Thanks for organizing this forum! (whoever you are ;-) I've only had tinnitus for about 2 months now, but it's been quite a ride so far. Mine is a high pitch ringing mostly. (around 8400 hz) I'm not 100% sure how it all started, but my best guess is that it started because of nicotine overdoses. I've always been more on the healthy side of living: eating well, lot's of exercise martial arts, and cultivating a happy mind. That said, I am a musician and in my youth dabbled with cigarettes. I haven't been a full time smoker for a very long time, but when my wife and I went on vacation we would enjoy them on our trips. Well I ended up taking a little longer to stop after one of our trips and decided to ween off by using an electronic cigarette. They are definitely a safer way to smoke (you are not really smoking as there is no combustion) but the problem is that it becomes very difficult to gauge exactly how much nicotine you've absorbed. So during that time I overdosed many times. Sever headache , sever tinnitus. After a couple of the weeks the tinnitus never went away I've since quit all forms of nicotine, cut down on coffee (although i am drinking a lot of green tea) and hopefully cutting down on other bad foods (sugar/salt) MRI and ENT could not find anything so I've basically been on my own trying to find help. Most of the time I am ok, but I must admit that i am starting to feel pangs of depression ... isolation ... hopelessness ..etc. Not being able to make music is just not something i can't even imagine, but at the moment I need to really limit the amount of sound i am exposed to. Right now I am taking ARCHES Tinnitus formula and hoping that it helps a little. Talking to other tinnitus suffers has been a huge help though. It's just awesome to talk to someone that knows how crazy these symptoms can be. Thanks again for putting this resource online! - J
Hi Joel and welcome. This is a great site with good information and great members whom share a common affliction. Sounds like you are doing pretty well for only 2 months into this.
Welcome to the site Joel. I was once an avid user of nicotine gum when I was in the process of quitting so I can relate to the periodic large nicotine intake.
Thx Aurelientt. Yeah I kind of wish I used the gum to ween off instead of those e-cigs. I probably wouldn't be in this situation if I had done so. Ah well. I can't say that is has been a totally negative experience. The constant ringing actually inspired me to use a similar sound in an audio book/story I was working on. That sound became a part of the narrative and it worked well actually! Also it was REALLY easy to drop nicotine once I was diagnosed ..the fear of the ring outweighed the fear of the craving ;-)
