Depression — The Silent Killer

Anxiety and depression are not foreign concepts to me. Most of my life since I was about the age of 10, I've had some sort of depression or anxiety with varying severity. Recently, it has gotten much worse. And I'm beginning to think I need to resort to medication to help.

I get these moments of highs and lows. Where half my time I'm fine and the other half not so much. Or for 3 weeks I am depressed and the next 3 I'm fine. I hate this constant up and down. I'm not gonna get into the nitty gritty nor get into why I'm depressed.

But I want to say that if you have a friend or family member who says they are depressed or have suicidal thoughts or just simply down. Don't ignore them. Because that's what has happened to me most of my life. No cares. Not my family and not my friends. Only until recently have I found a friend of mine who does care.

I have a question. I have hyperacusis and tinnitus and they have gotten better. However, I am worried about ototoxic medication. What antidepressants are considered ototoxic or that I should avoid?

 

@Taylorslay

Since your Hyperacusis and Tinnitus have improved my advice is not to concern yourself with medications that might be ototoxic. This word is banded about in this forum and others far too much and causes more harm than good. Due to worrying and stress which will contribute to making tinnitus more intrusive. Please remember tinnitus is 90% mental in the way that a person manages it. If hyperacusis is present this increases. The more you can distract yourself from thinking about tinnitus and what might make it worse you will feel better believe me.

My blood pressure medicine is listed as: can cause ringing in the ears. I haven't noticed any increase in my tinnitus and been taking this medication for quite some time. I drink alcohol in moderation and eat anything I want including chocolate and notice no increase in my tinnitus. As I type my tinnitus is completely silent as it's variable.

You are doing just fine and have made very good progress. Try not to complicate things by overly worrying about medication. Some antidepressants can affect tinnitus but this is usually temporary.

All the best
Michael

 

Regarding medication I’m not sure I could help, I wouldn’t feel comfortable with recommending any type of drug, I know a few people have a list of ototoxic meds on here. Obviously I know you will see a doctor for the meds, so if you get a list of those medications that may add to your hyperacusis and tinnitus I would talk in depth with your doctor. Have you ever thought you may be bipolar?

My heart broke a bit reading this, I’m so sorry that your family and friends ignored you when you needed their support this happens a lot unfortunately and I agree with everything you have said depression is a silent killer. I’m glad one of your friends have shown you support. I know this is a online forum but you will get plenty of support here from me and many others, if you ever feel alone in this come on here and chat to us we will support you as much as we can. Stay strong Taylor and hope you get the help and support you need.

 

Check out the
Ototoxic "Psychopharmacologic Agents" list
on
http://hlaa-sbc.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/11/Ototoxic_Brochure.pdf

How loud is your T now?

 

FWIW, I have felt suicidal since getting tinnitus but I also have other ear problems, mainly ear pain.

I don't have any good days at all. But, I do get the impression that many of the young people here seem to improve, on average. I won't say all but it might be an average, who knows for sure.

My point is, if it's mild now and you are careful, it has a chance to improve. It think it bodes better for younger people.

In regards to depression and anxiety, I think it's better to seek natural treatments. In this particular case, it might be where cbt, counseling and natural treatments may help. My advice is to try these out before medications and prescriptions.

Whether a particular med has an ototoxic affect is not necessarily the point.
Imho, it should be the last resort for two reasons. 1) some can be addictive and arguably, long term use can alter brain chemistry. I don't think that is very positive.
2) it's up for debate whether such and such is ototoxic but why risk it unless there seemed to be no other option?

Some discount the affect of those and say, my t is the same or whatever but I think hearing loss and t is so serious and potentially debilitating that I wouldn't want to take any serious risks.

But, everyone has to decide whether it's essential to take a med or not. Imho, it's a last resort thing because t is so devastating and if the condition is mild or better, you want to do everything you can possibly do (within your control) to maintain that, right?

 

@Taylorslay -- I would stay away from all of them, whether or not they're ototoxic. Reported benefits from them are no better than placebo, which questions whether or not they're even effective. Why not try some safer approaches first? Like experimenting with your diet, or reducing the amount of time you're exposed to electronic devices? Or spending more time in nature, changing your normal routines, trying different exercises--whether physical or spiritual--trying new hobbies, or volunteering?

When someone has tinnitus and/or hyperacusis, the last thing you want to do is take unnecessary risks that would make it worse. Since a worsening can be lifelong, why even consider playing with fire? That's what physicians do with many of their recommendations, who don't have to live with the consequences of their own advice. But you will ultimately be responsible for choosing to take a drug that may cause further damage to your ears. Please think about your choices very carefully. -- Best...

@PeteJ -- I couldn't agree more. Especially after reading this eye-popping article a couple days ago. It's quite a long and sobering article. It just amazes me that so many doctors prescribe medications that can be extremely difficult to get off of, yet they know close to nothing about helping their patients do so. They just add another drug to deal with the "side effects" of previous drugs. And the cycle often gets progressively worse.

The Challenge of Going Off Psychiatric Drugs
Millions of Americans have taken antidepressants for many years. What happens when it’s time to stop?
By Rachel Aviv

April 1, 2019

 

Those words are true.

I had a friend in school, he was so down, 3 hours after we left the club, he tried to kill himself. Its so important to listen to people who are depressed, else it may become a slow death experience. Especially tinnitus seems to be ignored as much by society as depression, but both are highly connected.

Suicide is not to be something that grows over night though, it takes a lot of time to build up the path to it, I hope you can find a way out of these thoughts. Your at such a young age and it is wonderful that you found someone who understands you.
I still have to find such a person in my outside world, so far all feedback i get from my family or friends is as if I had the flew.

Be careful with the meds though, but if they help you sleep and relax, they might be tolerable, but be careful, a friend of mine started suicide thoughts after the meds kicked in, he was fine before.

 

Let me clarify. My suicidal thoughts are not something that sprouted because of my tinnitus or hyperacusis. Most everyone here is focusing on my last question. Let me be clear, my tinnitus and hyperacusis doesn't effect my life like they use to. In fact, when I did have bad hyperacusis I wasn't having suicidal thoughts instead I was angry. I was angry at my family for not giving a s*** about me. And chocking all of my hearing sensitivity and ringing to being psychosomatic. Then bully me because I had very bad anxiety. When I had bad hyperacusis I wanted to live and I wanted to fight. I wanted my life to be normal again, as "normal" as it could be.

I asked:

because I wanted to know if getting anti depressants would cause a bad spike in my tinnitus or particularly my hyperacusis. Just because H and T don't have such a huge effect on my life. I still have to plan my life around it. I have to wear earplugs in noisy areas and have to be cautious.

I personally don't think T and H are a reason to kill oneself. However, these conditions affect people in different ways. In a case by case bases people have their own justifications. I'm depressed because of my childhood. When I look back at my childhood I didn't enjoy it. My childhood was full of me being bullied by my peers, by my family and by my own self. There have only been small times in my life where I can fully say made my happy. And sure maybe I'm being pessimistic. But that doesn't change how I feel.

Just yesterday I came clean to my mom about my depression. She blew me off. Told me there were more important things to take care of. I then told her I am suicidal. Granted being actually suicidal and having suicidal thoughts are two different things. I just have suicidal thoughts. But I wanted that to explain to her the severity of my depression. But alas she blew me off again.

It just tells me that yet again I got to figure things out on my own. Like I always have. Alone.

Give me about a month max and I'll probably not be depressed anymore. But see this is what I hate. I get depressed for half the day. And the other half I'm fine. I have weeks where I am depressed and then weeks where I'm not. It's this constant off and on cycle of hell. I never have enough time for any personal growth because all I do is break down and rebuild over and over.

 

I don't know the specifics of each AD med, but I do know that the list of side effects is generally long enough to give someone good food for thought. Ototoxicity may not be the most painful side effect to deal with, actually. I was offered an AD for my T/H under promise that "it's safe, there's almost no side effects", but I decided not to take it after a quick internet search showed this promise was a bit of an exaggeration (to be polite). I also didn't believe I had any chemical imbalance in my brain: I thought my psychological reaction was very rational in the face of horrible onset of T/H. Who goes from quiet rest to 24x7 screeching noise and painful ears without batting an eye? Whoever manages to do that is the outlier in my opinion.

Have you considered therapies such as CBT? They can be quite successful and have the advantage of not having to ingest anything in your body. It's something that may be worth trying before systemic meds, if that makes sense to you.

Good luck!

 

@Taylorslay -- Or you may want to experiment with a simple (and short) brain balancing exercise:

Balancing the Cortices Technique

 

My tinnitus began after taking Lexapro. I quit after two weeks with minimal tapering and exactly five days later I had vertigo.

10 years ago I took Zoloft and had no problems.

Make sure you see a psychiatrist, and not your GP.

 

I am gonna try this.
It is suitable for me... it looks pretty easy.

Hope it helps... thanks.