Hearing Thunder/Accelerating Drone in My Head

Can somebody relate to this please? I’m in absolute panic!

It started two weeks ago, I woke up during the night and my head was shaking from this thundering sound.

It has been on/off since, usually happens upon waking during the night or in the morning and can linger for some time.

I have this constant low drone tinnitus in my right ear but this is different, now I can actually feel/hear noise accelerating and sounding like a thunder in my head.

The best I can explain is accelerating a truck engine.

I have been under an enormous amount of stress for the last 2-3 months and that’s the only thing that’s different, no meds, no noise exposure, no illness. What could this be?

 

Do you have any hearing loss in lower frequencies?

Other ear symptoms?

 

@DebInAustralia
Hi Deb,
I haven’t had my hearing tested recently but from the past tests I have low frequency loss in left ear, not the right one with drone noise.

Deep down I think it’s stress related but I’m worried as I’ve never had this “accelerating” part!

Hope you are doing ok!

 

@Greg Sacramento

Greg would you please have any input on this accelerating sound?

It’s the same sound that we get if we cover our ears with hands, that rumble in the head. But for me it just happens on its own. I can actually feel/hear it coming and getting faster/louder then it settles down.

I’ve been searching internet and found few reports in people who can voluntarily contract tensor tympani.

I wake up with it so no voluntary input.

Hope you have some answers up your sleeve for yet another weird symptom!

Thanks Greg!

 

I would work on your stress, because stress can make tinnitus worse or cause it. That's how I got tinnitus - from major stress. I have three sounds. It's hard to deal with new sounds, but it will calm down.

You have to work on your zen.

 

Did you try drinking some herbal tea diuretic and keeping your head on two or three pillows while you sleep?

 

I have no idea, but this is just a thought. Have you considered it could be your tensor tympani muscle spasming? I can voluntarily make a rumbling sound by flexing this muscle and so can many other people. It could be related to the stress you are under.

 

This is from an article I’ll link below. Pay attention to the part I’ve put in bold:

If you really want to feel jealous, consider this: There's a select few people who can entertain themselves endlessly, by performing ear tricks only they can enjoy.

It's called ear rumbling.

Recently, an engineer who goes simply by "Massimo" offered an in-depth look at how it works with more than 150,000 followers on Twitter.

"A part of the human population can voluntarily control the tensor tympani, a muscle within the ear," Massimo explains in his post. "Contracting this muscle produces vibration and sound. The sound is usually described as a rumbling sound."

The post brought out a few naysayers ("I've never even heard of this...") a lot of yaysayers ("Awesome!") and even a couple of hey-that's-me-sayers ("Slightly crap super power, but I'll take it!")

But how exactly does ear rumbling work?

Tensor tympani contraction. That's literally the tightening of a muscle in the ear called the tensor tympani. It flexes on its own when we vocalize, yawn, swallow, laugh or cough. That results in the tensing of the eardrum — and a tense ear drum won't vibrate so much, which in turn muffles sound. All one really hears is the sound of that muscle contracting.

Some people were born with the ability their tensor tympani at will.

But, like ear wrigglers and other ear-crobats, ear rumblers blend in so well with the general population, there's no real sense of how many walk among us — although you might strongly suspect one of them is that colleague who never seems to hear a word you say.

Ear rumblers have a much more pronounced presence on Reddit, where a dedicated community gathers under the banner, Ear Rumblers Assemble.

And in one post, an uber-rumbler describes how he uses his gift for much more than entertaining himself. It gets him through boring and altogether too frequent office meetings.

"I can do it on a whim for long periods of time," Redditor PureFingClass crows. "Usually in a meeting when I want to drown out someone's voice."

It's also possible that more people have the gift of ear rumbling but don't know it yet. Unfortunately, there's no single way to find out if you're among them. People use their own unique methods to tap into their superpower.

"It happens when I contract my face and smush it real hard, my eyes close and my nose scrunches up and I hear this rumbling sound," notes one Twitter user.

Writing for IFLScience, James Felton suggests you proceed thusly:

"If you'd like to find out if you can make this sound, you can try screwing your face up really tightly, including your eyes. Go ahead and try it, don't feel embarrassed, I'm sure nobody is watching. Did you hear it? Most people describe it as a rumbling noise, with some describing it like a thunder."

Well, did you hear it?

Or was that just the sound of the ocean, echoing through the seashells that sit lifelessly on the sides of your head?

In any case, I can't hear you. I'm rumbling.

https://www.treehugger.com/ear-rumble-rumbling-wriggling-4859377

 

Hi Ed,

I have also read some stories of people who can do it voluntarily (as per your previous post) but wouldn’t have any clue what those people hear.

And the sound in itself is scary but this accelerating part is worst! imagine hearing a rumble and then it gets faster, it’s a physical feeling too, I can “hear” it coming, almost like a tornado coming closer.

I just don’t know if this is the tympani muscles going into spasm in sleep?
Is that even possible?

I don’t have any blocked/pressure feeling that is associated with tympani spasms.
Tinnitus is a damn thing for sure!

 

No I haven’t tried that, sounds like a good idea, thank you!

 

It’s often described as thunder and rumbling. I can only hear it when I do it with earplugs in and it sounds like a soft rumble/flutter for me.

 

Hi there, I hope you don’t mind me jumping on this thread.

I have had the low pitched hum for around 11 months and it’s been hell. I have just noticed something though... when I hang my head and just look downwards it totally STOPS - literally can’t hear it at all.

What on earth could this mean? I would be incredibly interested to hear people’s thoughts on this. My GP is sure it is ETD but could it be something to do with blood pressure? I keep going to see GPs and ENTs and I feel like they won’t take me seriously.

@Greg Sacramento, I feel like you are pretty knowledgeable in this area!

 

Did you find some relief? I don't have the same sound, but in my left ear there is an engine-like sound, but more hollow if it makes any sense. It gets so loud by the evening that now I'm seriously in distress. I deal with it better in the morning, I guess. But it's unmaskable, and so loud. It normally goes away for me in 1-3 weeks, but it's been going on with off/on days for 3 months.

 

Still here, maybe less but still present, hell...

 

Ever consider endolymphatic hydrops via your ENT? Definitely check your low frequency hearing and compare!

 

I know, absolute hell.

Can you stop it by covering your ear or does it stop when you talk, yawn, hum,etc.? Does your original drone behave that way?

 

Does it stop when you vocalize, like a long "aaaaaaaaa" for instance?

 

Sorry ladies, I did not see your questions until now.

@monkey124 I don't think that ETD blockage itself is the problem and a tympanogram would probably show that eustachian tubes were not blocked --- reason being plugging ear or lowering your head would not completely stop your sounds with ET blockage.

If your earwax was yellow to green, then infection was possible, but with having used olive oil, then color of earwax with removal could had changed to brown or golden brown. If your earwax on removal was black, then no infection. The use of olive oil itself, wouldn't be cause, but the removal may have stirred up infection sitting in the ear. With any infection, ear cells with gravity or air pressure change could stop sounds with covering ears or bending head down.

Since you have times where sounds are not bothersome, it may be infection from ET travel, but not blockage. So it may be seasonal, allergies to pollen or seasonal as to when using air conditioner or heater. A face mask for this may help. If you have developed any TMJ/D concerns, then ET infection travel is cause for that and ear. You may need sinus/allergy treatments.

@valeri I had though that your sounds were caused from occasional rising of blood pressure. If so and controlled, sounds should become less and disappear.

 

It's interesting that this happens for a few of us.

I originally thought the head tilt was some kind of internal rumble 'stopping' it like when we shake our head. However, I've been testing it very delicately, I can get a complete stoppage by lowering my chin to chest in sitting position and, as I slowly tilt it back up, the sound starts to appear and is at its loudest when head is fully up. You can hear it ramp up. Which gives it even more of a physical feeling in the ear as there's no obvious muscle tension making a sound when you head is all the way down and relaxed.

We should investigate what systems could create this effect within the ear and we might be able to find some kind of culprit that we can interrupt more permanently.

From memory, I've seen some notes in the low hum study that they think the oscillation may happen between the cochlea and balance system. Like an actual feedback loop of sound that can be interrupted in two ways - by sound and head tilting - as well as the obvious shaking, which could be sound or balance related.

There may be tricks to control it considering many people have the hum come and go for longer periods than regular tinnitus.

If anyone else reads this and has a hum that can be stopped sometimes by putting head to chest, let us know!