Healing from Tinnitus / Hyperacusis Is Accelerated Through Silence — My Personal Experience

First a bit about me and my tinnitus/hyperacusis.

I sleep in silence. Every morning since my onset from acoustic trauma 40 days ago, when I get up from bed my tinnitus is at its quietest point in the day. Each week it is getting quieter, the trend is towards recovery, though day to day there are setbacks. It has gone from a piercing tone which I could not endure without gritting my teeth, and sometime genuinely having dark thoughts, to today, where it is a quiet sort of hissing - I can best describe it as sand being poured, though with occasional, harsher "chimes" intermingled. The "chimes" sound like the dying cries of the original tone - whereas before it was continual and unbroken, now it only rears its head for an instant at time. I imagine the noise is slowly being buried in the hissing sand. I would like to believe that the hiss, in time, will also fade into silence, though personally I could live with only the hiss without too much annoyance if it were to stay as is. After what I endured the first 4 weeks, an ultrasonic piercing signal that may have genuinely traumatized me, I thank god for this comparative heaven. I'm not sure how to live life after this, though I'm sure muffs and plugs will be a staple, though that is another topic.

All of that being said, as I expose myself to more noise each day, part of which induces hyperacusis related pain, the tinnitus ramps up, being "reactive". After particularly noisy days, the tinnitus seems worse the next day, and after silent days, I tend to wake up feeling even less tinnitus than the day before, and more healed. The trend overall is toward less tinnitus/hyperacusis, fortunately, though I am trying to protect myself from sound.

My point/question is, it feels good to remain in silence and off of conference calls. Progress is also swifter when abstaining from noise. Personally, my decision will be to limit noise, that is already settled, but as I understand it there is a dichotomy between "protecting" and "exposing". Personally as of now, I fall on the protect side, given my experience. This broken leg must heal before it bears weight, in my opinion.

Because I have had such clear experience, I simply wanted to add my anecdotal account to the heap. I hope this is helpful as another data/reference point to the community.

 

Hi,

This is the exact method I'm using too. I've made more progress in 3 days over protecting my ears than I did in the 2 months since onset.

Tinnitus is a none issue for me but the pain for hyperacusis has driven me almost to suicide.

I now drive with my hyperacusis ear plugged, print docs at work with ear muffs etc.

Although the pain isn't totally gone it has eased off to a point we're I can currently live again.

I'm going to maintain this method for a year before starting to reintroduce sounds like road noise etc.

Like you say you wouldn't walk on a broken leg.

Shaun.

 

Shaun, I wish you the speediest of recoveries. I have very little if any physical pain, but had piercing sound which was so loud it induced nausea and headaches daily; although in that regard I am on the other side of the spectrum, I empathize fully with what you're going through.

It is probably common knowledge on the forum, but if you are looking for good earmuffs, I recommend the 3M Peltor X5A which are some of the most powerful in terms of noise protection that I have seen offered.

 

I work for an airline so we have top quality ear defenders... Just a shame I didn't wear them when I started ten years ago and was oblivious to engine runs.

The burning pain and tingling was the maddening symptoms for me but there going... Very very slowly.

I wish you continued health

 

I think that's accurate. Hearing needs a long time to stabilise after a noise trauma, and this means spending a lot of time in silence or around sound at low volume.

The tricky part is getting back on with a normal life, as peak sounds are unpredictable in daily activities.

 

I have yet to find a study that supports this idea that overprotecting your ears lowers your sound tolerance, or increases the severity of hyperacusis. Do any exist?

 

That's what I'm having a hard time with. My family is loud and it's difficult to know when a loud noise will occur.

 

Same dude, except add a dog to the equation. Very disheartening since I feel I could’ve improved a whole lot more in the two months since hyperacusis onset if I could live on my own in silence. We gotta find the strength to go on somehow.

 

Nope. Nobody seems to give a flying f*ck.

 

The don't overprotect advice is actively harming hyperacusis sufferers.

 

Silence at night appears to be important. The ear plugs at night promote this during sleep, and have helped me quite a bit.

 

How do you study something when one says potayto and another says potaato...

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/thread...tus-overprotection-and-antidepressants.40082/

 

Family can be challenging if you have bad hyperacusis, but the really dangerous sounds are objectively loud sounds that would bother or damage anyone, like power tools, car horns, sirens and the like.

 

True, everyone is different. What makes one person better will make another person worse and vice versa.