How Do You Learn to Go Back to Sleep?

If you wake up too early in the morning hearing your tinnitus (in my case it's a morse code like beeping), can you train yourself to tune it out? I'm an anxious person, and a light sleeper, and I can't sleep when there are noises. I have ordered a white noise machine, but I don't know if it will mask the beeping in my head.

 

Don't worry if you don't go back to sleep,the rest will still do you good.
Setting a alarm clock is good as will help train your brain wake up to that .
When you u see sound therapy at night remember set it below your tinnitus.
Your brain will work hard to pick up the sound you have chosen and push your tinnitus sound to the background....lots of love glynis

 

There are a lot more masking options than a white noise machine. Some people may also find the white noise boring or irritating. Perhaps try these masking sounds to see which one fit you.

TT's audio player: https://www.tinnitustalk.com/audioplayer/

or download free sound generator ‘aire freshener’: http://www.peterhirschberg.com/mysoftware.html

or make your own rain sound: http://mynoise.net/NoiseMachines/rainNoiseGenerator.php

or search youtube with words like 'tinnitus masking sounds', 'white noise', 'rain sound' etc.

 

Thank you!

 

I found it best to not try and mask the T fully. Sure, some background noise is good since it gives you something to focus on. But if you try and fully mask it, it has 3 main negative effects in my experience:

1. It makes you dependent on the masking noise, making it so you never allow your brain to adapt to the T, and learn to fall asleep and stay asleep with it.
2. You may find yourself listening for your T (and perhaps mildly perceiving it behind the masking noise). In doing so, your brain is actively working and focusing on the T. Very hard to sleep once your brain starts that kind of active search and focus.
3. For some people who suffer from panic attacks and anxiety, they sometimes begin to have the same nervous reactions to masking sounds since the whole "I want things to just be quiet" thought process kicks in.

Here is the key thing to realize. Its very likely not the T itself that is keeping you awake. Rather, its your brain's reaction to the T that is keeping you awake. My T is loud enough that only a passing train can cover it, and I spent night after night awake and focused on it since I had also spent all day focused on it. Yet, when I wouldn't think about my T all that much during the day, I would end up not thinking about it much at night, and would end up sleeping fine. Its all part of the process of habituation to the T. And not trying to constantly mask the T is part of that process, as difficult as it may seem at first, when you "just want it to go away"

 

I agree with brody about masking. It is often a temporary thing before your brain has the ability to face up to the alien T sound without panic. Try not to overpower T and set the volume slight below T. That way the brain can learn to habituate to that T sound, if slowly.

 

Try downloading some relaxation apps on your phone too. There's a lot of them to choose from and they're free. You can also get a blue tooth speaker if you want an external speaker. You have to tell yourself that your T is not that big of deal, you have to try to lessen it's seriousness so you can relax and go back to sleep. It's not easy it takes practice. I have pretty loud tinnitus and I've been working on sleeping and staying asleep lately too. Good luck!

 

This is great for masking

The Sound of a Air Conditioner 8hrs...

 

Good advice from @billie48 and others here. My sleep has definitely changed since the onset of my T a few years ago but I am used to it now and function just fine. In the beginning, I worried about it which only added to my anxiety. I used a white noise machine (being careful not to totally mask my T so I could still learn to habituate) and it helped. I also took magnesium, valarian root and malatonin. Don't know if they helped. Then I discovered some relaxation tracks which promoted deep breathing techniques that I also practiced in yoga. I found that most helpful and still do. I often wake up a couple of hours early with loud T (since the room is so quiet) and can't fall back to sleep, especially during the work week, when my mind starts pondering about what's on my desk at work. I find deep breathing helps me to rest even if I don't sleep. I hope you will too!

 

The Back To Silence method took away my anxiety and insomnia, plus, I don't have to listen to T anymore.
Be the next success story!! Only a paper and pencil required, nothing to buy.
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/back-to-silence.7172/

 

I don't stay asleep for long stretches of time anymore which I attribute to tinnitus. I do go back to sleep pretty easily though each time I am awakened. Sleep is my vacation from tinnitus. When I wake to the sound of T, I just tell myself to go back on vacation. This works for me but I understand that it may not work for others.

 

I can not believe that this type of sound can mask or even partially mask someone's T. Well maybe I can, my bathroom fan used to mask my T before it got bad. My T blasts so loud when I put this video on (even video turned right up) that my head feels like it's going to explode from this dentist drill tinnitus and my ears become red and painful very quickly.

Glad it gives people some relief though, it's just amazing how different all of our T's are. I would imagine if this noise helps mask your T that every day sounds would help as well.

 

Hi Telis,

T is not T. I took a Trobalt yesterday and had faint T of maybe 3/10 or 4/10 for two hours. My worst T is 3-4 loud tones above 12 kHz louder than the shower. I have that maybe 60% of my time and I switch to survival mode. Unmaskable, ok maskable with 100 db waterfall sounds.

It is frustrating for the really worst T people here to see how people habituate after some months and it seems our own fault that we do not reach this. Everyone only knows his own T and gives an advice as good as possible. It is what it is. Some have mild T they hear only in silence and others have an orchestra of 10 sounds and loud together with H. I guess if you want, you can put T into 10 different categories.

Nevertheless, at the end we need to go the same road as good as possible. And we see cases, where people with really loud T get their life back, although it can take some years. I read again and again that anxiety plays a huge role. And it is the same for me. Once I get stress and enter the anxiety -> louder T -> more anxiety -> even louder T loop, it becomes unbearable and I need a pill to leave this circle.

Stay strong my friend. I know how you suffer, how I suffer and how others suffer. Catastrophic T is really difficult to handle and takes a lot of strength, will power and energy. One day, we will be through this.