Any Christians with Tinnitus on This Board?

My story is long and detailed...before I post all of it, I'm wondering if there are any Christians on this board? I'm looking for support on a spiritual level as well.

 

I am Christian

 

I am Christian as well!

 

Absolutely! ... Christ is my Lord!

 

I am a Christian
Not sure where i'd be without my faith

 

Christian, too.

 

Hope you find rest and peace in the Lord. Hold on to His promises for you. I'll pray for you. May Gods grace abound and overflow in your life today.

 

Christian here

 

Welcome to the forum. Many Christians here among the members. I find Romans 5:3-5 very comforting to help us take on this tough trial of having tinnitus.

 

Awesome...thanks so much for all the responses...I am really struggling with the "T"...I am 56, married to a wonderful Godly man...I'm not sure where I'd be if he weren't going through things with me. Over the last 4 years, I've gone through tests, had different diagnoses (I am starting to feel like a professional patient!), and basically have felt like a lab rat in a maze, both spiritually and physically. You find out who your friends are when you're no longer able to sleep well, or be able to commit to things because of the tinnitus and deafness and hyperacusis. To top if off, I've had Lupus and Fibromyalgia for 18 years, developed medication allergies, became unable to work or lead worship at church, and am dealing with issues in regards to my autistic son. I'm tired, worn out, feel hopeless, and am feeling dry and wanting to give up...I just can't "do" life right now...I've never felt so gray and numb. I can share more details, but I don't want to wear out my welcome. Thank you to everyone who responded...I'm hoping this is a safe place.

 

Hi TiredOfT ... I know that I can speak for all the members above, when I say that you are indeed in a safe place, and that we truly welcome you amongst us ... and believe me, it's a welcome that you could never wear out!

Blessings to you and your husband for what you are both having to go through right now, but could I just say that in the midst of all this, you are doing such a wonderful thing by bringing us all together like this ... and that was all your initiative ... so let me offer you our thanks as well as a massive hug from each one of us!

If it should help, then do feel free to share your heart and longings with us about anything else that seems over-bearing ... we are here to listen to you, because of the way that Christ first listened to us in our times of pain, distress and hopelessness.

So may the peace of the Lord, which passes all understanding, be with you wherever you are at this moment ... please keep in touch.

Paul McLaughlin

'There is nothing in all creation that will ever be able to separate us from the love of God which is ours in Christ Jesus our Lord.' - Romans 8:39

 

I to am a Christian.

I have been meditating on this verse lately. I can tell you that I often don't FEEL this way, but I know that is most often because I am trying to DO TOO much of the things that are not intended for me or worry about things that are not in my ability to influence.

Matthew 11:28-30 (NIV)
28 “Come to me, all you who are weary and burdened, and I will give you rest. 29 Take my yoke upon you and learn from me, for I am gentle and humble in heart, and you will find rest for your souls. 30 For my yoke is easy and my burden is light.”

My purpose as a physician is to help relieve AT LEAST some of the PHYSICAL burden of those who enter my doors, and part of our purpose as Christians is to help relieve some of the burdens of heart and soul, but I am never quite so "gentle and humble in heart" as Jesus.

May His peace be yours and you recognize that your burden has been His.

 

@TiredOfT We are here to listen (Read). I can't speak for anyone else but I can tell you I am praying hard for all of us that we somehow overcome our T and I pray that you find peace from the pain you are experiencing with the Fibromyalgia and Lupus. To also have to tend to a child with special needs at the same time must be super challenging! I can only imagine. HUGS!

 

Thank you so much, everybody. I appreciate the rope to hang onto right now. I wonder sometimes if it would be better made into a noose, but that won't solve anything. My apologies in advance if this post ends up being long...I'm just going to start writing and see what comes out...

I remember at the beginning of this year, my husband and I sat down and prayed and really asked God to give us peace and direction. Last year was very rough for us on a lot of levels. Not our marriage - thank God - but just things happening to us and outside factors that were (and are always!) beyond our control. Actually, the last few years have been rough. I had some pre-cancerous gynecological issues and had to have surgery 4 years ago. I recovered very well from the surgery, but because of the issues with the Lupus, I could not take replacement hormones to help with hot flashes, etc. I've been on a low dose of Valium for many years, to try to keep the vertigo from Meniere's Disease at bay, but sometimes it would not work, and at the suggestion of my ENT, I started tapering off of it, very slowly. He felt that the Valium would work better for me when I had the Meniere's 'flares' if I wasn't taking it on a regular basis. So I began that, and am thankful that I haven't had any breakthrough withdrawal symptoms. I've been tapering 1/2 a mg per month, and so far, so good. I'm down to 4-1/2 mgs per day...so now I'm '2 for 2'...no complications from a very successful surgery, and no breakthrough withdrawal symptoms from tapering off the Valium...so far, so good...but wait...it doesn't last too long.

Over the last few years, I began having difficulty with sounds and being in certain situations. I've always been somewhat aurally sensitive since the Meniere's started many years ago, but it's gotten much worse in the last 5 years. Going to the Special Olympics bowling tournaments to see my son bowl would trigger problems for me, or going to the grocery store, or being in a loud room. It was as if my brain couldn't process a lot of sensory imput. Sounds hurt my ears, and even felt like they reverberated in my face. Weird... I had to quit working in medicine, which I dearly love, after 30 years. I couldn't play my piano, or guitar, or drums. I couldn't sing. I couldn't play in my little home music studio. People at church didn't understand, and people I thought were my friends began dropping out of my life, one by one. All the things that I enjoyed became nearly impossible to do. Very quickly, it seemed like I was a 'walking seizure'...I don't know any other way to put it. My rheumatologist decided that she wanted to try me on Methotrexate (a low-dose chemotherapy) to try to settle my immune system down. My SED rate was high (a factor in determining inflammation in the body). I was one of the few that got quite sick on the Metho. I had to stop it and go back on Prednisone. Nothing helped me feel better on any level. My doctor thought perhaps I had an acoustic neuroma, so off to the MRI facility I went. The MRI showed a pineal gland cyst, which is a benign condition (although it is weird to think that I have a cyst in my brain. My husband now affectionately calls me 'pea brain'). The MRI did not show anything else that was significant, except for some TMJ damage, which I'd already known about. I have an amazing dentist, and he's worked very hard with me to try to fix this, but we can only try to stop additional damage, and surgery is not an option for the problem that I have with the TMJ. I then saw a neurologist, at the request of my rheumatologist, who diagnosed me with vestibular migraines. I've had migraines since my 20s, but these migraines were starting to be different. I had all the symptoms, so we added another diagnosis to my ever-growing list. I started to feel like I was a professional patient. I had CT scans, more MRIs, blood tests, consultations with new-and-improved doctors (who, by the way, never seemed to be able to agree with each other about what was 'wrong' with me).

After a very difficult extended family Christmas last year, my husband and I decided that we were going to make some changes. In January, we started having worship at home, praying more, and really feeling some hope that by doing this, God would make himself known to us, and we would learn to love Him even more...even in just the little things, like the flowers that bloom outside, or watching some old movie that would make us laugh until our sides ached. We wanted to slow down and appreciate the little stuff and really make time to listen to the Holy Spirit instead of just getting through each day, and not be so focused on all the difficulties around us. Unfortunately, on January 21, all you-know-what broke loose, and I started feeling worse than I ever had in my life. I started having severe vertigo, nystagmus (I could not control my eyes!), and as we like to say in my house, 'two exits, no waiting' (tummy!) As I've had vertigo off and on for many years, I thought that perhaps the Meniere's was just flaring up, but this was different. Over the last 5 years, I've slowly lost about half the hearing in my right ear, and started having constant tinnitus in that ear as well. I started wearing a hearing aid in 2015. Since I had been diagnosed with Meniere's Disease many years ago, so I thought perhaps after it reared its ugly head, it would settle back down after a while. But days and days went by, and I couldn't leave the house. My mom had to come be with me every day so I wasn't alone while my husband went to work. I finally resigned myself to the fact that my life was not going to be the same. I couldn't walk straight. I had to crawl to the bathroom. My husband got me a 'life alert' type of subscription so that I could push a button and get some help if I had to be alone. The Valium didn't help. Meclizine didn't help. I lost some weight. My poor son didn't know what to make of all this, and I know that both he and my husband were scared. I'd never been this bad before. I had to sleep sitting up in a recliner. This went on until May of this year. Finally, I am at a place where things are more chronic rather than acute, but I am not really able to go anywhere or do anything by myself. I have a few days where I feel like maybe I'm heading back to what's 'normal' for me, but then it comes crashing down again.

So, here I am...discouraged, disappointed, not sure what is really going on with my body, and have very little hope of ever doing much more than being a lump at home. I have too many overlapping, convoluted health issues to try to pick apart what's contributing to what, so to speak. I've always been one of those folks who thought, "if I just knew 'why' this was happening, I could deal with it a lot better". Unfortunately, God doesn't always choose to show 'why' in our time, and this frustrates me no end. I have never been good at 'be still and know that I am God'. That's one of the reasons my husband and I wanted to make a change at the beginning of this year...we just wanted to be 'more still'...and what frustrates me even more is that I want so much to be Christ-like, and make a difference...even if it's just for my little family. I don't need glory, I don't need to be on stage leading worship, I don't need to be 'out there' and showy to feel like I'm making a difference...if I do nothing more for the rest of my life but pray for people every day, then that's okay...but I can't even do that...it's too difficult to organize thoughts and to bring them to God...but it's really discouraging that I can't seem to find the rest I need (chronic sleep deprivation with the tinnitus and the Lupus/Fibro symptoms). I'm trying white noise machines, fans, etc...but every day I wake up in the wee hours of the night...and it's dark, and I feel a twinge of sadness knowing that I could actually sleep a few more hours, if my body weren't so 'loud'. I just know that if I could get some sleep, I'd feel better to some degree. But the months and months of no real, refreshing sleep has left me cranky, angry, unsure, feeling unsafe, and not able to enjoy much of anything anymore. I went to the market with my mom yesterday, and a man yelled at me because he didn't like the way I pushed my cart past him. Really? Is this what it's like to be out there now? I can't even venture out anymore without someone telling me I have an attitude in the way I push my cart?

I don't understand why God is allowing sleep to allude me. Surely, if I follow the physical requirements of the body, I'd feel better, no? How can my thoughts be Christ-like, if I can't sleep and can't think. If I had some rest, and my body could recharge a bit every day, I know this wouldn't be so spiritually hard on me either. I have to be responsible for what comes out of my mouth, but it's so very hard when my body is angry that it gets no real rest. No rest means louder tinnitus...and more Lupus/Fibro symptoms. There are days I feel as though I've been beaten with a baseball bat...and that's before I get out of bed in the mornings.

My apologies that this has become a novel, but there you have it...meds don't help, meds that 'do' help create difficult or dangerous side effects, counseling doesn't help....this tinnitus monster noise breaks through any 'forced' sleep. I have pressure in my face and my head. The noise is everywhere. Nothing stops it. Oh, it quiets down once in a while, and I can feel my body relax a bit and take advantage of that...but tinnitus is always lurking around the corner, chasing me and making me feel jealous of people who can just walk through their day without fear of falling, getting dizzy, struggling with sensory overload, and being sensitive to noise. I have a pharmacy full of meds in my hall closet that do nothing for me. Maybe I can make a deal with Walgreens to buy back some of the meds...(jk).

If you're still reading this long post, and haven't been overwhelmed yourself by all the information, I must say 'thank you' very much...it is somewhat comforting to know that there are others out there who understand...

So, all that being said...God is still on His throne, and I am still his child...but I feel more like a lab rat in a maze than a daughter of the king these days...

Bless all of you...

 

@TiredOfT , I am impressed with the steps you have taken to embrace the positive and desire to serve.

Your condition sounds very bad. Clearly you have tried MANY approaches. I see a several people a year who are in similar dire straights. The approach of neurological and nutritional rehabilitation may be quite beneficial. We call it Functional Medicine and Functional Neurology. Some folks do both. I am happy to find that you live in SoCal. I have a number of colleagues down there. If you are interested, I might be able to find one or combine a couple to come up with a match for you.

 

Thanks, Dr. Hobbs...I've just started working with my aunt, who is trained in working with me on using the Standard Process line. I've also just started working on eating 'clean' and trying to keep my stress levels down (very hard with an autistic son, bless his heart!). I know this will take a little time, but I'm hoping it might make a difference. My husband works for UCI Medical Center, so I have access to some very good doctors there. But I'm sure willing to have you let me know about any of your colleagues that you think might be beneficial for me to see. And thank you so much for being kind and letting me know of your offer.

 

I read all of your story, to me you sound like a very strong woman, I hope this does not test your faith in God but brings you closer to him. When we have God in our life, we are never alone. So you may feel helpless but you are far from that! I'll be praying for you. ❤️

 

QUOTE="JoyBenz007, post: 260086, member: 24927"]I read all of your story, to me you sound like a very strong woman, I hope this does not test your faith in God but brings you closer to him. When we have God in our life, we are never alone. So you may feel helpless but you are far from that! I'll be praying for you. ❤️[/QUOTE

Thanks so much Joy...it helps to know that others care. Bless you.

 

Thank you for sharing your story! I hope we can all relate to each other in some way..

 

I'm Christian (a Catholic), welcome!

 

My life is dedicated to GOD, martial arts, and my 3 little dogs

 

@TiredOfT
Dear Sister in Christ, I pray that God may give you a double portion of grace daily. I understand how you feel as I have felt the same way many times. God loves you and He sees your pain and suffering....trust in the Lord with all your heart. He is your help. Let me share with you this: I used to work with the children in my church... was very active in a lot of the activities in my church and all that came to a stop. I now cant sit inside the sanctuary and worship together with my brothers and sisters. I have to either sit in my car or in the conference room and listen/view the service through Persicope. I just cant stand the noise let alone the sound of the organ/piano. I've been doing this for over a year now...and every time I am in that parking lot, I cry unto the Lord for healing, help, grace, mercy. Sometimes my husband and children sit with me and sometimes I tell them to go inside the church. I feel sad, but I know that I must continue going to church no matter what. God is right there with me in the conference room or in my car in the parking lot! Amen!!! Yes, I hurt. I am only human but this is not eternal.. and that's my "relief".... knowing that one day this too shall pass and we will be in our heavenly home in our glorified bodies with our Father!! Amen!!

I kept telling God how much I'd like to work in church again...do something to help and one day the phone rang. It was a sister from church asking me if I wanted to bake 100 cookies for Sunday service... I said, Yes!... But funny thing is that I am not a baker!!! hahaha. I said " Lord you are funny." But I had been asking him for something to do...you see...and he answered me. Even though I cant participate of Fellowship time after Sunday service, because it is soo crowded and the noise is so loud, God gave me a way to participate. God is good!!

I pray that you get some sleep soon. Try hot baths with Epsom salts at bed time...and sleepy time tea with half tsp of magnesium (if you can take magnesium)....then have your husband read the Word to you. Or get the Bible on CD's and play them at bedtime. Sending you a hug. May God bless you richly today and everyday.

 

Thanks for your story and your reply. Epsom salts are my friend. Sleepytime tea makes me ill (cannot do chamomile, unfortunately), but I do enjoy other light herbal teas. I've been on magnesium lactate (easiest form on my tummy) for several months now. It has been helping my headaches a bit.

Because I have problems with my balance, I haven't been able to go to church for several years. Like you, I struggle with the noise and also the movement. But my husband and I do have our daily devotions and we listen to sermons online (I like Dr. Charles Stanley quite a lot). I've been trying to read some really good Bible study books at night, with light instrumental background music going on, so that I can center down and try to sleep. I'm very grateful that my husband is so understanding and that he does care about my spiritual life too.

I've been asking God to help me figure out just what I'm supposed to be doing - or not doing - at this stage of my life, and so far I'm feeling like I'm not supposed to strive so hard. I think I need to focus more on just taking things as they come, and not trying to hard to find answers...I get frustrated when they don't come right away. God can use that to teach to me wait for things in His time, and I'm sensing that this is something I need to wrap my brain around.

Oh, and before I forget...send me some cookies!

 

HI. I'm a Christian who has tinnitus. My T is associated with the onset of Diabetes type 2. There has been some research that proves heightened sugar levels (and ineffective insulin) causes tinnitus, and my experience has corroborated that. However, there are other factors as well. Stimulants such as caffeine, alchohol, sweeteners (especially aspartame, erithrotol and sucralose) exacerbate the T. Only Stevia is Ok. Other factors that exacerbate the T due to congestion include too many dairy products and nuts. But, that's just me. I follow a HFLC diet and it helps. But, T, as you know, never really goes away. We simply have to manage it. I have found that fretting over it makes it worse.

 

Christian here..

 

Born atheist, was taught Christianity and lived my life by it...I have since returned to the faith of my birth...

 

AMEN !

 

After I posted my post here, the board shows me no love anymore...That's ok

I use to get tons of likes and agrees on my post and after claiming that I live for God and my martial arts and my 3 little dogs, no more love...that's fine....

Do remember that I come here to help people that suffer, if I am not appreciated here, then i won't bother helping anymore.....

 

Antichristian .. actually anti all religions ... but met some lovely people travelling the world from any religion, still religion is the reason for 80% of shit going on this planet imho ...

 

Hi @Wojtek Kalka ...I am a Christian and I couldn't agree with you more in what you say about 'religions'!

Religions are for people who wish to live their lives abiding by a set of rules, whereas true Christianity is not about rules at all ... it's about saying 'yes' in order to enter into a personal and eternal relationship with the God-Man, Christ Jesus, who comes searching for each one of us in all his love, grace and tenderness!

Please don't turn him away when he comes knocking at your door!

(Just one more thing: choosing to be antichristian is another form of religion!)

Love & prayers to you ........ Paul