Becoming a Father with Tinnitus

I am now the proud father to a beautiful baby girl who was born on Halloween. The first thing I did was reach for my ear plugs whenever she had a screaming fit, but this didn’t last long. The volume of the screams is definitely alarming, but it’s not something I could keep up and not something I even wanted to be thinking about. I felt it was getting in the way, so I just stopped bothering. All the hyper-analysing and worrying just became a huge burden, and in the end an unnecessary waste of energy. I know many of you are parents on here so I know you’ll all have your own ways of coping. I just thought it maybe appropriate to add that my tinnitus is no different after being subjected to weeks of screaming. A few times she has done it right next to my ear, and I will not lie there have been a couple of times where I was a bit concerned. But, I came to the conclusion it’s not worth worrying about and have being doing great since. The first week I used earplugs every time she cried but it became increasingly hard to keep up with. It boils down to: help my daughter, or track down my ear plugs and then help my daughter. I decided to just cut out the middle man and it felt like another milestone reached from my perspective.

I haven’t been around here for quite a while because I find it puts me in a negative headspace. Although, I’ll always be eternally grateful for the support I received regarding my chest problem.

I thought a positive thread regarding parenthood might be worthwhile.

 

Glad you are ok. I was thinking about you. You made me feel good knowing , that you are doing ok

Congrats buddy, wish you the best!

 

Congratulations @Ed209 on becoming a father and hope everything for the future goes well for you and your family. You are right about this forum and others if I may say, that can put people in a negative headspace/mindset. Although I'm not so easily affected by this being a veteran, I'm certainly not totally immune. Unfortunately this can be a problem. Some people that come here for help have to be careful as they can easily get put off or end-up feeling worse by listening to others that promote nothing but doom and gloom which doesn't help anyone.

All the best.
Michael

 

This forum is wonderful, but we still need to take in any info.... with a grain of salt Michael

 

I’ve been doing great @fishbone, thanks for caring bro. I stopped posting because I found the vibe was becoming increasingly phonophobic in nature, and unhelpful.

I usually cope really well with my T, but I still have occasional down days. But, I think that’s just human nature. My T kinda went on the back burner whilst other health concerns took over, but on the whole I’m doing ok right now.

 

I agree fishbone but the newbies are not as resilient as us veterans, so we have to gently coax them to try and be a little stronger.....

 

Cheers Michael. It’s not that I was affected personally (maybe somewhat subconsciously, who knows) but I stopped feeling the benefit. Reading nothing but ‘don’t do this; definitely don’t do this; this is bad’ stopped being beneficial to me. I prefer seeing solutions to problems that don’t involve living in a padded cell.

I hope you’re all doing awesomely!

 

I did miss your postings @Ed209 for you have so much good and positive things to say about tinnitus and hyperacusis and can really help people. Again, you have hit the nail on the head about "phonophobia", for it is among some members of this forum, that are adversely affecting others with their negative mindset. I know this from the many PMs that I get from members. This was one of the reasons I wrote my latest post: Complexities of tinnitus and hyperacusis. Anyone that would like to read it you'll find it in the hyperacusis thread. Phonophobia is real and can be very debilitating so can misophonia.

Michael

 

Congratulations, Ed!
I envy you so much for having a baby. The worst thing that tinnitus did to me was that when it surfaced i was a single mother and because of this condition, which had an extremely brutal beginning, i could not get back on my feet again, and do something about finding a life partner and having more children. Tinnitus seriously changed the trajectory of my life for the worse. I have only one son, who has Aspergerger's sydrome because of bad genes from his father, who has mental health problems in his family (brother with schizophrenia), but who had no problems abandoning me and the child when he noticed that the kid has problems.

When the worries that babies come with will go away and you daughter will grow a little you will be so happy! When she will be old enough to understand, you can ask her to not make loud noises and she will not make them, or try not to make them, as accidents happen all the time, we cannot live on our tip toes.

Congratulations to your wife too and my appreciation for her because she did not leave you when you got tinnitus and started to be a pain in the ass. And not only she did not leave you, but gave you a daughter. Admirable woman. You may not realise now, when having a child means mostly worries, just how much joy the daughter will give you later.
Congratulations again!

 

First, congratulations on the new life in your life! Two of my friends have newborns in their families and it makes such a difference in their hope for this world.

Okay, I'm going to swim against the tide here and recommend that you do wear ear plugs if your baby cries for more than half an hour a day. A crying baby is somewhere around 110 decibels, so that's a 30-minute limit in a 24-hour period. A screaming baby is probably closer to 125 decibel range (just guessing). Maybe you don't need to put in ear plugs, but how about a fluffy pair of bright pink ear muffs? Your daughter will probably want to touch it and be entertained by how Daddy looks, long enough to stop screaming.

 

And you’ll be all the stronger for it Dana in the long run. Thanks for posting.

Our daughter immediately had problems when the consultant noticed her hip dislocating. They booked an ultra-sound scan and it revealed she had hip dysplasia. Her hip sockets were a third of the depth that they should have been (this is because she was breech). We were both hit hard by the news, but the results of wearing a Pavlik harness were reported to be around 90% successful. When we went for the fitting she was too small for the extra small harness, so they postponed our appointment by 2 weeks. When we went back we got our Christmas miracle as we were told that her hips were now normal. This is after 2 previous scans showing no improvement (and the consultant saying she would definitely need a harness for 12 weeks). Even he seemed hugely surprised at the difference. Now she is wearing an abduction brace for 4 weeks (I assume as a precaution) and it’s the best present we’ve had this Christmas. The brace is an absolute pain to get on and off, but it’s totally worth it if it helps in any way.

 

Congrats Ed! I find that my daughter has an unbelievable power to keep me going no matter what life throws at me, T included.
You will do fine. Enjoy the ride!!!

 

I am sorry to hear that. Yes, i know, girls have higher percentage of having a dislocated hip.
Fortunately such a problem is not something that cannot be fixed in our day and age. Doctors were confronted with this problem for so long and a hip is not so complicated as the brain with its auditory system, which is impossible to have access to except with medication that is hard/impossible (so far) to produce with good results and no side effects or other drawbacks.

Indeed a Christmas miracle.
I wish your daugher to have, in the end, a hip that has absolutely no problems and after four weeks all the family to cheer "hip hip, hooray!"

 

It seems to me that you are celebrating too early. You can come to the conclusion that it is safe to not wear hearing protection when you are around small children, when your daughter is something like 5-10 years old, but not earlier.

If you begin hitting a wall with a hammer, it takes some time before you get to see the objects on the other side of the wall...

Why not just wear earplugs whenever there is a chance that you will be interacting with your daughter?

 

Congratulations, @Ed209! I found your posts to be helpful early on and was wondering if you were well. Glad to learn your absence is for a good reason!

 

Bill, the only thing I’m celebrating is my daughter. I’m only checking in to say hello as it’s the holidays. I’ve spoken about statistical cause and consequence on here many times, as it’s an extremely complicated web, and I’m sorry buddy, but to say your glass is half empty is an understatement. You could spend the rest of your life dedicated to protecting your ears (in all manner of circumstances) and still end up with tinnitus that gets a lot worse. I refuse to spend every precious moment under the shadow of tinnitus, because living and behaving like this only empowers it.

I think heavily about most things, and for me personally, a missed life, or a life full of regret about avoiding things because of T would crush my spirit more than anything. I can’t speak for everyone but that’s just my opinion. I do protect my ears, but I try to be realistic and sensible. Never underestimate the psychological aspect of how this condition can alter ones life, by crossing the line into fearing sound itself. This forum is full of people who fit this category, including yourself and I think it can be damaging to certain personalities. Not all, but some people may take a turn for the worse if they religiously read all of your posts.

Now, in no way am I some kind of oracle when it comes to giving advice so feel free to disagree, but that’s how I see things.

With that said Bill, I hope you’re doing well.

 

The above is true. The point is that the Probability of it getting worse gets lower (but never reaches zero).

Why aren't you refusing to live under the shadow of the dangers of driving - why don't you stop using a child's seat in your car, or stop using your seat belt? I am sure your daughter would think that it is fun to pet a grizzly bear at the zoo. Refuse to be the slave of safety and get her into the enclosures of those magnificent animals. After all, you can stay away from bear enclosures at the zoo and STILL get killed by a wild bear.

The fact that I have to stay out of dangerous neighborhoods at night (and during the day) doesn't do anything to my spirit.

 

Thank you for illustrating his point regarding negativity and anxiety.

Avoiding entering a tiger cage is driven by a reasonable fear based on a very likely risk.

Avoiding a zoo altogether because you are afraid a tiger might escape its cage is an example of an unreasonable fear based on anxiety.

Avoiding going outside your home because there is a zoo nearby and you are afraid a tiger might escape its cage and the zoo . . . well that is approaching anxiety levels sometimes seen on TT.

Why not make your argument on a more appropriate thread rather than one where a new father is posting his joy regarding his daughter? Ed did not ask for advice regarding when he should wear earplugs, and even pointed out that earplug anxiety was not beneficial to him.

 

I noticed his point regarding negativity. My point was that it is ok to be scared of scary things.

Even though one will not get a spike with 100% probability if one doesn't try to avoid noise while suffering from T, my uneducated guess (since there had been no scientific studies about this, nobody on Earth has an educated guess regarding this) is that the long-run risk is something like 20-60%. Even if it is just 20%, that is still a lot (given what is at stake). My (uneducated) guess is that the chance that a tiger attacks a human in its enclosure is also somewhere in the 20-60% range.

I disagree. You are assuming the risk is negligible whereas the fact that we get horror stories on TT on a weekly basis (if not more often) (horror stories where people who are optimistic, like you, learn the hard way to stop being so optimistic) seems to be contradicting your assumption.
Yesterday's horror story was the following:

I was trying to do him a favor by alerting him to a problem (as far as logic is concerned) with his beliefs (just because he was ok thus far does not mean he will continue being ok). I was hoping that if he changes his behaviour it might not be too late for him. Having said this, you are right - there is nothing worse than unsolicited advice.

I was worried that someone might read his post and actually begin thinking that it is ok to start being reckless. This is the main reason why I felt that it was appropriate for me to make that comment.

 

Bill, we could go round in circles all day long and we’d never get anywhere, and we’d never agree. You are not wrong to want to protect your ears 24/7 because we all have free will to do as we please. But, I still think your advice goes too far, unnecessarily promoting fear in circumstances where, I personally, don’t believe it’s warranted.

Your point about the probability dropping is also inheritantly flawed, as for some people psychological and behavioural changes can also worsen their condition. So can many other things. Tinnitus is extremely complicated and not fully understood. Loud noise is a huge contributing factor based on the evidence we have, but we are mainly talking about real loud noise and not all sounds in general. The biggest dangers are the kind of noise you’d be exposed to in the military (or any explosives), concerts, clubs, and loud power tools / industrial work. I’d say these account for most noise related incidents, by and large, that end up causing tinnitus.

I am a curious fellow so I did measure my babies most intense crying on two devices and it averages somewhere in the 80db range, but tends to float in the 70’s, decibel wise on an average cry. She can scream and hit a note that’s grating, but I only measured that at 95db. I have no doubt she could go above 100db, but it would be a very rare occasion. After a week or so of using earplugs, I found it becoming an increasing burden and definitely not worth the stress.

However, I’d rather not go pointlessly back and forth as I know we will never agree, and that’s fine. I just came to give an update since I spent a lot of time here.

 

Those are the biggest dangers as far as New T onset is concerned.

We are more vulnerable now. By now I have a good idea about what will cause a (possibly permanent) spike for me. A baby screaming close to my ear would do it. I am glad that you are less vulnerable than me. I hope this will continue being the case for you.

How close you are to the source of the sound makes a huge difference. Be careful...

You are right. Let us agree to disagree.

Thank you for an update where you show that one can enjoy life despite suffering from Tinnitus.

 

Really appreciate it - great to have more people coming back just to let us know how their attitudes and behaviours have shifted and that they are ok and that things can be ok!

Appreciating the update and congrats on the newborn!

 

Says who? I have only ever heard this theory on here, but have never seen any solid science on it. The professionals I have spoken to dispute it and say there is no evidence to support such an idea.

The origin of the noise itself isn’t even known yet. If it was only reliant on the damaged hair cells then every person with hearing loss would have it, but they don’t. It’s beyond our current comprehension. All I know is that thinking about it all the time only ends up exacerbating it.

Anyway, I’m going down the same rabbit hole I always do so I’ll leave it there.

I wish you well Bill, but I still think you’re a bit crazy And I’m not saying that in a mean way. You just have a vastly different outlook on life than I do.

 

I agree with this. Winding her over my shoulder can be risky if she’s in a bad mood as she can scream right into my ear hole lol. I usually wind her on my lap, but when she’s happy I have no problem doing it over my shoulder .

This actually happened, and I remember thinking ‘oh s**t’ (censored for Michaels benefit ), but nothing came of it thankfully.

Anyway, it’s good to speak to you all again.

 

This is because there had been no studies of this topic (and not because science actually says that we are as vulnerable as healthy people).

I had six acoustic traumas leading to Serious spikes some of which are still on, and some of which lasted for longer than three months (e.g., a hiss changing to a high pitch tone that was much harder to ignore, a new T sound appearing in my formerly good (T-free) ear). They were caused by slamming doors (3 times), a loud phone, metal shopping carts, glass plates clanking.

I already provided an example where a person got a spike after walking by a small orchestra.

More examples (note, these make up the tip of an iceberg):
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/earplugs-muffs-give-very-little-protection.21737/

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/tinnitus-much-worse-after-club-despite-wearing-solid-35-db-custom-earplugs-—-im-at-my-wits-end.15744/#post-186018

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/bad-spike-not-subsiding-after-loud-bar-—-despite-wearing-properly-inserted-earplugs.20675/#post-239000

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/thread...t-an-acoustic-trauma-shock.18964/#post-219363

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/thread...le-in-real-life-situations.19067/#post-220314
{There used to be more examples here. I got the following alert: "Your post in the thread Becoming a Father with Tinnitus was edited. Reason: Some of your quotes of other members were incorrectly formatted and broke the post, feel free to re-add them as you see fit" - those examples got deleted}

There countless more examples where That came from. So, to answer your questions - say the experiences of all of those people (including me). We are more vulnerable than healthy people. Healthy people are not going to regret going to the mall (or pressing a loud phone to their ear, or being close to two glass plates clinking) for months after the event!

I agree.

My T seems to be independent of my stress level. You are right - people are different. We can only think of T in terms of probabilities and not in terms of absolute truths.

Fair enough. I can see how one might think that about me.

 

Thank you for the censorship @Ed209 much appreciated. I abhor the use of bad language particularly in writing. I have been watching this thread for a while. It is a shame but everything you've said is true regarding the negativity towards tinnitus and the obsession on the use of wearing hearing protection, which I believe it totally unnecessary in many instances when there is really no risk of hearing damage or making tinnitus worse. The overuse of hearing protection often makes the condition worse and when hyperacusis is present even more so, as the "loudness threshold" of the auditory system is often lowered making it more sensitive to sound and the risk of phonophobia and misophonia becomes more real.

I received yet another PM a while ago from a member that will be leaving tinnitus talk because of the constant negativity mentioned in this forum. I will paste the message below but will omit the member's name.

All the best
Michael


Thank you Michael, I appreciate your response! I think I need a break from TT, I come here to read encouraging, successful posts, but every time someone posts something good, it just gets crushed with negativity. I need to get better, I need to heal and focus on my success story!
Thank you for your honest and encouraging posts. I know 10 months ago, your posts gave me hope, for some reason I had a set back this month, and seeking that hope again, because I know I will get better
Take care,

 

How is that consistent with the examples I provided in my last post?

 

I can completely understand this. Sometimes we need to just get away from it all, but talking/reading about it everyday can keep it very fresh and prioritise it to a certain extent. This year has been an absolute rollercoaster for me. The start of the year was unbearable (for non tinnitus related reasons as you’re aware), and nearly cracked me completely but I managed to find the strength to hold myself together. On the flip side we now have our daughter and with that comes great happiness. I never could have foreseen how this year would have ended from how it started. Never in a million years. We just never know what the future holds - good or bad - at any given moment. Things can change in a heartbeat which is why I try to live as normally as I possibly can.

 

I mentioned no names or posts of the people that I was referring to but anyone reading my post will know who I mean. I don't wish to elaborate further for I have been down this road many times and it's exhausting. For this reason I chose to write to @Ed209 as he hasn't been here in a while but sadly he's noticed nothing much has changed.

Michael

 

I wasn't talking about your post. I was talking about the horror stories in my post. In those stories, innocent sounding noises caused serious spikes. This is not consistent with the beliefs that you described below