My Tinnitus Story — Today I'm Into Music/Sound Design

I've just discovered this site, it made my day, it made me smile to see that there's actually something like this dedicated those who struggle with something of the sort. Thanks a lot!

My story:
I'm Daniel, at 14, I went to a school show where each class presented what they've been preparing, a small show to spread awareness, about handicaps (down syndrome, autism, a really neatly done event!). The event was a week long thing, tons of activities, it was super well organized. I wasn't taking part in the presentation, because we've just moved mid-school-year to another country. But that didn't stop me from keeping up with my old class's preparation! In fact, I was starting to get into music composition, electric stuff on computer, synths, I ended up composing the short music for my class! What a honor and motivation boost for a 14 year old dude who just started getting into the music world!

The evening the spectacle happened... I sat through a 2 hours long event, where the sound engineer completely messed up the speakers EQ-ing, where an jerk next to my right side wouldn't stop whistling screaming and clapping, me being next to the speakers, no ear protections (I always had sensible hearing), and other excuses... but, in the end I'm the only one to blame. That's when I got tinnitus.

Yeah I felt that it was painful to my ears, yet I didn't do anything, I didn't move away, I wanted to sit through naively hoping maybe something cool would still happen. No, nothing cool ever happened.

The next thing I notice, my ears are hissing. And it doesn't go away: not after a few hours, nor the next morning, nor the next weeks, nor after almost 7 years.

Ironically I never liked loud stuff, I never went near loud stuff, and I always knew that you should take care of your hearing. I've always avoided them. I don't listen to loud music.

Outcomes?
Today, I'm 21, I'm doing music, advanced audio mixing, and this hasn't stopped me from doing what I like: fortunately I haven't lost my hearing, it's just the ringing, and if anything it definitely changed how "saw" hearing in general. I pay 200% more attention to my ears, as well as to sounds and details. I'm still able to hear and enjoy sounds when doing music. And I'm grateful for whatever that night, that made it only what it currently is, who knows it could have been worse.

Here's a link to my music if you're interested! It's all a hobby thing that I love doing!

Maveran - DDEMKOO

My tinnitus?
I do hear the hissing pretty clearly when I'm in a quiet place, have headphones on with the audio off. When I'm falling asleep, or when I'm waking up, when I'm tired.

The only time I can hear silence? In my dreams, no kidding if I'm attentive enough the second I wake up, I hear the hissing come back! Meaning it's not there when I dream! Yea weird stuff. Do you sometimes have that as well?

I've been taking care of my ears, twice as much as before this "accident". I never caused any damage to my ears because of my hobbies, I take breaks, I let my hearing rest.

I'm sure people here joined for a reason, that is having tinnitus. But for those who read this and don't have it:

Listening to loud stuff is not worth the risk, I wish I stepped out of the auditorium that evening, but at the same time this is some life experience as well that you build onto, and that you gotta take into account! You can't go back, there are no miracles, this type of tinnitus won't go away, but that doesn't mean you cannot enjoy a fruitful life, or cannot use what you still got left to do awesome things involving hearing, even if it might be harder!

While there's 0 positive aspects of tinnitus (unless you have a precise 1000Hz ringing and you can use that to tune your guitar), this gave me a lot more insight on the fact that you need to take care of your body, hearing in this case.

To whoever is struggling with this as well, I hope this made you feel a bit better
Take care of what you have currently have, it could always have been worse!

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Oh yeah, since I'm doing sound design, I've recreated what I'm hearing here. One of the few things you can have fun with... eh?

 

Welcome to the forum. You do make great music. Thanks for sharing that. BTW thank you also for your positive post and advice. If you ever have time, you can make a version to post it in the Success Stories.

Take care. God bless.

 

Sounds pretty similar to what I'm hearing, frequency wise. In fact, I can only hear it easily with my right ear without increasing the volume (do have some hearing-loss between 4000-8000 Hz, especially on my left ear). But I sure do hear that tinnitus sound in my left ear – it is piercing.

Mine got triggered not from loud volume, but long term listening to music while sleeping (ironically to mask the other tinnitus sounds I have). Set at timer, folks! Let the ears rest!

Glad you're doing well @TruddyTheDuddi and some nice music you have there.

Hoping I one day will be able to hear music as well as I used to before I die (I'm 43 now).

 

Thank you @billie48 for the compliments, also I will take a look at that!

@star-affinity, thanks for sharing your story! And thanks for the nice words! Yup, taking breaks is essential, even if the music isn't that loud, you need to rest your ears from time to time. I still believe having a hissing tinnitus is "better" than having a solid constant frequency ringing. That would drive me nuts. Similarly to low frequencies tinnitus, sometimes ear ringing comes and goes, I had the opportunity to experience a deep sinewave in my left ear for a minute, it wasn't pleasant at all. I believe I'm part of the more fortunate people. Or... maybe I just got used to it? I don't know!

And while a permanent hissing in your ears is not something great, it gives you a second chance to be thankful it wasn't worse, and be twice as more careful, and act before anything could go wrong again!

I'm not hoping for cures or miracles to happen tomorrow, but that doesn't mean anyone should give up hope. I do believe some day it will be curable!

Take care!

 

Wanted to add that I did not just listen to music on low volume during night, which in and of itself would likely have been fine – it's something I had been doing for months without a hint of any problems from my ears.

But we all know things add up and in conjunction with other things that I exposed my ear to that week I can see why it became too much.

Here's my story in more length:
https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/two-second-”warped-chirp”-in-ear-while-listening-to-music-at-night-—-then-new-high-pitched-tinnitus.45754/

Hopefully OTO-313 will help lower the perceived tinnitus:

https://www.otonomy.com/pipeline/

Then the hearing loss still remains, but that can be dealt with later I think, although I do miss the nuance and ”timbre” of the cymbals and hi-hats etc. that my left ear can't hear so well anymore.

So go bio-tech, go!