Hello

Hi, just signed up to this now after reading obsessively for almost two months. I’ll give a brief explanation at the top here because I’m gonna write a full one underneath which will be long:

So about two months ago, 7th September, this tinnitus came on with Tonsillitis. I went on antibiotics for a week to get rid of that which didn’t seem to affect the tinnitus but gave me loads of other weird symptoms so I stopped taking it. The ringing was awful for a while and I had breakdowns over it. I’ve been told by several doctors (who didnt really seem interested) and one ENT (who did) that it will go away, and my hearing test showed above average. I have a high pitched static noise in my head which is worse on waking and before bed, sometimes accompanied by a constant high tone (that I can only hear if I try), my left ear has a bell like thing going on and my right ear sometimes has a constant tone, both of these bits get a lot worse before bed (like actually worse not just in my head). I feel blocked up often and still have a sore throat.

Full Version:

So about two months ago (7th Sep) I started feeling under the weather and this ringing came in, high pitched but quiet, with what felt like a cold. It made me pretty nervous but I thought it was probably just that temporary ringing that happened randomly sometimes and that it would resolve itself.

I went out that night, not clubbing - I just went to the pub with a few friends but we sat outside, it wasn’t too loud and when we did go to a club afterwards we went straight through to the smoking area and I kept my fingers in my ears while we went through the loud indoor bit. We stayed in the club smoking area for maybe an hour before I went home, I only had to slightly raise my voice to talk to my friends and I don’t remember the ringing being any louder at all after I left.

Woke up over the next couple of days with it still there and felt the Tonsillitis coming on (I’ve had it before) and I guess this is when the ringing got worse. I didn’t go to the doctor at this point because sometimes Tonsillitis clears up by itself and it wasn’t really bothering me so I left it but the ringing was driving me nuts.

On the tenth it was time for me to move back to uni (I’m in the UK) which was about a 4 hour drive and we stopped at a really noisy service station on the way which made me stressed the entire time I was there and I hated it but it only seemed to make the T a little worse and knowing what I know now I doubt it was higher than 85dB and we were only there about half an hour, so how stressed I was probably was what made it worse.

Anyway I moved into my new house, settled in etc etc the ringing was still there but fine. I was having trouble sleeping but I was essentially okay. On the 12th in the night I suddenly felt so so so ill that I ended up going to A&E (ER) and being given some penicillin for the Tonsillitis and the doctor didn’t seem bothered about the ringing, just told me calmly it would go away so I thought alright and went on my way. I started the antibiotics which didn’t seem to have any adverse effect.

The ringing was pretty loud at this point, I was in tears over it often obviously even more so because I felt so ill. I ended up going back home on the train, which made my ears pop a bit and I could hear the ringing still because I was wearing headphones (no music). I ended up staying at home for about ten days, at first I was really really sick and the ringing was awful, especially at night. The nights were awful in every respect, I had headaches and nausea and aches and pains and shooting pains and numbness I was honestly convinced death was imminent and I’m not an anxious person usually.

I stopped taking the penicillin because I found out some antibiotics are Ototoxic and I was worried that might be a part of it (have talked to doctors since and none of them seemed mad because I’d already taken it for a week and it was a super strong dose).

I got better, ish, I still felt pretty shitty but I was missing lectures due to illness at this point so I came back to uni. This was a mistake, my mum came to stay nearby and I went to stay with her for about a week, I still felt terrible and I kept having panic attacks and crying about the ear ringing, one night it woke my up just screaming in one ear and I cried myself back to sleep because I thought it wouldn’t go away but it did.

Eventually Mum went back home and I managed to get on with my life but still struggling with H, avoiding all loud noises and crying at them, not leaving the house and sleeping with a hoodie and earphones and shoving my head between the pillows when I went to sleep. I don’t know how I did get to sleep.

I’ve been back to the doctors a few times but was mostly brushed off and told it would go away - the first few times they checked my ears and said my eardrums looked full but wouldn’t diagnose me, just said it would go away so I trusted them but eventually I wanted more info so I referred myself to an ENT, who did a bunch of tests and listened to me - checked pressure, examined my ears, did a thing with a tuning fork. He did a pure tone hearing test as well and told me my hearing was actually above average which is good I guess.

He mentioned nothing about my ear drums being dull he said everything looked normal. He couldn’t tell me the cause but was really friendly and said he was absolutely confident that it would fade over the next few weeks and that I didn’t need to be careful around loud noises or anything as it didn’t seem to be cause by damage.

So I happily walked home without headphones on, not worrying about traffic noise etc and this has been how it is for a few weeks now. I’m feeling a lot better mentally and it seems to have settled down.

This high pitched static noise is always there, with an occasional sound in the left ear which is like someone running their finger round a wine glass and is always worse just before bed, and a high pitched noise in the right ear which again is much worse before bed.

In the day I can barely hear it unless I concentrate but it is there, and some days noise makes me a lot more nervous than others and I just stay in my room but I’m mostly okay.

I’ve been to two parties since, one with very loud music and so I only stayed inside for about twenty minutes and as far away from the music as I could get, it cause a spike but it was fine by morning, and two nights ago I also went to a party but I was wearing plugs the whole time (alpine party plugs recommended to me by an audiologist).

It wasn’t that loud anyway, conversation wasn’t hard at all, but I did drink a lot and when I got home I felt as if my head was vibrating and I was so worried but the next morning it was alright.

One weird thing is that the ringing seems genuinely much better while I’m in a noisy environment (I go to a quiet place and check by blocking my ears) but I get this funny feeling where I know it’s gonna come back maybe worse later in the day.

I also have this weird thing with the back of my shoulder where I can’t really feel it (like when you have a dead leg and scratch your leg how you can’t feel it) ever, my neck cracks sometimes and gets stiff and my jaw has been stiff (maybe from tension?) lately.

I still wake up with a bit of a blocked nose each day, some worse than others, and get crackling when I swallow and yawn and sometimes my jaw snaps randomly. I don’t think my glands are up really anymore.

I also get some pain deep in my ears, sometimes after I’ve had a noisy day and sometimes randomly.

I can go about my day pretty normally but I find myself blocking my ears whenever a motorbike goes by or I walk past a busker.

I don’t understand what’s going on and although I’m doing okay I’m afraid of making it worse because if it gets worse like some of the conditions I’ve read in hear I really am not sure I can cope with it (although I know I would find a way, I just really don’t want to have to.)

 

Welcome to the forum,

lots of caring people here. Always here to support those... that are affected by tinnitus

 

Consider using sound enrichment to give you something else to listen to, besides your T.

If I were you, I would stay away from parties for at least a year, to let my body heal. This forum is full of horror stories of people finding out the hard way that ear plugs will not always be enough to protect you.
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/earplugs-muffs-give-very-little-protection.21737/

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/tinnitus-much-worse-after-club-despite-wearing-solid-35-db-custom-earplugs-—-im-at-my-wits-end.15744/#post-186018

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/bad-spike-not-subsiding-after-loud-bar-—-despite-wearing-properly-inserted-earplugs.20675/#post-239000

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/thread...t-an-acoustic-trauma-shock.18964/#post-219363

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/thread...le-in-real-life-situations.19067/#post-220314

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/33-decibel-earplug-not-protecting-from-sound.22151/

I could go on and on and on (provide links to more horror stories where people found out the hard way that it was a bad idea to rely on earplugs), but you get the idea.

Even if those spikes end up being temporary, we are given a limited number of second chances. If one keeps being reckless, eventually a time might come when the spike won't go away...
xb

 

If you hit a wall with a hammer long enough, eventually there will be a hole in the wall. (Of course in the short run you might get the impression that the hammer is not doing anything. In this analogy, tinnitus is like the light that you can see once there is a hole in the wall.)

 

I agree with you about the hammer analogy entirely, that makes sense to me. It’s only been two months since onset so I’m mainly just trying to figure out what does and doesn’t affect me, once I’ve figured it out (and sadly I think I’ve now figured out after three problems that parties are on my no fly list) I will NOT be taking any unecessary risks...... and I will also be donating to research for this condition as and when I can afford it, definitely one you can’t understand the horror of until you have it and I’m sure mine is nothing compared to some people on this forum. Hats off to anyone dealing with it

 

It makes sense to me to be extra careful during the first year, to give my body a chance to heal.

Your age gives you an advantage - your body is probably a lot more resilient than that of many others on this forum.

 

I’m happy to be careful to be honest, I’m not really a party girl I’m quite bookish and just enjoy staying in mostly so ‘my ears are screwed’ has got me out of a few unappealing invitations so far.... I hope you’re right about my age! I’ll make sure my 21st is like a meditation meeting or something...