After Watching a Video with Apple AirPods, Tinnitus Has Gone Crazy + Ear Fullness and Numbness

Hello guys,

I had tinnitus for 5 years now, both ears, louder on the right ear. I had up and downs, sometimes I get a spike but I try to be patience and wait for few days to let it settle. I was doing good and I have to say in the last year it didn't bothered me that much.

Few days ago I was watching a video on YouTube and I had the earphones (not in ear tho, I have the AirPods), and suddenly I heard a loud spike in my right ear tinnitus. From that moment, I have a loud tinnitus only in the right ear but also a feeling of fullness in the ear and numbness on the internal and external ear. I've never experienced that in all these years so I'm really worried. I visited the ENT that as always was pretty useless. He checked me and he couldn't find anything in my ear, so he gave me a nasal spray for help with a congestion that I "probably" have. I really feel like I have a block in my right side of the head and it's bothering me a lot. Also I started again to be more sensitive to the noises, like the shower pouring in the bathtub spikes my tinnitus a lot.

I'm really worried, because I worked really hard in these years to get used to my tinnitus and it was working great now, I was living a normal life, but now I have this and seems like I'm beginning from zero again, with a situation that is even worse.

Any other that has experienced this? Any suggestion or idea of what it could be?

 

A spike.

 

Hi there. Thank you for you answer. I had many spikes during the years, but they were more like an increased tinnitus for a few days/weeks. In this case, it seemed like something completely different. I never experienced ear numbness for example.

 

Numbness is unusual, but so is everything about tinnitus. All these symptoms tend to subside over time.

 

I'm new to all things tinnitus, but from what I've been able to learn during my crash course over the past month, it seems like taking a steroid like prednisone as soon as possible following what might have been an additional acoustic trauma could be helpful.

 

Sadly I was abroad when it started, so I could get my cortisone only after 5 days.