Coming Down from a Near Year-Long Tinnitus Spike

Hi, everyone. My name is Evan and I'm kinda new to this forum. Up until now I've only passively lurked a few threads, looking to see if anyone had a situation like mine. I'd like to share my story here in hopes someone else has been through anything similar.

I'm not actually sure when my tinnitus began, but I became aware of this unusual noise in September of 2020. At the time, it was at a level that I forgot about it eventually. In the February that followed, my tinnitus increased drastically to a high pitched squealing noise for seemingly no reason, and was particularly intense on my left side. I sought medical assistance from a nearby ear clinic, and received a hearing test. They found that I had no hearing damage, but did note that I had low pressure in my left ear. Later that February, the ringing dwindled to where I could cope with it again.

A few months later in July, again the noise soared, again particularly in my left ear. It stayed this way for a long time, and I was convinced my ears would be ringing forever. I was distraught and kind of suicidal for a short period of time, but I carried on with my daily routines and schoolwork as best I could.

From July 2021 to February 2022, I've been doing things like I normally do, with some caveats to prevent the ringing from becoming worse, of course. I work out while listening to music and podcasts with the volume of my headphones capped at around 50%. I've gone to the movies a couple of times with friends. I work doing plumbing and sometimes use power tools, but I always have earplugs on when I'm on the job. I've even had dental work done on the last day of January that I'd been putting off for a good few years, which had no obvious effect on my tinnitus.

But now, after all those months of wondering how my tinnitus got this bad, as recently as yesterday it went back down again. I was able to sit in my car with the windows down and enjoy the sound of nature and nothing else. It was so good to hear that again, but I'm still cautiously optimistic about all this.

For a while now, I've been suspecting that my teeth were the cause of this. My bottom left back molar (not the wisdom tooth) had been cracked in half from a neglected cavity, and since it caused me no pain, I've let it go by the wayside. More recently, the bottom back molar on the right side of my mouth also cracked in half and that was the one I had extracted.

If you've read this far, have you gone through anything like this?

 

Welcome to the forum. The positive thing is that you are able to live your live as normal as you can, and that your tinnitus has quiet moments. Take these positive things and stay positive that given more time, your tinnitus may just return to baseline or fade. I don't know much about teeth problem but infection of the gum or bad teeth can contribute tinnitus getting worse for some people, myself included. Perhaps get a dentist to check out your teeth. Take care. God bless.