Really Need Help Here. So Worried.

Ok everyone. Something I have just learnt the hard way. So I was having a panic attack (I have them alot), only this time, I started shouting quite loudly. This is whilst I was wearing the noise cancelling plug.

I'm experiencing a huge spike in the reactivity of my tinnitus, which is a separate noise. I've just learnt about the occlusion effect. I'm really scared now. I literally asked an ENT this question and they told me it's not dangerous, but the occlusion effect suggests otherwise. If I had to add up the total shouting time I would say 30 seconds. This occlusion thing though. I may have just done serious damage. @glynis @john paul @Bill Bauer

 

https://www.parkside-hospital.co.uk/consultants/dr-borka-ceranic/

This is the ENT that told me there is no danger to shout with earplugs in. She's a very qualified audiovestibular physician though? How could she get this wrong? She specialises in tinnitus! She has a PHD!

I'm actually freaking out to the max

 

Listen up....I doubt the occlusion effect did any damage no matter what some say on here. You anxiety is most likely causing you to have spikes all the time. I have damage and NIHL from a 160 db gunshot. 10 months in all my spikes have come from extreme anxiety and nothing else. I know everyone is different but I think if you get your mind off it for a couple days and focus on something for awhile, and treat the T as the least important thing on your life's list you might find it comes down. Dude I just walked outside yesterday and got hit with a transformer explosion from my neibirs power line. It was loud as crap...bomb loud.
No spike, I was on edge for a second but I just calmed down and let it go.

 

Jason. Look i was shouting loudly with an existing tinnitus (of unknown cause by the way!). Now there's horribly bad reactive high pitched stuff. I'm scared man this Dr with a million PHDs didn't mention this upon questioning. What do I do now. Oh Lord.

 

Nothing...try and relax and do something to take your mind off it...you are young, it could very well go away. Don't overprotect from everything...you are making your hearing a lot more sensitive and your brain is turning up the gain on your T. It sucks I know but there are so many noises in the world you can't escape the everyday stuff. Your shooting your anxiety through the roof trying. Listen I just met another home inspector about three hours ago and he asked me why I had sold slot of my target and hunting rifles and I told himI wasn't using them because of hearing loss and Tinnitus. He said he didn't even know what it was called until I mentioned it by name. He has had it 30 years!

All from shooting a .45 from a creek bed without protection. He doesn't even care after all this time. He is 65 years old now and hasn't worn ear protection for mowing or any sort of power tools for years. I'm not saying do these things but don't scare yourself into wearing earplugs just sitting around the house and thinking of T.

 

Well now there's a reactive ring I can hear it over everything

 

Ear wax or anything that impairs hearing can cause tinnitus/hyperacusis but if ear wax is the case then removing it should eventually lead to the brain removing the tinnitus signal.

Also you mentioned a test that measures the sensory cells of the cochlea, I never heard of that before and would like more info on it?

Hope the best for your recovery and I'm honestly confused how a one time scream would cause such a spike.

 

I can now hear this reactive ringing over everything. This is since I shouted multiple times with an earplug in. The occlusion effect may have ruined everything.

 

You have hyperacusis, it's a condition commonly associated with tinnitus which is characterized by abnormal sensitivity to everyday noises.

Example, the noise that you here of a spoon hitting the ground is not extremely loud. Your brains auditory system is amplfying certain frequencies to make them sound extremely loud in response to hearing loss which certainly do have even if it is only to a very mild degree.

The best and proven way you can reduce your hyperacusis is to "slowly" retrain your brains audiotory system to tolerate everyday noises. Currently in the stage you are at you should protect your hearing very carefully and avoid loud sounds at all cost, but at the same time you should not wear noise cancelling headphones 24/7 in paranoia because doing that the audiotory brain will only "listen harder" for input, turning up it's internal volume and making hyperacusis worse. Slowly introduce your self to ambient noises, low level music. high pitch noises that irritate your hyperacusis at low volumes that way your audiotory brain will rebuild it's tolerance to those noises and readjust as much as possible. I don't think this is a cure for hyperacusis but it is safe to say it will make a 90% difference based on my own personal experience.

 

I'm so sorry, Do you have therapist to talk to?

 

I just hope I didn't do major permanent damage.

 

@Bill Bauer help! What's happened!!?

 

Thanks John. But my main worry is not the spoon anymore, as you can see. I shouted with an earplug in which can apparently be bad and now my situation is much worse. Damage done

 

Ok people. Here's the situation. Read carefully if you can be bothered.

On Sunday, I wore my earplug in the left ear only, most of the day (something I don't normally do but I was particularly nervous about some microshocks.

Also on Sunday, I suffered a panic attack, this time I was particularly angry and started shouting a few times. The ear plug remains in my left ear during this incident.

Interestingly, only when I took the plug out in the evening, did I notice the noise - the same reactive ringing I've had before - this time it's happening in silence as well as reactive. At this point, I didn't think about the shouting thing. It was the next day when I remembered, "oh yeah I shouted with an earplug in".

The interesting part folks.
I asked Dr Borka Ceranic back in February, "is shouting with an earplug in dangerous?" This doctor holds multiple Post Honour Degrees in audiovestibular medicine, specialises in Tinnitus, she's a top ENT. Very high up. She never ever mentioned the Occlusion effect, and she told me it's perception that our voice is louder. Perception. She must have some ground here. There's no way, after decades in this business, would she have got this wrong.

This ring, which I've had before, has returned after the shouting + earplug. I can hear it in any situation, because it's reactive. It's literally the worst. How on earth did this happen? You get people who will wear these plugs at concerts and will scream and shout non stop. How did this happen.

I shall be questioning the Dr upon my follow up with her in a few weeks. I will also be asking her alot of the claims that the people on this site seem to make.

Has bad damage happened? Is this going to settle or did I just screw myself? I certainly wasn't at the top of my voice - far from it- but the earplug was in, and ringing has followed. Wtf?

 

NOTE: there's a spike in the existing sound as well.

 

@JoshuaD2002 ~ This cycle of anxiety you're caught in is one I know all too well. When you have anxiety about something, you are on guard against it all the time. This is called hypervigilance.

Very often you'll find that when something triggers your anxiety, you forget about the previous trigger and focus on the one that just happened. While there can be more than one thing currently fueling your anxiety, many of the earlier triggers will be forgotten. Because of this, it can be helpful to keep a log of these triggers (or go back over your thread and reread what you wrote in the past). This will show you that many of the things you thought were dangerous turned out to be okay.

Believe me ~ I know with tinnitus it's different. There are noises that are harmful to our ears that are not harmful for others. We don't know exactly which ones are harmful and we don't want to find out the hard way! But we have to cautiously test our limits and take some calculated risks.

This is what I have been doing ~ exposing myself to low volume high pitched noises. I had been finding that even when high-pitched tones were very low in volume, I would still respond with anxiety. I'm no longer covering my ear if the TV beeps out a curse word or two. Though I do end up covering if it goes on too long. I'm not perfect, but I'm working on it. If I can stop regarding all high-pitched noises as harmful, then I'll be better at judging which high-pitched noises are harmful and which are harmless.

Joshua ~ I think you can do this too. Take note of which noises you thought were harmful that turned out to be okay. Once you discover that these noises are not loud enough to harm you, you will know they are safe and you will gradually feel less anxiety when you hear them.

Just because you're experiencing a spike after shouting with ear plugs in, doesn't necessarily mean the spike was caused by shouting with ear plugs in. That's one possibility. But another possibility is that shouting triggered anxiety and the anxiety caused the spike. I believe that only by getting a handle on your anxiety will you be able to make judgments about your ears. I say this from my own experiences with out-of-control anxiety.

 

Thank you for taking the time out to write this. I appreciate this alot, but I'm not hopeful that this one will be okay. Because the reactivereactive ringing is here now, using white noise at any level makes it ring more. Should I use white noise despite this? I'm more frightened then ever because of this. I can hear it all the time. It's like the noise of an old CRT television, you know? Like that very very high pitched hiss. I now have this pretty severely.

 

@JoshuaD2002 ~ Don't expect the white noise to drown out the ringing. Maybe try music or TV instead. They won't drown out the ringing, but they give your mind something else to focus on. Thinking about the ringing is not good, so you want to get yourself thinking about something else.

My tinnitus is also a high-pitched hiss. I've got some music on at a low volume, but I still hear it.

 

@Jason37

Did stuff like this happen to us before we had t or only after? I swear, some of the stuff that happens I couldn't make up if I tried.

 

@New Guy You're right, I can't remember crap like this happening before....It's messed up.

 

I know it won't. It's incredibly reactive. It gets ridiculous during the sound of a kettle boiling. There's no way I'll be able to take my mind off it, but I started using soft rain last night- the Dr with like 10 PHDs told me to do this.

Also I shall be loving in regret from shouting with an earplug in.

 

This is officially the most concerned I have felt about anything in my life. It's so reactive and loud. Is this gonna settle @john paul

 

Just been on a school trip where the coach was quite noisy. I didn't expect it to do anything to my tinnitus but it really has. It is now unbearable reactive ringing that now remains without the prescence of sound. That's the end now. I'm giving up. Bye.


Thanks for all your messages, but God had chosen to do this and I must find a way to live with it. Currently on the coach now with earbuds in (using as earplugs) for a small bit of protection. It's so loud now

 

This will be my last post here. Some of the information I'm reading here is not in line with that of the many specialists i have seen. Furthermore I am not benefiting, but actually worrying more from tinnitustalk. My tinnitus has become reactive and unbearable. No progress has been made. Bye.

 

@JoshuaD2002,
Please see your doctor and ENT as it sounds like you could have Tinnitus with Hyperacusis.
Go to Emergency care if you need help or having dark thoughts .
Take care
Love glynis

 

I am in a few weeks. Can reactive tinnitus settle? It sounds like an old tv turning on and just rings with any noise.left ear. Help me glynis please. I'm desperate. Please. Is this forever.

 

It can so try stay calm and see your doctor .
Love glynis

 

Ok. Well Dr Borka Ceranic, at my Feb consultation, to listen to sounds of nature to avoid any silent situations as hyperacusis treatment. I Have been doing this, at low-medium volume, and it just worsens it? Should I continue?

 

Are you listening to it through headphones/earbuds or for example through your pc's speakers? I personally wouldn't listen to anything through headphones/earbuds and prefer speakers. Tinnitus and hyperacusis might act up once you introduce white noise but that should calm down with time. Also don't completely mask your tinnitus (in case you're doing that), white noise should be set slightly below your tinnitus.

 

@JoshuaD2002 ,
Hyperacusis can be treated for most people.
It's like re training your ears again to sounds that you are normally ok with.
Avoiding the sound won't help but building your time up around it will help very slowly .
Noise reduction plugs are good for extra loud sound so becareful you don't wear them all the time as will make your ears more sensitive.
Love glynis