So Much Noise

Hi All. I just joined and I've been reading some of the threads but I'm not finding anyone having the same mix of noises that I have.

This is going to be a bit long. Sorry.
My tinnitus was a sudden onset. I was sitting at the kitchen table talking with a friend and her daughter. It felt like someone gave me a good, solid thump on the head just above my right ear. I turned around ready to thump them back but there was no one there. Then the high pitch ringing in my right ear started. I tried everything I could think of to stop it, but nothing worked. Two months later my left ear began to ring. Sounds I knew should be there started to disappear quickly.

I went to an ENT about a year later. By that time I was no longer able to hear most of what people said to me. The ENT looked into my ears and said everything was fine. I disagreed. She sent me to an audiologist who said I was very good at piecing together what people say from the bits I could hear. I had lost 30% hearing in my right ear and 70% in my left. After this, the Dr said, "Something definitely ruptured somewhere. We could do surgery to see if maybe we can find something that we might be able to fix." I declined the surgery.

Hearing aids were a bust. I can't hear white noise. All these masking tracks are drown out by the ringing. Loud sounds are painful. Bass sounds are very painful and ironically they're the sounds I can hear.

I've had T for 18 years now. There is such a mix of sounds that I truly believe my brain is just making it up as it goes along.
Constant 24/7:
*multiple high and medium pitches
*buzzing
*pain
*pressure

Intermittent sounds:
*car horns
*metal wind chimes
*bamboo wind chimes
*high pitched *ting*, like some one quickly strikes a musical triangle then stops the sound
*bathroom fans may sound like 80's rock music minus lyrics
*crickets or birds chirping
*the theme song for Two And a Half Men when the female news anchor is talking

I'm not able to hear alarms which scares me. I was standing by a fire alarm at the hospital didn't realize it was going off until everyone else covered their ears

I'm not able to talk on the phone. I have to have someone make all my calls for me. My business is suffering. I can't go to any appointments alone because I can't hear or understand what they say. When I think I clearly heard something, I'm almost always wrong.

My kids laugh at the way I hear things. I laugh and say life is more interesting in my ears, but really, I feel so isolated from the world.

Does anyone else have all of this happening in their ears?

 

Have you thought about lip reading or sign language if find hearing aids no help ?
Have you had a MRI or CT scan with dye ?
love glynis x

 

No first time I read something like this, I feel so bad for you . Whish I can help , but hang on thery not far from finding a cure. Stay away from loud noise. Do you mind sharing what frequency you have the most loss with the 70% . I have 70 % in my left ears at 6 k . Did you recently was exposed to any loud noise.

 

Sadly, no Dr seems to think it's a problem although I have told every Dr I've been to hire bad it gets. One prescribed misoprostol which horrified the pharmacist who then tried to talk me out of trying it. I took it for 2 days and agreed with the pharmacist. The wracking stomach cramps it caused weren't worth the possible benefit.

I can lip read if the person talking is facing me and actually moves their lips Amazing how many people don't talk with their lips! I'm a massage therapist so I can't see my clients faces when they talk. Sign language only works if the people I'm talking to also know it.

 

I have no idea what my frequency loss is. I gave up trying to figure things out years ago. Only recently did I start looking up info again.

When it started in 2000 I was in a quiet setting. I hadn't been around loud noise in a long time. I worked in a quiet setting, spent time outdoors working with horses. There was nothing I could trace it to other than the "thump".

 

Why is your hearing so bad? Maybe you need stronger hearing aids. Hearing aids can serve the purpose of hearing loss and some can help with tinnitus. Have you seen a reputable audiologist? Have you had your hearing tested lately? Are you possibly deaf?

Either way, you have my sympathy as I know how hard it can be, when our hearing is bad....

 

I had perfect hearing before this started. I always assumed the hearing loss is related to tinnitus. Since no Dr has taken the time to figure out what's going on, I've just been left to my own thoughts on it. I'm not deaf. There are some sounds I can hear, they just have to be lower tones. High and medium pitch voices are just a series of sounds without actual words, like vowels with no consonants.

 

My hearing loss and tinnitus onset was similar. One moment I could hear fine, the next I could not. My loss was caused by a virus, just a minor cold I had earlier in the week.

When did you last see an audiologist? Hearing aid technology has improved a lot in the last 18 years. From your post, it really seems you would benefit from better hearing aids. Aids often need quite a bit of adjusting before they work correctly, too.

Or sometimes hearing aids do not work because the nerve damage is too severe enough. Cochlear implants can be an option then. One of my ear specialists regularly does cochlear implants and unfortunately had multiple examples of patients who needed them following viral SSHL.

 

The theme song for two and a half men?!? Honestly you couldn’t make this stuff up. What we all go through is just insane. My heart goes out to you.

 

@Tinker Bell I haven't been back to see an audiologist since it all began It just seemed pointless since no Dr even saw a reason to refer me to another ENT. Only recently have I started looking into things again. I'm still not convinced hearing aids will do any good given the amount of weird things going on in my ears, but I'm considering giving them another try.

 

Update: I finally found a hearing center that took the time to figure out where all my noise is coming from. They'd never heard of anyone else in my situation. After multiple tests they determined that everything is fine except the nerves. They aren't able to relay the sounds correctly so my brain can't tell what I'm hearing. The Dr said I need some powerful hearing aids to cut through all the noise. They fitted me for the hearing aids and set me up with a TTY phone. I'm not understanding how the hearing aids, no matter how powerful, will help if my brain isn't receiving the correct information from my ears. I guess I'll find out in a couple weeks.

 

Did it work? Hopefully it fixed everything for you

 

@Nonzens,
I did not see this thread when you created it and I wonder if you are still around. I would like to know how you are doing now, and whether or not the hearing aids helped.
I also had that strange sensation you describe right before my hearing loss, as if someone had hit me on my head. It wasn't a pain but more of a sudden jolt of something....hard to describe.

@Tinker Bell, did you experience anything similar?