How Is Your Hearing After a Year of Tinnitus? Could My Brain Be "Thinking" My Hearing Is Worse?

Right, so I think I've asked this question before but this time I want to word it differently..

When I first acquired tinnitus in September 13 it was really really loud. What came with it like most was hyperacusis. After a few months later, around mid spring of last year, I noticed things were quieter & also my T, I was no longer affected by loud noises such as the washing machine, toilet flush or hoover to name a few, like I was before. I also started to think at that point that my hearing was getting significantly worse, it became an obsession. No longer was a I looking for my T but comparing my hearing.

My question now is, could this be something my brain now thinks has happened? The ENT said there was no more hearing loss than when I had the test at the beginning of Jan last year & that it is simply my brain 'thinking' my hearing is worse but is actually not. Could the lack of hyperacusis give the impression of hearing loss after experiencing it for a long period of time with a lot of stress?

I'm at a loss & I'm very confused

 

Actually my audiogram improved a little bit this year (I thought that quite odd).

Maybe your brain is still blocking out what it thought to be painful/stressful at one time; but I think that's a stretch. Trauma can do odd things to the brain (T and H is trauma). But really, I have no idea.

Mark

 

Yes it would. Hyperacusis isn't actually super sensitive hearing like Superman has, were you can hear a leaf falling out of a tree at a 100 yards. Your hearing threshold is the same, but your limbic system is "priming" your pre-frontal cortex with negative emotion 300ms before the actual sound hits it.

When that sound arrives you pay a lot more attention to it, as the emotion is designed to make you do so. People with H are so wary of further damage or worsening their T that they attach a lot of emotion to it.

Imagine driving a car through a strange city with your wife/husband constantly shouting "lookout!" every time a hazard appeared. It would be very annoying but you would certainly pay a lot of attention to the road.

However.....as time goes by and nothing untoward happens, your passenger falls asleep and you drive in your normal manner [The passenger/emotion isn't constantly putting you on edge]. Has your driving/hearing got worse? No. It just seems like it.

 

@Kopesy
I might be on the wrong track here, but you might be dealing with something different than tinnitus and hearing loss. Regarding your post about detatchment, you might have some form of depersonalization and derealization. Derealization can dissort how you percieve senses and create abnormalites in your hearing. It might be difficult to determine where sounds comes from and make sense of them. Notice that these distortions are not permanent and will return to normal when the derealization is gone.

 

Yeah, last year when I was at the brink of despair with my T, I thought that my hearing had decreased as well. Then I got a hearing test and it showed my hearing was normal, at least normal by my standards since I have otosclerosis. The ailment and our perceptions of that ailment are often two different things.

 

THIS.
This is exactly what I'm having or rather am in the process of getting rid of.
In the beginning every time I heard a beep or an eeee or something I would think about hyperacusis,tinnitus,anxiety,fear,all the horror stories and by doing so I developed sound sensitivity 2 days in.
But then I had some spike, after the spike I realized a couple of things.
1.) I'm young so I got the young and healthy and fast healing stuff going on
2.) My Tinnitus is mild, mild enough that it doesn't bother me at all
3.) I don't have a history of noise abuse, further more if my Tinnitus got so low in 3 months that leaves a lot of time for it to improve further.
4.) Its only about 1/3 of what I make it out to be in my mind, like you said the driving thing.
After I realized how much I make the situation worse in my head and how it actually isn't nearly as bad I stopped being bothered by my current sound sensitivity a lot.
It's 20% of a bother it used to be, and today something weird happen, the sudden temporary relief of sound sensitivity hit me so hard while I was busy talking with friends I thought I had gone deaf, but instead it was silence.
It didn't last long as I began looking for it right away and sure enough I found it, but it proved just how much of a mental thing this is for me.

Also just read that 25 mil American experience Tinnitus once in their life.
This has made it clear to me that Tinnitus resolving is actually a common thing rather than an impossible thing only 1/1000000 get to have.
I'm habituating and all and I won't be holding my breath for my Tinnitus to leave, the sound sensitivity I know will leave, but if the Tinnitus goes too that would be just dandy

 

It's totally weird how Tinnitus works. I don't think we will know for sure how it's perception can be explained until we have a working model of a "theory of consciousness", and that's years in the future.

It always reminds me of the Schrodingers cat business where the cat is both dead and alive until you look in the box. When you're habituated then T is there....but only when you listen for it. By observing it you make it real. I don't observe mine haha. So it is there...but it also isn't. Worrying about it is like putting flashing neon lights on it; it's a lot harder to ignore.

 

Just after onset i had my hearing tested and it was ok, and now after 2 years I bet mine is the same if not better, my T is not associated to hearing loss and I've been able to go to "loud" bars without problems, no spikes even. Anyway, I try to be very careful.

 

I've had this T for seven years. No hearing loss - super hearing. No increase or decrease in my T level. Sounds are the same.

 

Kopesy i'm trying to contact you but i cant start a conversationele with you because of your settings

 

@bekker
Thanks for letting me know! I had no idea I'd had it set up like that. Should be good to chat if you're still wanting to o/

 

@Kopesy how did you get your T?
And if your T is better are u habituated?
I personally would have less hearing then moreT
How long did it take for your T to get softer?

 

@Dominic1955
Not entirely sure exactly how/why I 'acquired' T but I'm pretty sure it's some sort of acoustic trauma. I think a dose of stress also exacerbated it & gave it the little push it needed to become a permanent 'companion'.

Hmm, I think I've definitely habituated to it. It took about 18months for the sound to diminish & since then I've slowly reacted to it less, thus perceiving it less. A few other problematic things were added to the mix whilst struggling with it, that almost ironically, took my mind off it a little more here & there.

I wouldn't necessarily put it down to anything I could say was definitive in somewhat resolving my T, other than giving up trying to fix it & a small -compared to a lot of others I know- dose of time.

 

Glad you are doing much better, and glad you habituated.
im 5 months in and starting to habituate, but sometimes it spikes and its terrible for me.
i cant get used to spikes still.
do you still go to bars, cinema or parties?

 

Thanks! @Mario martz
Yeah the spikes still hit me like a truck. I doubt there's any way of habituating to those attention-seeking buggers!
Tbh, I was never really into going out to bars/parties. I've been to one club a few months after I'd gotten T.. Never again lol It's worked in my favour really, perfect excuse to sit & chill with my headphones instead. Silver linings & all that.. ^_^

 

that awesome man!, in my case... i really loved going to parties, i dont care much for bars.
im starting to focus on my art and other things, too bad i built my life around parties, friends and social gatherings lol
but its not the end of the world, just changes.

i still havent used headphones, since i think it might have been my problem first, i miss working out with my headphones on!