My Story — Tinnitus for 3 Months from Accumulated Noise Damage

Hello everyone. I’ve had tinnitus for about 3 months now and I’m preparing myself for being in this for the long haul, so might as well introduce myself.

I can’t pin-point an exact event that caused my tinnitus as it onset randomly. I am aware that acoustic trauma can be delayed. My ear popped and I felt a bit dizzy and have felt a general head pressure/congested feeling ever since.

I have had the noise exposure of an average, social 26 year old. So clubs a few times in places like Vegas and Miami, a few concerts a year (mostly in nosebleed seats or outdoor festivals and being far back from speakers), bars, etc. I’ve never experienced tinnitus after any event - ever.

I also did quite a bit of travel last year - about 12 domestic flights total and used noise cancelling headphones frequently. I never blasted music, always on levels I’d call low.

I was 2 weeks out from one of the worst colds I’ve ever had when I got my Tinnitus.

To this day one of my ears clicks when I chew, both ears pop pretty hard even if I open my mouth a tiny bit and every time I swallow and sometimes my head will build up with pressure that only seems to be relieved if I swallow. I also have a bit of hyperacusis. My ears also get achy if I’m on a high hill or on a high floor in a building.

My Tinnitus started out as lots of crazy tones of ringing. Then turned into crazy crickets plus the ringing but the ringing was never high pitches. Then it turned into a loud hiss and that feeling when you can feel a Tv on inside your house but this feeling follows me everywhere. These last few weeks I’ve been experiencing EXTREMELY high pitched ringing (it will switch up ears) it’s like fleeting Tinnitus but lasts way longer than a usual fleeting tinnitus episode. This is on top of the hissing.

This daily fluctuation of sounds has been driving me crazy and makes it impossible to get used to.

I’ve never had TMJ issues but I’ve been noticing how much I’ve been clenching my teeth. I’ve been having a ton of jaw pain and it gets very achy in the corners of my jaw if that makes sense. I noticed the other day even speaking was pretty achy/ uncomfortable. I’ve always had issues opening my mouth wide. It wasn’t painful per say, but I’ve had a lot of dentists/orthodontists comment on me not opening my mouth wide enough and to open it more would cause me discomfort. I have more dental issues that I won’t go into here cause it’s extensive but can discuss in PM if anyone is interested! (Issues with orthodontics)

My work is sedentary - I’m at a desk 8 hours a day and have been working this job for three years. I don’t have great posture and my neck has been hurting a lot recently but I think this is mostly due to stress and spending extra time in bed from being depressed, plus the strain on my muscles when I had really bad anxiety attacks and flipped out (my body would tense up severely). Some days I get a tingly sensation along my spine on my neck and at its worst I would get the sensation of two huge, strong thumbs pressing down on the area where my hair begins (like on my upper neck).

I’m a pretty anxious person by nature and was having a pretty rough year prior to getting tinnitus (despite lots of good things happening) I’d say I was very unhappy. I had a lot of medical issues unrelated to tinnitus that I can also discuss in PM if anyone is interested.

So as you can see above, this is like the perfect storm of things and why this has been particularly hard for me because I can’t narrow it down to just one thing. Again, chances are it’s just an accumulation of noise damage.

I have had my ears checked out by a few ENT’s and neither found any issues. My hearing is also above average for my age but I know they don’t test for hidden loss so I don’t think my Audiologist telling me I have perfect hearing makes much of a difference.

Anyways, thanks for reading. This community has been very helpful in these last few months and has made me feel less alone as I tend to isolate myself from friends and family when I get depressed and Tinnitus has brought about a depression like I’ve never experienced before.

 

It's a good sign if you have a perfect audiogram at least. I'm no expert, but my guess is if there's no sign of OHC damage then hidden losses may be limited. Unless you're struggling to hear speech against background noise or having issues with clarity.

Seems like there's a number of things contributing to the tinnitus. Hopefully it goes away or at least settles down in time.

 

First 6 months were the toughest I think, there are still tough days.

I get neck pain also and that really makes tinnitus worse.

Hopefully settles down soon.

 

Paging @Michael Leigh. I believe his tinnitus also varies from almost nothing to catastrophic and yet he manages to live with it. Maybe he has a few tips to share.

 

Starting my doctor journey this Friday. I’ve already seen a few very unhelpful ENT’s.

Gonna get my blood pressure checked. Perhaps an MRI, check out if I have TMJ.
Neurologist. Mostly doing it so my mom can stop telling me to self diagnose (but also can’t hurt I guess).

Recently developed pulsatile tinnitus and have this general feeling of pressure in my head. Let’s rule some stuff out.

 

Reading your story, I highly doubt this is a hearing issue... but I suppose you cannot recall any kind of physical trauma before onset?