My Outlook Is Deteriorating, from Mild Tinnitus to Bad Tinnitus and Hyperacusis (Getting Worse)

I'm not sure what I can do here, because I'm not getting any answers from the medical community in life. I'm in a mindset that my ears are so bad, or so genetically screwed, that I'm going to continue to get worse because it is doing that currently.

I had mild T for 7 and half years that didn't change based on going out, or drinking, ect., and last June a wood saw that I awoke to ruined my ears further (Took 5 days later to fully get worse for some reason). Coming up on a year soon I've struggled. I can hardly go out because of H and T seems to get worse with noises in 80-95db range (minor short noises that go into 90's and such) and I don't see any progress, only worsening.

I thought around late Jan./Feb there was some progress but since moving it's gone. I've been subjected to loud dog barking in my own room, which goes into mid 90db's at over 10 feet away, constant military jets and helicopters and other noises. I try to protect when I can and sometimes I can't, but even with noises that shouldn't do damage, my T reacts and get's worse. I cannot tell if these are "spikes" because they continue to pop up and drag on until another incident happens, so is it worsening, spiking very long and overlapping, I don't know. But I'm not improving at almost a year and I'm pretty sure that I'm past improvement if a year wasn't enough time, unless these other noise encounters are stifling progress.

In the last week alone I had the next door dog bark about 5 feet away near me a few times, which I felt my T elevated for 2 days, then on that 2nd day had military helicopter go over my car directly and felt my left tonal high pitch T go up and then the following day a plate dropped on my wood floors and was very loud, and 3 and half days later I'm still struggling.

My fear that it's just going to get worse and having no improvements is causing me severe depression. I'm already unable to enjoy things i used to enjoy because hearing the T makes me sick. I can't adapt to it or ignore it. Even with mild T before it wasn't cutting through everything and making me focus on it.

I'm not sure if it's my type of damage and tinnitus or what, but I'm just at a loss. I not only have a high pitch tone that I hear more on left side, but a very hard to mask secondary tinnitus in both that used to be low static which is now higher freq. and louder. I also have a rumbling type tone that I can only hear when it's quiet. On top of that, I have a random vibrating type pulse that popped up in my right ear last year ( before the noise incident) that seems to have came back in full forceafter the plate dropping.

In addition, my T seems to temporary from normal noises and even my own voice. If I'm in my 40db ambient area for example, typing on keyboard, talking ect. it makes my T spike right in that moment of noise. After a noise issue that shouldn't even damage my ears, supposedly, my T starts to make misfiring sounds, and go up and down and up making it very inconsistent and bothersome.

For being 27 years old and having a handful of noise trauma's that weren't even gun shot levels, this is just mind altering and upsetting. It's one thing to have these things and then to see no progress after a year. No hope and repair to feel a bit better. Just a 30-40% reduction and it's just not happening.

From what I can see, there's no ability to see the extent of the damage to hair-cells or neural transmitters correct? The fact I seem to slowly be getting worse, or that noises that shouldn't be damaging in short term exposures are giving continuous elevations and spikes, is just making me mentally tired and feeling like I can't go forward.

 

Did you do a hearing test ? Do your have hearing loss and how much at which frequencies ?

 

I got a hearing test late last year and they said my hearing was that of a 6 year old child. Only up to 8hz since I didn't find anyone at that time that wen't higher.

 

I am actually in a kind of the same situation as you. Had T for about 7 years. Then, when I went to a club (did it relatively frequent, biweekly or so) it was so much louder afterwards. Wore ear protection like I always did. Not only did the T spike tremendously, I got a light H too now.

I actually am very doubtful about how this will continue and evolve. I would even be happy with a consolidation of these thresholds. But it seems to get louder with every stupid sound. A shouting person, a very loud car passing by, ...

I don't have any answers or consolations though.

 

Hi, sorry to hear you're struggling, I am not in a good place either right now. My symptoms are similar to yours but they only began 3 months ago. I had a hearing test up to 8khz which came back as within normal range, however I've since done a high frequency hearing test and I have moderate to severe hearing loss from 12khz, this makes sense as my tinnitus pitch is 12000hz. Maybe you could do a high frequency hearing test, but really I can't say by doing it it's helped me. Only to clarify my hearing loss. I hope you experience some improvement soon.

 

Yeah, that's what's most messed up about this condition as far as I am concerned, that as soon as you have it it's not just very loud sounds that can make matters worse, but also normal sounds that are perfectly harmless for everyone else. Or at least that's how it seems to work for some of us, myself included. I managed to keep my T&H more or less stable for the past three years until I made a couple of very long phonecalls about two weeks ago, then a few days after that (why always the delay?!) my T almost doubled and my H got much more vicious too. From talking on the friggin' phone!! On the lowest volume setting too! Pfff...

As for an outlook; the treatment that seems to be most successful is something called Tinnitus Retraining Theraphy, I'm going to look into that soon myself. I'm also listening to 'pink noise' every day now (that's also a part of TRT I think), supposedly that can (eventually) help reduce H, which for me is an even bigger problem than my T.
Neither things are a cure of course, one simply doesn't exist yet. Research is being done, that's the good news, but from what I understand the general consensus is that it's unlikely we'll see anything close to a real cure in the next five years and it might very well take (much) longer.

Don't lose all hope though, there are cases of people's T suddenly getting better out of the blue, and others find ways to get it under control even though it's very intense. Also see the Success Stories subforum. You never know.

 

How did your original T occur? I'm also surprised a long phone call made it worse, could be there was just damaged haircells or the neural transmitters were on the edge of losing functionality and it was coincidence. Very odd indeed if it wasn't like maxed out phone call. Has it stayed the same these last few weeks?

Then again my ears are seemingly getting worse lately from being out and about with normal everyday noises. Temp, perm., how can you even tell if you go out daily.

 

Acoustic trauma was what started this all for me, being exposed to the sound from a megaphone at very close range to be exact.
Yes, I was very surprised when I realized what was happening. I had my iPhone on the lowest volume setting and kept it away from the ear my T is in so I thought that would be safe. But turns out it wasn't. It's still an odd thing to happen though. I searched around on here and other places for people with a similar experience and I couldn't really find any. But then again, I guess people who have T&H usually know better than to talk on the phone for five hours, four days in a row. Looking back I realize it should have seemed risky to me too. But yeah, that's looking back..

I also posted my story on Hyperacusis chat, someone there had the theory that the problem is that sounds from a phone are very unnatural, heavily modified. Some frequencies are left out while others are amplified, and the result is a very piercing, sharp, pointed and strident sound for the human auditory system to process. Healthy people can handle that but people with H can't. And that somehow makes everything worse for them. Or something. That's his theory anyway, only one I've seen so far.

It's been over two weeks now since this happened to me and my T has gone down a little bit, though it's still stronger than it ever was before, but my H is still vicious and my ear still hurts a lot too. I guess I'll just stay away from phones and give it more rest and time. I mean, what else can I do, really?

 

Did it ever come back down? I have noticed things like that also, just talking to my friend for 30 minutes spiked t and h for 3 days...but then again, I'm only 2 months in this game.

 

I am in the same situation, there is a 5 day delay from when it gets worse, initial cause of mine was someone screaming in my ear, but after donating blood twice both time spermenantly increased the ringing exactly 5 to 7 days later and now as of 2 months ago went to a club for 20 minutes and 5 days later the tinnitus increased yet again with no sign of relief yet. I have been suffering since I was around 10 and it only gets worse.