Is This Reactive Tinnitus?

I caused my own tinnitus by standing too close to a speaker at a music concert. It was at a small indoor venue and the music was much too loud.

In terms of severity, I can 1) hear a distinct ringing at night when my ear is on the pillow or when I am in a quiet room, 2) I hear almost no ringing during day-to-day activities (I'm very grateful for this), but 3) I always hear the ringing when I am surrounded by a loud, drone-like noise.

I don't entirely understand this last case, and hope someone can explain this to me. For example, I don't hear any ringing when I am in the bathroom and it is relatively silent (I live on a busy street). As soon as I turn the fan on, however, I'll hear the ringing. Similarly, I'll hear the ringing very distinctly when my car's heater is on full-blast, but not so much otherwise. The same happens when I use my laptop in a quiet room. As soon as I turn the fan/heater/laptop off, the ringing will return to its usual volume immediately. This only happens for this particular type of sound. For example, I do not the ringing at all when there is quiet ambient music or conversation.

Does this sound like reactive tinnitus? When I read about people describing their own reactive tinnitus, I get the impression that the reaction is not immediate like in my case. Any insight is greatly appreciated.

 

That's definitely reactive tinnitus - I have it too.

Reactive tinnitus is a strange one because the T can spike from specific sounds at lower volumes, even if the volume isn't at all damaging your ears. This seems to be the case with you.

It sounds like you're not subjecting yourself to very loud sounds when you get these spikes so I would say it's nothing to worry about. Just be careful in the future with anything over 80Db because there's a chance it'll make your T worse, as it has done with mine.

 

I noticed that as well
whenever there is low frequency noise my T seems louder. I think that if you have high frequency loss then an increase of low frequency sounds tricks the brain into thinking that even more of the high frequencies are missing.

A bit Like wearing earplugs which cut the highs a lot more than bass.