Ready to Give Up... Reactive Tinnitus Killing Me

No, but you also found your way of coping. And others need too. So they must know that there is a way of coping.

 

We all know how soul destroying tinnitus can be and this is how it should be presented in the media - so the world can see how devastating it can be. There is no doubt about this. Show the worst of it to help with prevention and to fight for a cure.

However, when it comes to a support forum the key word is support. We need to be honest about how it’s affecting us and share coping strategies if we have any. Helping each other is key here, so if a positive story is told to give hope, that person shouldn’t be jumped on and called a “chest beater.” Likewise, the person who is opening their soul by telling their story (which may include suicidal ideation) should not be called negative.

What we say on here will have little to no effect on how the world sees this condition. It’s a forum for sufferers; regular folk don’t read any of this stuff.

 

Exactly, Ed. We need to come together and support each other and have a sympathetic ear and empathy for all tinnitus suffers. Kindness and respect for one another is crucial.

 

Hi Michell
I know how you feel, thinking of suicide and crying all the time. Many of us have been there.

If you read a lot of posts here you will get the imprecision that all tinnitus is permanent and that you will have to live like this the rest of your life. This is just not true.
Most tinnitus (unless it is caused by years of abuse) will sort itself out in 6-24 months. There are countless stories out there of people tinnitus fading away in time, but it is so slow it can sometimes take 3+ years.
I have had horrible screaming loud tinnitus 2 times, both from acoustic trauma. The first time (13 years ago) it took almost 2 years, but it faded to zero.

I am now 27 months in from another bad acoustic trauma, and my tinnitus has faded over 90%, and continues to slowly fade.
If your not sure how you got your tinnitus, sometimes diet or medication can cause it. Give it time (and lots of it) and eat healthy, exercise and research any medication and supplements you may use, and you will get thru this
IMO you will get better if you give it time

 

@Michellejean
Sorry to hear that you are having such a bad time.
Its a vicious cycle you are stuck in and you have to try and break the loop.
I am now Three years in and mine still 'reacts' to the same things it did at the start BUT as time has gone on I find I care less about it.
I now just see it as a silly noise ( that whilst very annoying) isn't going to kill me - unless I let it.
Try to ignore it as best you can - we all know its hard but it gets easier in time.
Laugh at the stupidity of it.
Don't give it the time of day - its a naughty child that wants attention.
Keep busy.
Keep distracted.
Tell your loved ones what you are going through.
Find time for you.
Try and sleep well - get some medical help if you cant - or try L-Tryptophan / Melatonin.
Eat well.
Take long walks outside in quiet and beautiful places.
Try meditation.

If all else fails try a good vodka.

You will have better days.
Hang in there fellow sufferer.
Sending big hugs.
X

 

Manual cleanings, no tools used. If dental work has to be done, go to a dentist with a laser drill.

 

Hello Michellejean. You tried to chat with me, but cannot reply on that for some reason.

I had Reactive Tinnitus for two years last time. It eventually whent down replacing it with an uncomfortable Hyperacusis. Fortunatly i got treatment that worked for that.

Sadly, I am back with some struggles now, but I had some fine years without problems.

 

@Tonny can you describe the way in which your reactive tinnitus reacted this first time for those two years? Was it a noise you hear around other sounds or certain frequencies or was it your normal tonal sound getting louder around other sounds.

How did you get tinnitus the first time and would you have considered it severe?

Would you be willing to write a success story in the section for others to see?

I know now you are having your second bout of troubles with tinnitus, and I am so sorry your family can’t be with you while you go through it. We are all here for you. I wish I could tell you how to reply to my message but I’m not sure how. Keep trying to respond to me.

 

@jjflyman thank you for your support. When I read these kinda of stories I become so hopeful but then my mind tells me I am the exception and I will be suffering the same forever. If I could just tell my mind and body to stop reacting that’d be so wonderful. Unfortunately I had a major setback after a grommet surgery and now my tinnitus is much worse than it was and that was 4 months ago. Still hoping the tonal sounds all morph into one. I hear quite a few now.

 

@Kelvin thank you for your kindness. I desperately need tinnitus talk and the support I find here. I wish I could go for walks or do anything like listen to music and just ignore the tinnitus for an hour or so but it’s just this hideous high pitch searing sound between my ears when I am around any broad spectrum white noise.

What did you find helped you best cope with your tinnitus? How did you get tinnitus? Are you habituated? Thank you for your kindness.

 

@Ed209 your description of tinnitus is mine exactly! To the t lol. When did you reach the moment you knew you’d make it through this. When life wouldn’t be over? When life could still be good despite the constant noise? If someone told me I’d be happy whether or not it stayed or went and they were some prophet or god I’d be able to relax. It’s the not knowing and wondering how can I do this my whole life. I just try to listen to what people like @jjflyman said that it can get better.

 

@Michellejean

Sorry to hear you cant get out, that must be so so hard.

Walking in forests and sand dunes etc has helped me so much to find peace.

I guess you need to find your peace at home then.

Mediation has to be worth a try if you can find a few spare minutes. It can only help calm your racing mind...which is fuelling your T...and on it goes.

I got my T after having dental filling...but think its linked to years of neck and shoulder pain working as an architect. I think the dental treatment was just the last think brain could take.

Not sure if I'm Habituated as I still hate it and go to react...but I am getting used to it and the limitations it brings.

Is just so annoying, stupid and frustrating....because I cant fix it !!

Kindness comes for free...keep leaning on us for help...we wont break.

I hope tomorrow is a better day X

 

Michelle, for some reason I cannot engage in a private conversation. I see you poked me, but I can't poke back. I can only talk here. At first I felt affronted by tinnnitus, then defeated by it. I sought help from my local hospital. A clinical nurse put me on Lorazepam for the short term (also helped me sleep), and Zoloft for the longer term. She weaned me off them within a year. Cured! Not the tinnitus. My reaction to it. When you stop giving a shit, you're cured.

 

See my initial post today. I got T from an exploding tire and might be combine with my band playing + extreme stress at work. It started off like a hum, and I got highfrequent noice after some days. It got worse for about a year and stayed like that for another year before it suddenly got better (with H) instead. T got bad if I was listening to fans, flowing water or similar. Preferred silence and sleep which I had in huge amounts. It was absolutely horrible, could not take the railway without ear protection.

 

By only asking for manual scaling and flossing and then upping your home regiment so you don't get cavities. Not getting cavities should be a top priority for anyone with tinnitus. I post my regimen here: https://www.tinnitustalk.com/thread...u-be-careful-with-dentists.31766/#post-377061

 

Might sound strange, but when's the last time you seen a dentist and had them Xray your jaw/teeth? Maybe you have somatic tinnitus but only hear it during the circumstances you've described.

 

Hi Michelle, I felt so sad reading your posts. I have had high pitched tinnitus in one ear for 3 weeks. I am coping but at times it is distressing. We just have to take life one day at a time and have hope that it will start to fade or become easier to cope with. Hang in, you are not alone

 

Yep. I say this because I've been there. It took me 2 years till I was okay with my tinnitus part of the time. I'm not habituated, but it's not the 24/7 torture that it was for the first 2 years. I spent a lot of time obsessively researching tinnitus and hoping for a cure, and thinking that I would never be able to habituate to this ultra high pitched tinnitus that I could not mask.

What affects me the most now is the reactive nature to my T/H than the ringing itself. That can really limit your life; and while you can habituate to a noise, I have to admit hyperacusis can really be debilitating and can't always be habituated to in the same way that tinnitus can.

 

I've mentioned before that the VA spends well over a billion dollars a year on compensation for tinnitus. It would be nice if they put some money towards research, but there is a lot of dysfunction in the VA and not with just tinnitus claims.

 

Wow man what the eff!! Are you OK with living with T now? I remember you have posted for many years and you were in a bad bad place. So are you better now? Congrats man You deserve it!

Yea reactive parts suck big time. I mean both reactive kind of tinnituses limit life, 1) the kind of reactive tinnitus where tinnitus reacts to sounds and tinnitus is loud for hours after being in for example high pitch noises, or 2) the kind of reactive tinnitus where tinnitus reacts instantly to almost every sounds and whistles to songs in the exact rhythm or beeps in rhythm etc etc...

When one doesn't have tinnitus (like tinnitus goes away) there is no any "warning system" about being in loud noise. You can go more and more into noise, and one doesn't realize their ears are not healed.. but it's good living because the tinnitus doesn't bother but when the camel breaks the neck it sucks then big time... But I would prefer not T with no warning system over T with a warning system because the latter limits life very much and really "is the life"

 

Thanks. By "OK" I mean it's not at the forefront of my mind all the time. It's still annoying and bothers me from time to time (mostly in the evenings and at night), but before I was acutely aware of the ringing every waking moment of every day; I couldn't go 5 minutes without thinking about it, now I can go hours without thinking about it. You're right I was in a bad place, it was just constant torture before; now it's more of an annoyance most of the time.

I agree with the 'warning system' but I simply cannot tolerate moderately noisy places like most people can (I'm talking restaurants with a lot of people talking etc.) without my tinnitus reacting to it. That's the most frustrating part. I'd still love to be rid of it too. The thing is, I have a real fear of it getting worse and I know it's not just sound phobia, I did develop a new quieter tone after being in loud place without hearing plugs last year. I know it can get worse, and I know it could go back to a level that I'm unable to ignore if I'm not careful.

How have you been?

 

I don't like the term 'habituation'. But I would say that my tinnitus doesn't bother me most (though not all) of the time and when it does I just find it annoying and distracting.

My tinnitus is reactive in the sense that it ramps up in the presence of things like supermarket refrigeration units and the noise of the engine on some forms of public transport, like buses for example.

For a long time, this put me off doing a lot of things. But in the end I began to do those very same things in spite of what the tinnitus did and eventually I stopped noticing the reactivity.

It is important to note that it took several years for me to get to this point and a lot of the time I was afflicted with profound suicidal ideations. But now, although I avoid exposure to very loud environments, I pretty much do everything that I did before.

Unfortunately, I am too busy with work to maintain any kind of consistent presence here. So I won't be able to respond to any queries that may arise in relation to this post.

Perhaps I should therefore end by stating that I think I have tinnitus pretty damn loud, but I reckon it's bog standard (there's no hyperacusis and only occasional TTTS). So I probably do fall into the category of those for whom significant progress can be made through the standard approaches like CBT and MBCT.

 

Wow so pleasant to read you don't think about T all the time anymore, hours is good! Nice progress, what did you do to get there?

Do you still have the same work as you used to have by the way?

For me both T and H stopped in the summer 2017, then I could tolerate more and more noise you know. I didn't have the warning system anymore, I did not have any T to spike, no pain, so I was in louder places than I had been. And just like you wrote (dang how you knew, had you already read what I had written or something lol) it was exactly that what ruined me: moderately noisy place = a restaurant with a lot of people talking.

For the first time in manyman years I was in that kinda place a week ago on Saturday, and after I left I noticed ohh ffffffffkk the T had returned... So here I am reading TinnitusTalk again and just hoping that the ringing would go away

 

I don't really know what I did to improve as it was gradual and there are a lot of variables: the passage of time, protecting my hearing as much as reasonably possible, a new job, gave up on holding out for a cure obsessing about it, and I did take trobalt for over a year.

I have a new job now, and I think that has helped a lot. One thing about my old job was that I was always pissed off because of the way management treated me after the acoustic trauma (my tinnitus was caused by a work injury) and the fact that I shared an office with the guy that damaged my hearing. I would be there on a slow day sitting in the office listening to my screaming tinnitus while watching him sleep.

Ouch. I'm sorry to hear that. I travel frequently for my new job and sometimes that includes going out to dinner with customers and coworkers . It's always a challenge finding restaurants that are quiet enough for me even with hearing plugs. I'm assuming you didn't have hearing plugs in at the restaurant?

 

ggg

omgg!!! Happy to hear you got a new job, it was a shitty situation when you could not switch jobs but you hated working there because of "that guy" who was to blame for your tinnitus.

Congraz on your new work place! Did Trobalt help btw? Just nice to read it got better. It's weird because this feels like I "KNEW" you because we both used to frequent this forum so so much and were so down

I don't carry plugs anymore. Or didn't carry. It was "quite loud" but didn't think it was too loud. Kinda want to off myself for being astupid fuck and doing that to me/myself.

 

Yes it can! I have had T for many years, H for about two or three, and I have had great success with sound exposure therapy. Being a DIY guy I did it all myself, very slowly, and very carefully subjecting myself to louder and louder sounds. At my worst, when I initially developed H, I was protecting from oven chimes, sneezes, heck, even the shower, it was BAD. At this stage, I'm to the point where I can do almost everything without hearing Protection. About all I protect for now is loud vehicles, loud venues, low flying planes/helos, and metal clanking/banging (large pots and pans, banging on stuff when I'm restoring my project car, hammering nails, etc.).

It gets better, but you to have faith in the fact that most noises, although sometimes painful, and sometimes causing spikes, will not cause permanent damage. I say this as someone with pretty loud T and profound hearing loss at high frequencies, it gets better, and not just for the folks with mild T/H. I believe most folks on here weren't nearly as reckless/unlucky with their hearing as I was (gun shots, explosions, motorcycles, clubs, race cars, ultra high power subwoofers, expensive earbuds, you name it... ) and should have an even better, as well as faster recovery than me. T is still nuts but my main gripe was the hyperacusis, I'm so much better than I was on the onset of the H. I have a wonderful, caring, understanding girlfriend, I'm socializing much more, and my stress levels are significantly lower. It's a slow process, but if you stick with it there's hope my friend, just take it day by day.

 

It can fade and go away. It can also come back. I’ve had it for over a year. I have had times when it’s gone away but yet some unfortunate sound incident here or there has brought it back. I currently get it some days when my H and T spike, yet other days not at all when both T/H are low.

Gradual sound therapy does help. Trying to limit the amount my kids scream around me has been important. They can be loud. And listening to my ears, if they start to get sensitive about certain noises, it’s best to take it as a warning to rest them.

It’s a strange part of hyperacusis that’s for sure.

 

Thanks.
As for Trobalt helping it's difficult to say. It did reduce the T and H while I was on it and helped me get through the worst times. When I tapered off of it I found the ringing didn't bother me as much. I think that's the experience a few others had with the medication. Whether it was just the passage of time and other factors or it helped some I'll never know.

Don't be too hard on yourself. If your tinnitus went away before (that's amazing to me) then this spike could very likely settle down too.

I know this got a little off topic, but @Michellejean, although it may never go away completely things usually do get better in time.

 

Maybe gotta try to find Trobalt some day lol

 

@Michellejean
I've been off the forum for a while, but was thinking about you and several others today so decided to check in and find out if any of you had posted recently. I'm so sorry you're in a rough patch. I don't know that I have anything to add to what is already here on the thread, but just wanted you to know you're in my thoughts and that I'm hoping the best for you. You were so generous with your time a few months back when I had some specific questions, and I haven't forgotten that! For several reasons, I've limited my time on the forum these past few months, but wanted to respond here and let you know that I hope things will improve for you -- for all of us, for that matter. There are some really upbeat responses in this thread -- stay positive!

Mystery Reader