Tinnitus and Suicide

Depends on your quality of life. Some people with tinnitus suffer non stop 24 7 and would basically take anything in exchange to get rid of the maddness in their head, even death. If you are ready to murder yourlsef in probably a painful horrific way, you would have to be suffering tremendously and would actually take ANYTHING else! when you are isolated and in pain, people preaching about children with no legs, or people with other ailments downplaying your pain would just be more annoying, condescending, humilating and insulting than anything. The fact is that some people loose everything due to T..., their careers, their friends/family, their homes, their ability to function,their general health, their personality, their ability to feed/house and take care of themselves, and worst of all, their sanity. Not recognizing someone else's pain and telling them that there are worse off (based on your own experience with T) is arrogant and serves no purpose at all except to make the sufferer feel even more hopeless and ashamed.

 

While you are alive there is hope. Pretty confident there will be a cure inside 10 years.

 

I just wanted to add a few thoughts to this. Firstly I see bravery in the way that NiNyu has stood his ground in this discussion, despite being alone in what he argues. That can be a hard thing to do. Despite what some might claim, suicide is not an easy or a cowardly way out. To do it successfully without substantial risk of failure (possibly with increased suffering) takes considerable knowledge, planning and resolve ("For every suicide that results in death there are between 10 and 40 attempted suicides" - Wikipedia). And as Telis rightly says, it is not helpful to contrast one person's pain with another's and make comparisons about who suffers more. This smuggles in value judgements about who is a better person for enduring more and still persevering. It might be intended as inspiring, but could also come off as patronising and/or undermining (i.e. not the same thing as support).

I think some people will value and cling to life down to the last breath. Others will live intensely for as long as it is good to do so - and when it consistently no longer is (for whatever reason) will prefer to let go and say "Hey, that was good while it lasted but I feel my time has come". I do not personally believe that either is inherently better... or indeed stronger (so long as the decision is not made too hastily). We may make people sad when we go, but death is part of life and I think our culture would actually be kinder and braver if it was more accepting of that fact.

That said, it warms my heart to see all the support and encouragement here regarding the way that one's feelings about tinnitus can change from the initial distress in the acute period. For most of us it is so true that the intensity of our negative feelings about tinnitus mellows out as time goes by. The sleeping gets better, the anxiety goes down. It does become more bearable, and I 200% advise NiNyu to postpone any decision making for a while and see whether his life force comes back and reasserts itself. I have a feeling it might, and I certainly hope that it does.

 

Such people have not lost everything because of T, they have lost everything because of their reaction to T, and that's something which can be treated even if the T itself cannot.

 

Ah! Right...No one suffers through anything in this world without reaction. Why do you even bring up other ailments or disabilities? There is no such thing in your world as suffering, none of these examples you mention would be a problem without reaction right? No legs, arms on fire, without reaction to these things they aren't even an issue...right? Get a grip bud.

 

Tinnitus is a sound. It is not a fire. It is not cancer. It is not a bullet. It is a sound. The neurological pathways for sound have little in common with the neurological pathways for pain and temperature. Unlike suffering due to pain and temperature, the suffering that results from sound is 100% due to reaction.

This reality in no way minimizes that suffering. But it does point to avenues for relief that are unavailable to those who suffer, for instance, from "arms on fire."

stephen nagler

 

I think that statement is ideology. There is some truth in it (you haven't technically lost everything) but at the same time it is to some extent misleading. Some of us do lose things because of T. I lost a lot of my pleasure in music and in building speakers and hifi. I lost the experience of being at peace when I sit on a mountainside or even on a beach. I am scared to ride my bike in case the wind noise past my ears damages my hearing further (it gets loud and lots of cyclists seem to have T). I might be able to carry on without those experiences, but I have definitely lost something and it is the T that took it, not my reaction. Other people have it much worse than me as Telis describes.

So I am doubtful about the value of mystifying our experience with such blanket statements. I've watched this meme about it 'all being in the reaction' spread around the forum recently. If you find it helpful then great, use it and discuss it. But see also that it might be another way of unintentionally blaming the sufferer. That is to say, use it gently please.

 

I think this is a good point, @dboy. I think we all have the best intentions in mind but I can see how this could be an effect of trying to help T sufferers. Striking a balance between "live your life" type of support and "sympathy" type support seems like the way to go. Easier said than done, of course.

 

I'm not refurring to an actual fire. I'm refurring to the example put forth by linearb And no where did I mention a bullet or cancer either.

 

Right. I mentioned those examples. What's the difference? @linearb is spot on when she says that one's suffering from tinnitus is 100% due to one's reaction to his or her tinnitus.

stephen nagler

 

Whats the difference? I thought that you were making a point about something that I had said as you did respond to my comment. Maybe you tagged/responded to my comment out of error as your response has no relevance to anything that I said.

 

Love your attitude @linearb and wholehearteedly agree.

 

I'll go a step further than Dr. Nagler did, and say "Well, more or less, yes..."

Think about the discipline involved in calmly self-immolating as an act of protest. You think that dude would have been fazed by some head noise?

That said, clearly there is a difference between physical pain and sensory distress. I have some (fairly mild, thankfully) chronic pain problems, and I also have more severe, non-tinnitus sensory issues: I see 'visual snow' and static everywhere, on everything, at all times. I do not see still surfaces, if I look at a white wall I see something that vaguely looks like TV static. It has been like this for a decade and a half. During the first year, it drove me absolutely insane. Now I think about it perhaps twice a week. It is the exact visual equivalent of tinnitus: I am completely incapable of seeing darkness, instead I get a stimulating fireworks display, at all times. When I was stuck in a loop of perceiving this as a threat/problem, I was completely convinced it would drive me mad and ruin my life. Whether or not I am mad is a matter of opinion, but it clearly hasn't ruined my life.

Tinnitus has been a somewhat tougher cross to bear, but at the points in my life that I've reacted to it well (meaning, not at all), it is much the same -- just sensory background data.

To come down off my high horse for a moment, I want to be very clear that I have a ton of empathy for @Telis, @NiNyu , and everyone else who is suffering terribly from this ailment, because I've been there, I know it feels like the bottom of hell, and I know that it can completely blot out the sun and seem to consume the world. Relative to how well I was doing in the fall/early winter, I'm in pretty rough shape right now. Overall, often the thing that has been the most helpful to me is a slap in the face, someone having the tenacity to say "yes I hear what you're saying, but you're completely bonkers right now and not thinking at all rationally, and I'm not going to go down that hole with you". So, that is all I have tried to do with all my replies here that I have invested some time and effort in. If you feel that I am condescending to you or belittleing your problem, I am very, very sorry; that is not my intent, but I tend to be abstract and wordy when I try to express myself in text, and I know that can come off as being sort of aloof. Believe me, I am not aloof. I'm not some superstar tinnitus patient wh0 has this all figured out and thinks life is all roses. Life is fucking HARD! But, it's hard for every living creature on earth. The number of things that can or are actively trying to kill or maim us every minute is dumbfounding.

I have no idea if your tinnitus is objectively louder, worse, or more unpleasant than mine... but I've read many, many accounts on here and elsewhere from people who's tinnitus is clearly louder, worse and more unpleasant than mine, who none the less love life and have found a way to share space with the ringing without being consumed by it.

Trite as it is, I think a lot of this really does come down to the conscious thoughts we choose to have, minute by minute. We all want the ringing to just stop, on some level, sure. I have read accounts of various yogis who basically cultivate tinnitus and love it because they experience it as the "cosmic sound". Well, that's not me. At best, I am slightly annoyed by my head noise when I think about it -- but at worst, I hate it, I am terrified of it, I am consumed by it, etc. And I've been through this enough to understand that for me, my own behavior and the thoughts I let myself think minute to minute, have an impact on which way the wind blows.

I'm not saying, exactly, that we're creating our own hells that we can just step out of at a moment's notice by changing our thinking... because deeply established thought patterns cannot be changed quickly. As an analogy, those thoughts are a river slowly cutting through rock, digging a canyon over a long period of time. If you want to change the direction of the river very early on, before the bed is very deeply carved, it's relatively easy. If you wait until the canyon is a hundred feet deep, it takes a lot more determination, effort, energy, time and patience to change the way it flows... but it can still be done.

I don't think that chronic pain/tinnitus comparisons are necessarily off base, because there's plenty of research to suggest that they have similar underlaying mechanics (link)... but so what? People learn to live with chronic pain.

@Dr. Nagler, I guess there may be a certain feminine slant to some of my wordiness, but I assure you that I am a man

 

I still think if you can find a way through the worst of it, then things will get better. It could go away, it has for some, and there will be a cure one day, we just don't know when. The potassium based treatments look promising.

 

@linearb
What can I say? You are a stronger better man than I. I endure pain 24 7 with T and H. The T is so loud it produces migraine headaches and pain in my ear that to be honest wipes me out. I spend most days 18 hours a day in the dark,in bed alone. My H is bad (well I think it's bad, I'm sure nothing for a guy like you) to the where my own voice hurts. The isolation is hard as well (well hard for me anyway, again I'm sure for some it would mean nothing, again my bad reaction) My ears are ruined, I'm half deaf and don't hear anything properly anymore. This is my best, wish I didn't have such a shity weak reaction to all this.

I have made enough money to retire at 39 years old through dedication and mental strength for my entire career. I guess a guy like you would have it all? I can't imagine what you have achieved in this life with your unstoppable incredible mental strength. I'm sure the sky's the limit for you.

Anyway, you are a strong person. i get it. You make that very clear. You and buddy on fire in the pic that you posted I'm sure wouldn't give this silly crap I go through a second look. I on the other hand am pushing as hard as I can, I may even at one point not be able to handle it any longer, this will be my unlimite humiliation in the end when I die. Wish I was as mentally strong as I thought I was all these years before T. I guess that was just an illusion.

 

@Telis , if your hearing and tinnitus is as bad as you say, then you're no doubt stronger than I am. I am by no means an unusually tough person, I have a history of drug issues, and I routinely call my parents in tears.

One thought, though.. If you're spending 18 hours a day in bed and you still feel this bad, have you thought that maybe it's not helping you to be bedridden? If you're with it enough to post lucidly on here, I bet there's some kind of volunteer work you could do out in the world.

My general observation is that people who let their illnesses keep them home and stuck in their heads, don't improve until they find a way out of that. Do you have any personal or professional support? Have you tried therapy our cognitive therapy?

 

nills, I have heard that old Cherokee story (a friend of mine she told me this one long ago). It's a powerful metaphor about social dynamics. However, the problem is it's NOT applicable to ailments where there is no cure or real treatment. It's like, when a tree falls in the woods and nobody is there to perceive the tree falling did it actually fall?

marqualler, certainly the anxiety dissipates eventually since you can't do anything about the noise. T controls you, not the other way around. Thus you must accept it. Still, the problem remains: it IS annoying, and life ain't much fun anymore - especially when you used to cherish silence, like me. Even worse, when your career centered communication.

labrat, masking won't work when you are deaf. But yes, I do mask every now and then. Does it work? Sometimes. Would I call it a success? Nope. It's merely a short term mitigation.

linearb, perception is reality, right? I'd say that only works for some time. Eventually cruel reality gets back at you.
Fair, I'd like to give my freaking T to those lot that have learned how to deal with the noise without having to suffer. I mean, hey they are happy T or no T, right? A few sounds more won't hurt. More variety right?

'Pain is inevitable, suffering is not.' I'd say it depends on the pain. Is it mental or physical. Moreover, how severe is it? Are there breaks?

You cannot apply proverbs to every condition.
Indeed, everything that is, is temporary and fleeting. Is T a temporary thing? Probably yes if you put T on the same level as life. Life is a circle.
Positive and negative things are subjective. Physical pain makes us suffer mentally and physically. Whereas mental pain makes us merely suffer mentally. Even though, the mind can affect the body. As well as the body can affect the mind.

Interesting. I feel you. I've had depressions before and those were laughable things compared to T. Nevertheless, I always managed to cure my tiny depressions. I did study psychology so mental issues were no real problems. I used to help others with their problems.
Now I have a severe physical problem, which is mutilating my very soul.

Same here. It's bothering me so much that I'm considering to off myself to be free. To have peace. I am here to find some answers, some revelations. And so far it seems there's nothing to really fix this malady.

I am very impatient lately. And my self-compassion is dwindling. I mean, I have enough other physical problems, and now this. Matter of fact, T is the worst ailment I could imagine! I talked about this with friends before I got it. Fucked up irony. Now I have it.

Acceptance. You do not have a choice! That ain't success! It's merely the inevitable. You cannot fight it. So you pretend that it doesn't bother you anymore. But T is in control, not you. And you are being reminded 24/7.
Imagine the following, someone punches you in the face repeatedly. Of course, you could defend yourself, right? No. You cannot 'cause your hands are tied behind a tree. And the punching goes on. Obviously, as you can see, being punched in the face is a 'physical thing'. So you probably suffer physically. Now you try to apply psychology. Yes, I am being punched in the face, again and again. I do bleed, it does hurt but I won't show an emotion. I even go further and pretend that it doesn't affect me anymore.
Get the picture?

I feel you, linearb. All I want is quiet. I think I've never wanted it more than now. Still, I hope I am one of those good stories. Poof and free. A second chance.
True you can't do the things you fancy now when you are dead. But if you are being reborn you could do them again. Life is a cycle.
I appreciate your words. And I understand where you come from. But psychology won't help with this. As said, I studied it.

I have had a severe oral mucosa inflammation once. Two weeks of excruciating pain. It was an eye opener. I really thought my life was over. Still, even back then there were medications available that mitigated the pain. Now, for T there's NOTHING. Nothing that helps on a conscious level, that is.
It sounds familiar. And one more reason to off myself.

As you have discovered, more than once, for yourself all these psychological therapies (boot-camps) are a mere short term fix. In the long run T is killing you. It IS killing me. It kills us all. :'(

 

It IS annoying, yes I agree with that. But my life is still fun. And one of the biggest things that brought me down when my T started was mourning my loss of silence. And that's what I did--mourned it, experienced that grief, and then moved on. Does it mean that I don't wish I had total silence still? Of course not. But the things I was worried I would not be able to do anymore, like read books, enjoy nature, etc., are all things I have since done and enjoyed. I work in an extremely quiet office all day long and can hear my T all day long, but I made modifications for it and now it's not so bad.

 

I disagree with much of what you've written here, but that's okay because we certainly don't have to agree on everything!

Things change. This is inevitable. The things I used to think were fun, I might not now. I don't really do concerts anymore, outside of very exceptional circumstances (and wearing thick earplugs), and even movies in theaters are a challenge. That's okay, though, because I've found other things I enjoy doing.

Yes. So why don't you put all this energy you have to write on here, into exploring that and figuring out what mental changes you can make to ease the suffering you're experiencing?

Yup, I also have some early memories of finding out about tinnitus and thinking "yikes, that sucks!" But, I think that your dwindling self-compassion is something you can work on, and if you can figure out how to do that, you might be surprised at how radically it changes the way you experience the noise in your head.

If you're going to get better -- and you can -- you're going to have to be patient, because nothing about this is easy, and nothing about it is fast. But, as impatient as you feel right now, you can find a way back to patience. Hell, if you've never been a patient person, you may even eventually decide that tinnitus was the thing which forced your hand, forced you to change... and that can be a positive, even if the T itself is not.

You do have a choice, you can figure out how to accept, or you can keep fighting it. Acceptance is not inevitable. I have known people who refused to accept certain facts of their lives, just fought them endlessly all the way through to the end. There is no peace in that.

Yes, and the picture I see is "denial", which is about the furthest thing from acceptance I can possibly imagine. Acceptance is not about pretending. Pretending is still striving. Acceptance is the end of striving. I'm not there yet, but I've had some good glimpses.

If I'm reborn I will not have any of my memories or any of the things that make me, "me". That concrete "I" is just ego shit that's going to get blasted away when my brain dies. Linearb likes strong lattes, walks in the woods and motorcycle rides. Reborn linearb might not like any of those things, or have access to them, so I feel like I need to enjoy them as much as possible at the moment. "As much as possible" might be less than it would be without tinnitus, or less than it would be if I was fabulously wealthy and could afford to have my own barista, my own 1000 acre estate, and my own garage full of a thousand motorcycles -- that's all just striving, wishing for things to be other than as they are. And striving, is suffering, as closely as I understand the word.

Okay, so what will help with this, exactly? You can't change the nature of the sound. I can't change it for you. But you can change your psychological response to these things. That doesn't make it go away. It just might make the suffering stop, though.

Er, "short term" means I've often had periods of weeks or months where I literally don't think about this bullshit at all. Why can't that be sufficient? I mean, there's no such thing as a "permanent" fix -- none of us are permanent. We're all going to die, one way or another. If we can adopt strategies that keep this stuff from consuming all of our attention all the time, why can't that be good enough? Also, you're sort of cherry-picking my words -- I was pretty adamant that at least half the reason that I have these up-and-down swings, is because when I'm down I make a bunch of healthy changes to my life, and then when I'm up again, I stop doing those things because they are time consuming and hard and I'd rather be playing games and having sex and watching TV and all that other hedonistic nonsense that I fill my days with.

Like, if I said to you, "I am demi-god, and I can do some magical things. I can't take away the noise in your head, because I'm not a powerful enough demi-god... but I can cast a spell that will make you not think about the noise most of the time, and make it so that when you do think about it, you're not afraid of it and don't have an emotional reaction to it", wouldn't you want me to cast that spell?

If not, you're stuck in some kind of perfectionist mode, and I'm sorry to say it but life will never, ever, ever be perfect. People who will settle for nothing less than perfection, live and die unsatisfied.

So again, I ask, what is it that you're looking for here? No one can solve this for you, and no one is going to suddenly agree that suicide is a reasonable response to tinnitus.

A couple years ago, I was pretty much exactly where you are now. Here I am today, and I feel a lot differently. I don't have it all figured out, I still spend more time ruminating on my tinnitus than I'd really like to, but, shit, if it's gone from an average of 90% of the time to an average of 10-50% depending on how well I'm feeling, that still means that at worst I have half my life back.

 

Yeah, totally disagree with some of the posts here, not to mention this is an important support forum. No I don't like it, but things change, and I might get better, or there might be a cure around the corner. Besides, I know two people who have had it for 30 years and it doesn't bother them in the slightest now.

 

Did you know that they use sound as a torturing method?
Moreover, can sound hurt or damage things? Yes, it certainly can. Sound waves are quiet powerful.

You believe that the neurological pathways for sound (neurons) have little in common with neurological pathways for pain and temperature (neurons). So basically there are two kinds of neurons, those that are apples and those that are oranges depending on what activates them. If that's the case how can you objectively differentiate between them if you just look at the brain. Get the picture?

@Matt01, I don't think that there will be a cure. Because they are looking in the wrong place.

@Telis, I feel you. ~hug

@marqualler, I wish I could enjoy reading or music again.

 

Give yourself some time. You'll get there, if you are patient. Reading was a big challenge for me, for a long time.

 

@billie48 I have to say I find your story beeing quite something. It's not a bad thing knowing that someone prone to stress reactions were able to adjust. There are a lot to consider if you suffer from T, but giving it time may be the main thing.

 

Thanks @Vincent R. If you read the success stories enough, you will find that common ingredient of success among many posters - the passage of time. Even it time hasn't healed the T, it will reduce the severity of the T sensation because the body will just slowly get more used to the alien sensation, particularly if we don't put up a painful resistance to the T sound. That is why time, patience, acceptance and some strategies (CBT, TRT, mindfulness etc.) will usually help people improve, with time being the common and most important factor towards habituation.

 

I push myself out almost every day for a pain staking workout. I put everything I have into it. You see I need to work myself no matter what, even if I have to drag myself out. They aren't like my previous workouts prior to T, I was a work out freak and pushed myself far beyond what I could even imagine now, but they are still tough workouts. I also get out for dinner here and there, play tennis in the summer etc. help kids with their hockey down at the local rink, I do this with my ear plugs in barely able to hear anything but the painful scream of my T. I don't lay around and feel sorry for myself, I push hard even if I hate it (and trust me I hate it). The fact is that I'm exhausted by absolutely nothing. Watching a movie is exhausting, trying to listen and concentrate through the tinnitus and take the pain of my H. Driving my car is painful, I do it all almost every day. Doing these things for me is like running a marathon, completely wipes me out. I have no reaction to speak of, nothing. I just go do what I can, I don't talk about my T to others (except here). I don't even mask, nothing. I just do what I can and take the pain. I sleep ok as well. It's just the fact that it's all hard and I physically exhaust. I collapse and end up laying in bed where I'm out of the exterior noise and sleeping on and off. When I wake up I'm weak, takes me about 3 hours to get the strength to get out of bed and in the shower. Then to the ice to bag skate myself, work on a few puck drills and then home, do a few things around the house, cook dinner, maybe some TV and I'm done. Physically and mentally I'm finished. I lay in bed and meditate, close my eyes and try and forget the pain in my ears and the painful noise in my head. I'm basically sleeping/meditating for 16-18 hours a day. It gets very very lonely and feels scary in some weird way but that's the only way I can get through this. Awake and fighting T and H for more than a few hours a day for me is impossible right now. I can only take it for so long and then I need to absolutely zone out or sleep/collapse. This from a guy that in the past wouldn't miss a beat in life even if I was sick.

So I push myself absolutely as hard as I can, do my 110 percent best and all people can tell me is that I've got a bad mental additude/reaction and could do better, and if fact, that I'm quite useless. Like I'm some sort of mental case imagining this, and it's just like ignoring traffic noise on my front street. This can make a person feel pretty ashamed. I have been very respected in the past by my peers, I no longer see any of them becasue I don't want to be seen as weak, obvioisly I know how this all looks. After all, all I need to do is change my reaction, how weak could this make me look through other people's eyes. Nope, I've worked too hard to establish my reputation and I am way too proud to be looked at like that now, I would rather suffer alone than to be looked at as some drama queen suck who just needs to get on with life and change his additude and reaction.

And as far as death, well I am only human and I only have so much energy to give. We all have our limits. Doing this for another 40 years is not a option for me personally. I'm sure my desision will not be respected and I will go down in the books as a very weak man. People will forget about what I have done if life, all the adversity I had faced, all the things that I have accomplished, all of that will be thrown out the window as people spend my hard earned money and look down on me as a coward that couldn't handle a little ringing in his ears.

Anyway...I'm out of this thread. I have little energy to begin with. Defending/explaining myself and actions to others isn't something I'm really into right now. I shouldn't even have chimed in, I knew it was a bad idea. We all have our own ideas and opinions. I guess they should all be respected.

Peace

 

I just want to make sure there's nothing for my ghost to hang on to, so my soul flutters away to where ever it's supposed to go. Like I wrote, it's a paranoid thought and a sign that I'm in a bad spot right now.

I still might write it down in my last will, though.

Laziness can be something that gets in the way of suicide as well. While death will effectivly dismantle the neurons that blasts away for no good reason, 9 times out of 10 it's easier to drink another cup off coffee and participate in a conversation like this compared to put yourself in front of a train, which actually requires no small effort of will. This kind of avoidance won't do a thing about your misery, it's just more convenient for the moment. After 10 000 cups of coffe or so, you'll be so old that death shows up without you having to do a damn thing.

It's kind of funny thinking back about the stuff that one used to think were troublesome. Compared to beeing locked up in a box with the precise size of your own head together with a never ending wake up alarm, just about anything is a walk in the park.

I personally plan to plodder on with life. Once I'm dead, it will feel a whole lot better looking back at my life knowing that I never let anyone down by suicide. The difference of getting through one more horrible day and thousands of them is insignificant, since they come one at the time.

While I don't think habituation is impossible or mereley selfdeception, I do know deep inside that I will never more be 100 percent until I start all over again with a new existence. I also know that the quickest way to get there would be with a nice and clean chopping sound. But I'll try to show patience. Let the fella with the scythe do his job when he can be bothered to.

I used to train hiphop. It was so much fun, and I told myself I'll dance until I die. With T and H, there's no way. For my next reincarnation, I'll try to remember that ambition.

 

Perhaps he had T and H in that pictures and he thought that was worse than the flames.
Perhaps he was on drugs and did not feel a thing who knows... and who cares.....?
Perhaps he was on a high horse and fell off and was dizzy....
Did he live to tell about it!?

WTF

 

Very wise to leave this thread!! Stay strong Telis !!!

 

I think the 'dude' was protesting about political oppression. Makes you wish someone had told him that he could adjust his reaction and just accept it.

 

Yeah, the picture is a bullet point, guys. Maybe it's not a very good one. It was useful to me when I was in a deep, dark hole. I am sorry if it is not useful to others.