Did My Tinnitus Get Louder? It's Hard for Me to Tell...

Hello,

About three days ago a 9mm gun discharged about two feet from me. It was an accident and so I wasn't ready. The sound of the gunshot was about a millisecond. It was so fast I didn't have a chance to react. All I heard was a boom then a different ring from my tinnitus for about 2-3 seconds and it went away.

Now I am paranoid that there have been some damage that it seems that it got louder. When I plug my ears it sounds the same. I am having a hard time figuring if it got louder or not. I feel like it didn't but at the same time I do hear it at some places where I normally don't but then I'm not sure that it's just because I am looking for it and that's why I hear it now and not before.

The first time I got hearing damage I felt my ears full and I had a pain on my left cheek for a month and I got tinnitus and hyperacusis. The T stayed but the H went away in about three years. The ringing didn't go away it stayed the same the whole time. Unlike when I heard the gunshot I only got it for 2-3 seconds without any pain or fullness in the ears and no hyperacusis.

Do you guys think this is just a spike? Or did my T really changed? Any help or insight would be greatly appreciated.

Thank you,
Alex

PS. Just in case you are curious why the guns. I help train self defense to the police department in my area and we were at a room in their shooting range when it happened. Luckily the room had bad acoustics and didn't make the blast louder than it is. There was two officers in the room and both of them didn't get any hearing damage whatsoever. Their ears didn't even ring.

 

I think that if it were to get louder, you would Know.

 

I'd say that if you think it sounds the same when you plug your ears, you're probably fine. The fact that you hear it in places where you usually don't is most likely because you're looking for it and testing.

It's hard not to, but it'll probably go away again as soon as you stop doing that.

 

You are right it was just me being overly paranoid. I am almost back to my baseline. Thank you so much for the feedback.

 

Good to hear!