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Hi All,

My situation might be slightly unique, although I developed T whilst preparing for final exams (5th Nov 2016). It was about five days before the exam when I started to hear this buzzing sound in my head & it just intensified. I thought I was going completely mad, it prevented me from sleeping & doing any proper revision.

During my exam the buzzing was extremely loud & developed into a strange horn sound, I couldn't concentrate & only wanted to leave immediately. Afterwards, I visited the doctor, his diagnosis was T, issued me sleeping pills, ear clear, and some tips with masking etc..

The last 4 nights I'm sleeping okay without any pills or masking devices (6 to 8hrs perhaps into REM sleep). The buzzing is still there, yet I've just accepted the situation and showing kindness towards T. However, five days ago I was in a VERY DARK DARK place , fortunately, I spoke to mental health service for ten minutes, who're just opposite campus, and now I'm back on the spiritual path .

I was a meditation practitioner before T, & since T I've now increased my practice & I believe this is helping GREATLY. T is just becoming background noise and I'm not really paying too much attention to it, initially the sound was unbearable, although I think showing compassion has dissipated the anxiety I was enduring.

It's still very early, but I've seen small improvements during the last couple of days (e.g., being able to read in silence), so good signs how our mind can habituate with a little bit of buzzing happening in our head.

T & I will experience some sincere intimacy very soon during a 10 day silent retreat I booked before our lovely encounter .

Thank you, thank you, for letting me join the group.

Mick

 

Welcome to the forum @Mick007. It is rare for a new sufferer to be able to remain calm only after 5 days of suffering and you are surely special. Count that as a positive. Perhaps it is your meditative stance of showing compassion (which is really acceptance to me) towards T instead of fighting it with extreme emotions. You are on the right track. The less stressful about T, the less it will bother you and eventually mother time takes over with the body hardening to the repetitive but meaningless T stimulus. You will get there. Take care. God bless.

 

@Mick007

I am not sure if this is the case for you, but I have heard from some other meditation practitioners who actually got their T from meditating. I think in Buddhism there is even an own word for this phenomenon. So there seems to be a link between those two. However if you first noticed your T during studying it might very well have another cause.. although that's actually also a moment of deep concentration?! But I don't meditate, so I don't know if you can really compare that.. however as mentioned before you seem to have gotten control over your situation pretty quickly and that's already a good indicator that you are on the right track. A lot of strength and good luck to you on your path.

 

Thank you so much your kind words Billie and Emmi!!!

It’s nice to belong to another group, and its great to see a global network of such caring people who are willing to help each other. Thank you, thank you

My biggest fear about a week ago was never to have silence again, nor being able to meditate, although I stopped this wrong view fairly soon.

The turning point for me was reflecting back to a meditation practice that attempts to minimise the wandering mind & maintain cognitive focus (e.g. mental awareness) on a particular object, easier said than done.

Sometimes our practice is analogous to a young child who keeps running outside the house to play, & you’re forever brining the child back inside to remain seated, yet as soon as you turn your back they’re outside again.

So, the turning point for me was seeing my mind actually wandering during meditation with T. This showed me that T was not obstructing my practice e.g., I wasn’t total absorbed/fixated with the white noise. This lead to further inner confidence how to deal with the situation and knowing its merely meaningless sound, similar to the perpetual rumination we may experience throughout the day.

Its still early days, although the method that’s helping me is just face the situation in a kind manner, and try to be as natural as possible because our external comforts may not always be available.

Again, thank you so much for your warm welcome

Mick

 

Your technique is like Mindfulness practice. Mindfulness meditation brings the object we fear into focus and consciousness, and then by willing to face it, or even to embrace it with compassion, it buffers against the extremely negative and resisting reactions which can produce extreme emotional suffering. Dr. Hubbard also describes a similar approach called 'exposure' in his CBT technique. I guess similar techniques that help us accept our dire situation with better emotional response will always help.
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/how-cbt-helped-me-live-again-dr-hubbards-story.4608/

Your approach of not strongly rejecting the bad sensation of T is also in line with the approach used by the late Darlene Cohen. She didn't use it for T, but for severe chronic pain. Accepting severe chronic pain as a life-long sensation is a challenge but somehow her approach of 'finding joy amid the pain' works for her. I think all these approaches are helping us to accept sufferings in life with compassion and openness, which allow the brain to have enough time to harden to the bad sensations.