Need some support!

Hi Guys,

I've had T for going on 5 years now and during the first 3 years I would say it was the T was a mild annoyance and not really something I worried about too much. In the last 2 years I have experienced a much higher pitched hissing sound that seems to resonate more in my head rather than the ear. This sound I hear just as clearly when I cover my ears with fingers or do not have them covered. If I make a cup of tea, this sound fights with the sound of the kettle so I hear the tinnitus over the sound of the boiling kettle! On some days this higher pitched sound takes a back burner, on others it is very present and feels like its at the front of my mind.

The issue being is my T just isn't getting better and it feels like every month it is progressively getting worse and I do not know why. I don't want to worry anyone else but this is just how it has been going for me. The sound is so high pitched I rarely get relief, although I do normally sleep ok. I have been SO careful with using earplugs in noisy situations, but cannot believe that someone would need to be that careful in order to protect oneselves when everyone else can tolerate that same sound level.

The only thing I can correlate to my T getting worse is me putting on about 2 stones in weight. I am not obese or anything like that, but could do with losing 2 stone and massively improving my diet. Could this have caused the T to worsen and does weight loss potentially improve matters?

I am struggling a bit at the moment as I have tried CBT, Acupuncture and Osteopathy but these only yield short term results. So feeling a bit down this evening .

Also worth noting I can distinctly hear very fine bubbles in the back of my neck, which my osteopath explained was blood through the arteries. I have never been able to hear this before and was wondering if circulation could be the cause.

I haven't seen the ENT in nearly 1 and a half years, so if it worth going back to note this persistent increase in sound to see if it can be investigated further? I am almost certainly going to sign up for Autifony phase 2 trials later this year if I qualify!

Thanks,
Mission

 

Hi there!

I am sorry to hear you have a hard time!

We need to stay optimistic and hope for either a cure or that it will resolve on its own! Either by habituation or that the body will heal itself! One way or another!

I just read about a pilot who had T for 15 years in here, and got rid of it

I have exactly the same issue tough, it kinda resonates in my head..

Any idea what triggered your T?

 

Yours sounds very similar to mine MFTC.I had one little noise exposure in January and things have gotton alot worse.A few days after the noise exposure I started getting loud pops in the back of my head and pressure thats still here to this day.Had my hearing checked and came back perfect.So im going to see a professor in Royal Victoria eye and ear institute and a neurologist in Beaumount hospital in May to get to the bottom of this once and for all.I suggest you do the same if its getting worse for no apparent reason.In my opinion it shouldnt be getting worse by itself as I mentioned in another thread my uncle has it 30+years and it never got better and it never got worse.Hes been round plenty of noise gained weight and then lost weight in those 30 odd years and he says it never changed since the day he got it although everyone is different.Best wishes Bill

 

Dude, loud pops in the back of my head and pressure sounds so familiar.. I can even hear those "pops" on the side of my head, close to the ears, and in the back of my head.. Im pretty sure those pops are caused by muscles.
Also it causes me headaches now and then.

Worth to have a look at:
http://tinnitus.org/Tensor tympani syndrome_Klochoff.pdf

Please let me know if they figure something out..!

 

Hi Mr Cartman thanks for the support it means a lot! I also read that article and that helped, here's to hoping that happens to all of us! My t was originally triggered via noise exposure, too much clubbing and DJing which in hindsight I wished I and been a lot more careful!

Hi Bill, sounds like you have something similar indeed. At first I thought it was some sort of air in my blood (fine bubbles), creating the sound, and I can really hear this clearly when it passes through my ear. Very difficult to describe but would hope a good specialist would understand what this is and this sensation has only been apparent since my ears have suffered this much higher pitch.

I think I will make another trip to the doctors but not sure if it's worth the time even going to a GP. Do you know what the neurologists will test for when you go?

 

Wow ok sounds like we all have this popping/fine bubbling thing going on!

I do not want to appear crazy, but I should also add that when I walk I can hear a very slight rattle, almost like a thin bone is tapping something else toward the back of my head. I am very confident that this is something physical, I just wonder how it will be possible to test for this, hence I am try the Osteopath route at present.

 

IF it's not the muscles around the head that is contracting / having spasms because of the intense high pitched sound, then im 99% confident this is of physical matter.

A possible way to test this would be to put on a few people that doesnt have T earphones with a 15khz ring/noise or whetever it is we have, and see if the same happens to them. Taken into consideration they can hear the sound.

 

Another weird thing I have found, is that when I wear headphones, and each time the wire rubs my t-shirt when moving my head it makes this soft sound in my earphones (because the sound is transferred from the wire into the headphones), I get a muscle contraction inside my ear.

I suspect that it is the tensor tympani muscle that is way to overactive.

The same is happening when I drive my car with the window open, and if a bus or something drives by, I can feel this contraction. It is even giving me a tiny threshold shift as my hearing lowers for a few secs.

 

Hi Cartman yeah ill keep you all posted my popping comes from the top of skull kinda around round the back a little bit kinda hard to pin point exactly.I also get this pressure around the back of my head and sometimes above the ear.My audiologist was concerned it may be something to do with spinal fluid so thats why im going to the neurologist also he wants me to have an EEG done and a few other tests while im there.Hes convinced my symptoms are not ear related as all hearing tests done audiogram,OAE,reflex tests etc etc came back perfect.So either way im getting to the bottom of this and if all this comes back clear he said he will put in an application for me for the Autifony trial(hes involved in clinical trials at UCL)so either way im praying for results.Best wishes Bill

 

Sounds like we are in the same boat. I got that pressure in the back of my head as well from time to time.
Have had all the tests you have had, all came out fine, including MRI and CT.

However, im 99.9% sure that my T was induced by noise/blast, as that was the time I got it.

For the record; I have experienced symptoms like those we have now in the past - after accidents from noise exposure at work, but they went away once the T resolved. So for me it seems like T and those symptoms you describe are deeply rooted in eachother.

Whether it's caused by the tensor tympani muscle, muscle contractions because of the sound, eustachian tube or a pressure change inside the ear, I dont know. But i am guessing it might be one of them.

 

Also, it started in my left ear (that took most of the trauma), and within a few weeks it progressed to both ears.

 

The last week or two I just got a new very loud sound in my right ear, which was usually the quieter one and it's making me suicidal every single day. I too have been careful and everything but still it came out of nowhere. I wonder if it's all really worth this suffering.

 

Hi LeQuack. I am sorry for this.
What shall I say? I suffer from loud ringing for 6 months now.
Every day is a challenge. But I am sure there will be much better days ahead.
We will get used to this like so many others before.
Do not give up and stay strong.
I am sure it will go down again. Many here wrote they had temporary spikes which go down again.
Take care.

 

Hi there.

For the record, when I have experienced short term T in the past, this loud sound you are talking about has always been the last stage of my T. After that my T has resolved completely.. I find it very weird, but when I got that sound in my ear, I was happy because i knew my T would resolve.

I have no idea what is happening though, but at least that is my experience.