Sleep Quality Problem

Hi,

I've had a noise-induced tinnitus since 2010, so that makes it 8 years now. I've been reading these forums often but never posted anything.

My tinnitus has been progressively getting worse no matter how I try to protect my hearing. Until late last year it's been bearable and I have been able to live quite normally.

However, due to a recent spike I can no longer seem to get deep sleep. It was caused by extreme stress. My spikes always seem permanent, they never go back to the lower levels after the volume goes up. Now the level is becoming unbearable, I hear it constantly in almost any situation.

Now I'm in a desperate need for advice on how to get proper sleep again. I fall asleep quite alright and sleep for even 12 hours a night, but clearly get no deep sleep as I'm very tired and sleepy throughout the next day.

I've tried to no avail:

• melatonin (1.9 mg)
• cold showers
• hot showers
  
• sports
• alcohol

If you have experience in improving your sleep quality please share advice with me!

 

There could be reasons other than T for this to happen. Consider doing a sleep study to understand if you are indeed not getting any deep sleep.

 

Thanks for your advice, I will research where I could undertake such a study. However, I find it unlikely that it is caused by anything else than tinnitus, I'm otherwise a very healthy person with really no other big issues, nor any major changes in life until the level of tinnitus increased.

I wish there are some people on these forums who have managed to improve their quality of sleep using some methods that they could share with me.

 

@Vertti ,
Maybe worth getting your bloods checked and have a chat with your doctor.
love glynis

 

Thanks for your advice! However, unfortunately my doctors don't really know anything about this issue or how to cope with it.

What specifically am I looking for in my blood that would help explain this? I maintain an unexceptionally healthy diet, have never had problems with cholesterol or blood pressure or virtually any other medical issue. I'm 30 years old and have never been the slightest bit overweight. I do light to medium exercise 6 times a week. I also maintain adequate levels of vitamin D and don't take any drugs or synthetic supplements.

 

Have you tried masking the sound with a large box fan? That has been a big help for me.

I've had T since around 2005. In 2016, it got much much worse. There are noise machines that you can purchase on Amazon that help. Sleep is the most difficult time for me. Having background noise helps quite a but, but there are still nights when I do not sleep well. My doc also prescribed a generic of Elavil and that has helped as well and it is not very expensive. Good luck.

 

@LibertyToad thanks a lot for your input! I have not tried a fan, however, I vaguely remember that I used to find the sound of an air conditioning machine you'd find in hotels or in warm countries quite soothing while sleeping. So the fan might well give the same effect as it's essentially a fan that's producing the sound in those machines too.

I'm thinking about trying some anti-depression drugs or such as well. Do you have any recommendations on what could possibly help the best with sleep quality?

 

@Vertti ,
Iron if low can spike tinnitus.
A low antidepressant for sleep can help so worth looking into and not adictive like sleeping tablets.
love glynis

 

@glynis thanks for the reply!
I've had beef liver up to 2 times a week, which is exceptionally high in bioavailable iron. If anything, my blood iron levels were probably too high. It's far more common to have excessive amounts of iron rather than too little.

Currently as advised here, I'm looking into antidepressant medication, but don't quite know what would be the best choice for me. The doctors in my country all pretty much prescribe the standard chosen antidepressant medication regardless of your personal circumstances.

 

You do cold showers? Did that help for you in the past? Sounds odd, maybe il try it sometime.

I would say try reishi powder for a month.
Its shown to increase the amount of deep sleep you get. I tried it and it works some for me. Loads of dreams when I take this, which must also mean I did sleep deeply.
Also you could try magnesium citrate, works well for me as well.

Source: https://www.organifishop.com/blogs/news/magnesium-and-red-reishi-the-magic-duo-for-good-sleep
Another source: https://examine.com/supplements/ganoderma-lucidum/
To quote the second source: ''Some effects, such as improving sleep and decreasing symptoms of chronic fatigue syndrome, are not acute; sleep improvements are seen after 3 days whereas aid in chronic fatigue may take more than 4 weeks.''

 

@John_415 thanks for the advice!

Cold showers:
I've been doing them for a few years daily now. During the winter I may substitute with a dive in a frozen lake. Helps with stress, thinking and other things, however, unfortunately no effect on sleeping with tinnitus.

Reishi:
I used to do decoctions and tinctures out of reishi mushroom as well as other herbs and mushrooms. Unfortunately I found them to have no effect either. Their primary function in our bodies is to provide the polysaccharides (that you extract by means of decoction) as nutrition for our immune system. I haven't heard of studies linking reishi or other mushrooms to promoting deeper sleep yet.

Magnesium:
I secure my magnesium intake by eating plenty of raw green foods daily. Never supplemented it cos I believe I already receive plenty from my diet.

 

Cold showers:
I have heard good things about feeling better after a cold shower and such perhaps il try it sometime.

Reishi:
Neat, Its a lot of effort making your own decoctions I think.
You have the alcohol and the water extraction method for reishi, alcohol extracted ones give me more effect then the hot water extracted one. Plus taking it right before bed is really important for the effect to be optimal.
What I read on reishi was that it makes you more awake during the day and more sleepy when you want to go to sleep. It works some for me.

 

@John_415 Thanks for bringing this up, I think I will try reishi again as inspired by your success with it. I will try some other medicinal mushrooms as well with both tinctures and decoctions and see if they could improve my sleep quality as they did for you.

In the meanwhile I suggest you experiment with cold showers yourself, what I do is first take a warm shower, then at the end turn the water as cold as it gets and then count to 100 or so. Has a nice calming effect.

 

I have been monitoring my sleep for about 1 year now via my Fitbit watch which provides me with sleep details.
Each morning I am able to see my sleep pattern and how much time I've spent in the different stadiums of sleep, like REM, deep sleep, light sleep and awake. I have noticed that I am lucky if I get 1 hour deep sleep... at most it is about 30-45 minutes each night. Now I know this data isn't actually 100% trustworthy, but at least it gives some form of indication.

Now, I wouldn't say that I have sleep issues, but I have apparently issues getting deep sleep, and I wonder if this affects my T since I have a VERY variable T through the day. I'll try some of the things mentioned here, but keep the tips coming if something else is recommended.

 

Try everything you can before going on drugs. Do the sleep study, get blood work, try maskers. Long term drug use can make the T worse so make sure nothing else can be wrong. Who knows you can have sleep apnea or something. Not everyone is overweight who gets it. Some people have misshapen jaws and the older you get your throat tissue gets looser and can sag.

 

Yeah, drugs are the very last way out, I've seen what that can do to some people.

Maskers does not work for me cause I have a moderate/severe hearing loss so when I unplug my hearing aids, I really dont hear much. I've done tons of blood work the last year, but came up with nothing... Sleep apnea, yeah, could be worth checking out even though I never suspected it.

 

L-Trypotophan worked for me ( as did Melatonin )...might be worth go and should not have any nasty side effects. If I am desperate I use Nytol (diphenhydramine) which always works a treat but can make me feel a little 'hungover'. Either, may just get you out the no sleep cycle which is a difficult one to break.

 

Please be careful about antidepressants. Some SSRIs are correlated with the onset of tinnitus or the increase in the volume of tinnitus. I acquired tinnitus immediately after increasing my dosage of Wellbutrin/Bupropion, and there are many cases on tinntiustalk where people report getting tinnitus from taking or withdrawing from other anti-depressants.
Melatonin has helped me get good sleep from time to time, and there are people on this and other forums who have taken CBD oil to get deep sleep. Everyone is different, so just tread cautiously and do research before taking any anti-depressant (or supplement, for that matter).
I'd definitely start with a fan or a weighted blanket. A fan got me through my first few months with tinnitus, which were upsettingly loud. I sleep with a sleeping hat that I pull over my eyes. That helps me sleep past sunrise.

 

Thanks to everyone for tips and advice!

I appreciate everyone's advice on checking all remotely possible other problems first. I will, however, I have no doubt myself this is purely because of tinnitus. I've had absolutely no other medical issues or issues with sleeping before. As I said before my diet is unexceptionally healthy too.

@dnl I understand your concerns, believe me. I've taken medicine probably about 10 times in my life, and those times were all normal antibiotics and painkillers.

However, I can no longer sleep normally, I really need to do something or this ends very badly for me. Frankly at this point I don't care if I die in 10 years from some side effects, I just want to sleep again.

As my tinnitus is noise induced I'm hoping the medicine won't cause it to increase in intensity. I've always slept with a sleeping mask (the sun doesn't really set now where I'm from) and have tried melatonin too.

 

Dear Vertti,

I am still new to tinnitus, but I also have sleep problems. I am a research scientist by profession and I've looked at sleep medication evidence in some detail, because I too was extremely paranoid about sleeping pills.

If you Google them you get horror stories, and they shouldn't be ignored. But the evidence says that most people can use them, at least for short periods, with very few problems. The newer 'Z' drugs are not usually addictive, in the sense that people need ever-larger doses for the same effect, but they do cause dependence with use for longer than a few weeks at a time. Anti-depressants are also proven effective for the management of tinnitus.

I entirely understand your reluctance to get involved with this stuff: I had never taken anything like this either until a week or two ago. But when your house is on fire, you may just have to jump out the window, even if the landing may suck. Speaking only for myself, I will naturally try literally every alternative / herbal / behavioral therapy going - because they're obviously better long term if they work. But I'm definitely taking every bit of hardcore medication too, if it might help - and there's stuff out there that might well help you.

 

@NeuroNut
Sorry to hear you're suffering from tinnitus as well!
Are your sleeping problems related to falling asleep, or decreased sleep quality, or both?

Your post describes my mental mindset really accurately. I too am at the point where I'm basically seeing more merit in taking conventional medicine, at least for the time being. I actually visited a psychiatrist yesterday - I'm exploring anti-depressants currently, but definitely want to stay away from the ones that influence the dopamine receptors.

As far as my condition goes, it's exactly the sleep quality that's the problem. I actually tried a sleeping pill which unfortunately did not improve the quality of my sleep - it decreased the overall sleeping time instead. I will need to find and experiment with other ways in treating myself.

As for herbal medicine and natural supplements, I'm trying those that are said to enhance sleep quality in in normal healthy subjects. Basically most of them are claimed to be "adaptogenic", meaning they should help your body adapt to stress better. What used to make me sleep a little better in the past is taking 3 raw egg yolks of well raised hens. That plus sauna & cold shower prior to sleep.

By the way, what have you tried so far in terms of alternative treatments (supplements, therapy, lifestyle changes etc.)?

 

@Vertti,

I've tried propranolol for anxiety, and while it did work a bit for anxiety it made sleep impossible. I'm on zopiclone now, for the last 5 days, which works but doesn't make me feel great. I tried 5-htp last night as a replacement, but got no sleep at all! It seems to have a paradoxical effect of making me jittery and anxious rather than aiding sleep...

Any view as to what to do the day after no sleep? Should I try to nap? Or just press on? Getting pretty low right now.

 

Honestly, you'll have to do several things consistently to get good sleep. As an insomniac, I speak from experience:
1. Consistent sleep/wake time even on weekends
2. Sleep just the amount that you need, nothing more, nothing less. 12 hours seems a bit excessive, cut down naps.
3. Reduce the amount of stress/worry that you have.
4. Use relaxation techniques like meditation or breathing.
5. If all else fails, try a benzodiazepine and/or sleeping pill to help you sleep occasionally as you need it (not nightly)
6. See a neurologist, he will check to make sure everything is in order and may refer you out to a CBT-I practitioner which I hear that the results are fantastic.

I would not recommend getting on anti-depressant unless you are truly depressed. If you are, you might find some benefit in that, but they are not usually great as a sleep aid (there are exceptions, but they can take weeks to work). I've been taking sleeping pills nightly for the past 3 years and they are like taking sugar pills now that my body is used to them. I've been detoxing from them and the rebound insomnia has been pretty rough. They can be good to reset your biological clock but withdrawal is not fun, especially if you have to get up every day and still be expected to function.

 

@NeuroNut sorry for the delay in my reply, I've been trying to avoid reading about tinnitus related things recently to see if it helps.

I've been having nothing but bad sleep for many months already. What I do when I've had an exceptionally poor night in terms of sleep is that I punish my body with a harsh physical exercise, followed by a cold shower. This seems to help a bit in sleeping just a little better the next night.

The worst thing you can do is to take it easy after a night of little to no sleep. But doing something strenuous is also about the hardest thing to do in that condition. So it's really a battle of will at that point for me.

@Spiral thanks for the tips!
I don't nap. I need deep sleep which is not what I'm getting anymore. I've tried a sleeping pill too but unfortunately they do nothing to improve the quality of sleep, probably vice versa. I'll read more about CBT-I and see if there's something available for that in my country.

Thanks again for the advice!

 

I do feel better on sleeping pills. It's only the 'Z' drugs that seem to do the job for me though: I have discovered that my weird super-power is a near total tolerance of benzos. As far as I know I've never tried these even once before, but neither a small nor a large dose (on consecutive nights, all properly prescribed) had any effect at all on me as far as I could tell. Certainly didn't sleep more than a couple of hours each night. Perhaps my tolerance is limited to one of this family, but I'm not very motivated to try the whole range: maybe best to just take this as a sign they're not for me.

I actually have no problem taking anti-depressants in principle - never tried them before but when your house is on fire you shouldn't stop to worry about the color of the curtains. The evidence on anti-depressants is excellent: they definitely do work, for most people (and cause awful, terrible side-effects for a few). I'm not really there yet though as not really depressed: I have moments, even hours, of total panic, but not the kind of grinding endless stuff that my depressed friends report. Only a month into this nightmare though, so I guess there's plenty more road left to travel...

My T appears to have lessened a little now: the tones and screeching of last week have been mostly replaced by the sort of sound I'd expect to hear when lifting a seashell to my ear. It's loud still, but better than before. Maybe something I can get used to long term. Still very sad to be in this position though. I'm wondering if I can turn this nightmare into something positive, by running some research studies in the area. Thanks for the suggestions!

 

Personally I'm concerned about the SSRI type antidepressants that increase the levels of serotonin in the brain. The reason is that some experience an increase in their tinnitus after using them. Gotta read more about what types could possibly be useful for enhancing sleep even short-term without significant drawbacks.

@NeuroNut since this is only so recent for you I believe your brain will start adapting quite quickly. That's at least what happened to me after the initial shock and despair. I also think it may well tune down remarkably much in the coming months for you. Let's keep hopeful about it!

I really wish some smart minds would turn to researching tinnitus - we desperately need new approaches and subsequently new breakthroughs with it. I feel most of the studies seem to have quite loosely come up theories that they're trying to prove right or wrong with very mixed results. This really should get more attention, considering how much money and attention has been poured into treating depression with drugs.