitus. Tinnitus doesn't cause hearing loss however, some people with hearing loss develop tinnitus. This can usually be addressed using hearing aid/s and the tinnitus will usually reduce with time.

It is important to know what caused your tinnitus. If my suspicions are correct and it's headphones, please follow my advice in the links below by reading my posts. It is important that you do not use headphones again even at low volume.

All the best
Michael

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/new-to-tinnitus-what-to-do.12558/

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/tinnitus-a-personal-view.18668/

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/hyperacusis-as-i-see-it.19174/

 

the noise is killing me. ive had no sleep even when I put 3 hors of tinnitus relief sounds on

 

Bill does this apply to people with tinnitus from neck/jaw issues? OR do you have to fix the neck/jaw? And once the neck/jaw is fixed does it still take time for tinnitus to go away or once the neck/jaw is fixed the tinnitus goes away instantly?

 

My friend has tinnitus from CCI and after each chiro session she immediately hears silence again.

 

@Matthew Gould --- Tinnitus refers to the central auditory system - dorsal cochlear nucleus, the auditory plasticity theory, the crosstalk theory, the somatosensory system, and the limbic and autonomic nervous systems. The key words for physical input of somatosensory - such as jaw and neck is crossover talk. From your history, you will need to fix the jaw and get your muscles in balance maintaining strength. It's not your C1 axial complex causing your tinnitus, but that needs to be in balance first. By maintaining correct jaw and neck posture, you should see recovery, if you don't let crossover talk become a factor.

Somatic tinnitus is in which the frequency or intensity is altered by body movements and posture such as clenching the jaw, or applying pressure to the neck and head.

According to crosstalk theory, when auditory nerve fibers are intact and some other cranial nerves are damaged, crossover can develop between individual auditory nerve fibers, resulting in the locking of auditory neurons. Cranial nerves are sensitive to compression at the root entry zone, where they are covered by myelin. Nerve compression causes crosstalk between nerve fibers, and the breakdown of the myelin insulation of the nerve fibers establishes ephaptic coupling between them. This is applied to the cochlear-vestibular nerve, which is covered by central myelin for most of its length and is vulnerable to compression from blood vessels. Such compression and consequent ephaptic coupling might lead to tinnitus if synchronization of the stochastic firing in the cochlear nerve is perceived as sound.


The activity of the DCN is also influenced by stimulation of nonauditory structures;however, the somatosensory system is the only nonauditory sensory system that appears to be related to tinnitus (e.g., in temporomandibular-joint syndrome and whiplash). Somatic tinnitus can develop from activation of latent oto-somatic interaction. Somatic (craniocervical) tinnitus, like otic tinnitus, is caused by disinhibition of the ipsilateral DCN, which is mediated by nerve fibers whose cell bodies lie in the ipsilateral medullary somatosensory nuclei. These neurons receive inputs from the nearby spinal trigeminal tract, the fasciculus cuneatus, and the facial, vagal, and glossopharyngeal nerve fibers innervating the middle and external ears.

Stretching of the neck and masticatory muscles have been associated with significant improvement in tinnitus. Patients with somatic tinnitus can have symptoms of cervical spine disorders, including head, neck, and shoulder pain as well as limitations in sideways bending and rotation. Treating jaw and neck disorders has beneficial effects on tinnitus. Injecting lidocaine into jaw muscles, such as the lateral pterygoid, also reduces tinnitus.


Answers to some major misconceptions of tinnitus to remain on subject.

Pulsatile tinnitus can manifest subjectively as an increased awareness of blood flow in the ear. The cause of somatosensory pulsatile tinnitus syndrome is not vascular, with the syndrome deriving from cardiac-synchronous somatosensory activation of the central auditory pathway or the failure of somatosensory-auditory central nervous system (CNS) interactions to suppress cardiac somatosounds. Pulsatile tinnitus superimposed on steady tinnitus could result from the pulsation of blow flow with the spiral capillary of the basilar membrane.

Less prevalent forms of tinnitus, such as those involving well-known musical tunes or voices without understandable speech, occur among older people with hearing loss and are believed to represent a central type of tinnitus involving reverberatory activity within neural loops at a high level of processing in the auditory cortex.

Tinnitus due to SOAEs is mild and is more common in subjects with normal hearing and in those with only middle ear disorders. SOAEs decrease as hearing loss progresses, and hence these otoacoustic emissions are not likely to cause tinnitus when a hearing loss of 35 dB or more is present. However, SOAEs cannot fully explain the mechanism of tinnitus since aspirin largely abolishes SOAEs without improving tinnitus.

 

Have you started the medical diagnosis?

 

No, I'm going to make another appointment on Friday. I'm going to wait to see if anything changes by then.

 

Great taste in girls btw.

Yeah tinnitus sucks big ass. There's a good chance yours will go away, but if it doesn't neuromod comes out in about a month's time. If it doesn't stop then you can get that. Hope your tinnitus goes away.