My Journey (Half Way Through)

It all started in March 5th of this year. I was talking with my best friend in speaker mode and then I raised my phone to my ear thinking I turned off the speaker mode when suddenly her voice hurt my ear. Next months with tinnitus and hyperacusis were really bad, I lost all confidence in myself for being so stupid for doing that thing with the phone. Hyperacusis lasted for 3 months and tinnitus went down also (not to a full extent), but I still get ear fullness that bothers me every single day.

My mistake was buying a Motorola G6 that has the loudspeaker and ear speaker in the same place above the screen. I was going to buy a Samsung but for some reason I ended buying the Moto G6. I don't know if this happened for being so clumsy or in automatic mode (I was really stressed those days because of my dissertation thesis and many other things that you can feel when living in a communist country like Venezuela)

I mean I don't even listen to loud music with headphones, I also don't go to clubs or concerts maybe once per year. My hearing test indicate that my hearing is perfect but I know that is not true. Seriously, this is the worst thing that ever happened to me... I thought that being cheated on, failing a college semester or crashing my car with a truck (only got a bruise in my forehead) were the the worst but now I know those where circumstantial things. I don't even wanna take more risks going to a concert or going to a party and that's really sad. I remember my last concert four years ago I went to see jamiroquai but I was in the back drinking some whisky and enjoying the music with friends I feel I can't do that anymore because of the fear of ruining my hearing further.

All because I bought the wrong phone.

 

Welcome to the forum. Glad that your condition is stabilized and improving. Have you checked what is causing your ear fullness? Liquid in the ears or ETD, infection, inflammation?

 

I went to a couple of ENTs and they just gave me advice and prescribed the typical stuff (Vitamin B, Ginkgo Biloba, anti-allergy meds and magnesium). I had steroids but a month after my acoustic trauma. Two days after my incident I went to the Urgent Care but the doctor wasn't an ENT, she prescribed some ear drops and NSAIDs so I took Advil for two weeks and I just didn't know about steroids. Everyday I wonder what could have happened if I had got the steroids the next day after my incident, but they didn't prescribe prednisone.

I want to buy some professional custom earplugs, they seem cool for going to weddings in case that I need them, but the damage is already done. It sucks that I have to live with this right after college, many days and nights working for my engineering degree and now I feel it all went to the toilet that night.

I mean I'm ok, maybe my tinnitus will die slowly but I really want to get it as low as possible. I also fear to get hyperacusis again, not being able to enjoy a normal life but on the other side I know there are people who got it worse with bilateral tinnitus & hyperacusis with hearing loss. I changed my phone to a Samsung S10 but I don't dare to put a phone on my ears again. I don't know why I have my right ear clogged. I suspect it is ETD. Weeks after the onset of my hyperacusis my throat was dry and I could move my eardrum just by breathing. But that makes no sense. I still think that my problem is from the acoustic trauma.

Fear is my ultimate enemy, I don't want to go deaf or stress everyday thinking about hearing damage. I used iPods during my teenage years but later I realised the damage that I was doing so I didn't use my iPod anymore. The funny thing about this is that a week before my onset I was reading about tinnitus because I wanted to get a drum set but I knew that noise is bad (what you run away from end up catching you).

Am I exaggerating?
Will my ears get a full recovery or is this damage permanent?
Are phones loud enough to damage hearing?

 

Noise induced injuries cause the sensation of ear fullness that gets mistaken for sinus/congestion related ETD.

I believe all your ear problems are from noise.

 

Here is a site talking about types of noise and the duration of exposure that can damage the hearing/ears and none seems to suggest phone is a culprit.

http://www.dangerousdecibels.org/education/information-center/decibel-exposure-time-guidelines/

 

I doubt that a phone call in accidental speaker mode is loud enough to cause hearing damage. Even close to the ear, a smartphone doesn't reach 100dB. In addition, the exposure time is too short.

 

I'm sure they do if the speaker grill faces directly on the ear canal. It's the same principle as an earphone but with more volume. What else can cause my problem? TMJ?