Tinnitus aka Trollitus Got Much Worse from a Fire Alarm

Heyhey. Am I doing this right? I'm new on Tinnitus Talk and don't really know how things work.
Well, I´ll give it a try.

38-year-old dude from Sweden. Got my tinnitus at the age of 19 after being a drummer and was a bit careless about protecting my ears. Got tinnitus, a high pitch tone in the left ear. It was not too bad tho. The tone was not that loud and I got used to it fairly quick. Had no problem sleeping at night, and I never had to use maskers or sound reliefs during sleeping hours.

That changed about a month ago. I was chilling in my sofa watching a movie. All of a sudden my freaking fire alarm went off and that sound was horrific. Long story short, before I was able to turn it off the damage was obviously already done. The tinnitus I had in the left ear got a lot worse, and I also got a new lower pitched tone in the right ear (plus a 3rd one that comes and goes, lingering in the background). The following 2 weeks was like hell. Thought everything had gone to shit. A lot of emotions. Was really scared and anxious about it, which of course made it a lot worse. No sleep at night, perhaps like 2-3 hours of sleep per night tops. I was close to getting crazy. Went to the doctor, did a regular examination. Got some sleeping pills and another set of pills to calm me down.

Now 7 weeks later, it's a lot better. The tinnitus tho is still annoying and I need to listen to mask/relief sounds during nights, and sometimes during the day too.

Going to a new doctor next week.

What has really helped me, was finding out about "acoustic neuromodulation". Found a really good channel on YouTube (I don't know if I'm allowed to post YouTube users here, but I´ll give it a shot, I mean, it could help someone else so); "TinnitusWorks. He has posted some really good masking/relief sounds to blend out the tinnitus, and it helps me stop focusing/listening to it. Which helps A LOT during the sleeping hours. There is also a good app for iPhone users called Tinnitusplay. with alot of different masking sounds and other goodies.
Still need the pills to sleep but eventually I will ditch them too.

I hope I will be able to ride my skateboard once spring time comes. If I get tinnitus spikes from doing something I love and have done since I was a kid, I will get really upset! But hey, IT COULD BE WORSE, right?

Well, have a nice evening folks. Let the PEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEP flow through you.

(Sorry if my english is weird. Its my second language)

/C

 

When you say Acoustic neuromodulation, you mean ACRN? Have you tried the program itself?

 

I have no idea what kind of program that is. Never heard of it. Might as well check it out. Can you perhaps point me at the right directions as to where to look? Or can I just google it and find it that way? Heck, i´ll give it a try.

 

Hey again, yes it seems its pretty much the same thing. The Youtuber I mentioned has this video up:

Acoustic Neuromodulation - Musical

But thanks for the info on ACRN, found a site where u can adjust the modulation to your T-frequenzies. Generalfuzz.net, gonna try it for 30mins or so and see what happens.

 

This is what I use every night together with some pink noise. It's the thing that helps the most during really tough tinnitus days. It's also available at Mynoise.com, search for Tinnitus neuromodulator

I think this sequence was created by someone on the forum.

 

Same here, but Im having a hard time listening to constant pink/white noises so I normally skip them.

Thanks for the advice, I´ll check it out!

have a nice day and I hope your T is nice to you today also.

 

Short update if anyone is interested. Did some boarding today, first time since new tinnitus. It was awesome, but I did notice quite fast that I needed earplugs cuz the hard sounds from boards on concrete and what not sounded really sharp and kind of hurt. It worked well with earplugs. It was couple of hours ago and I feel really good. The T feels lower for some reason, maybe because I feel relaxed and happy. This was the first time I even was out doing stuff since new T. However, I think i have some of the hyperacusis because Ive never been bothered by skateboard sounds earlier. The new tone ive got in the right ear, is at the moment really low, sometimes its gone completely. Is that a good sign? I mean it was only like 6 weeks since new T, and I feel improvements. We´ll see if I get a spike tomorrow or tonight. Time will tell. I hope not.

Cheers.