- Jun 15, 2017
- 4
- Tinnitus Since
- Feb 26, 2017
- Cause of Tinnitus
- Loud Noise. Editing sound fx. Guns, swords, explos, etc
... Said no one, ever.
Hi everyone,
I'm Angelo
I am a sound designer, musician, composer, sound fx editor. You can see a pattern here.
Everything I do involves sounds.
I've been doing all things sound related for over 20 years now. Now at the young and tender age of 45 ( I'm being sarcastic, of course), I have developed some form of Tinnitus or Noise Induced Hearing Loss, as my unhelpful ENT and physician have informed me.
Briefly, around the end of Feb, I was working on the final episode of a soon to be cancelled TV show. As all big finales go, this one spared no expense. It involved an Apocalyptic battle involving machine guns, swords, horses, flame-throwers, fights, bodyfalls, explosions, ... you get the picture.
I have a tendency to monitor my work fairly loud and this time was no exception. I edited for hours putting this episode together.
The next morning, I woke up, went to use the bathroom and while urinating, I noticed a weird distortion accompanying the sound of my pee going into the toilet.
I was shocked. I freaked out. What the hell!? In a weird intuitive way, I kind of knew what it was and that I was screwed.
As most of us I'm sure, I panicked. Basically what is going on with me is that I hear a ringing, distortion, buzzing, rattling, resonating sound in my head/ear only when I hear sounds.
So, I don't have the traditional tinnitus described as a constant ringing.
My ringing is when I'm talking or someone else is talking. Even worse, when I hear music, strings, piano, what ever.. there it is. AND it's AS LOUD as what ever I'm listening to.
It's distracting, frustrating, anxiety-inducing, and just maddening. It also throws me into a depression. Also, I'm beginning to notice that I'm isolating myself a lot.
Anyone else have this type of ringing??
I've been to an ENT. They put me on a steroid regime to rule out an infection or some sort of inflammation.
Didn't help
Went to the House Ear Institute here in Los Angles. This is a world renowned institute that specializes in all things related to hearing. I had my hopes up.
They had me take an MRI to rule out a tumor. No tumor, thankfully.
Then I had audio exams. I was shown to have lost some of the high end freq in my right ear. No surprise.
They said I had Noise Induced Hearing Loss. They wanted to see me back in 8 weeks. 8 weeks later I went back had another exam with the same results.
They couldn't do anything for me. All they said was I need to protect my ears from here on out. Monitor at low volumes. I got custom ear plugs so I could at least block out or mute some of the sounds so that I don't hear the ringing.
But it's not comfortable and impractical.
So that's it in a nutshell. I feel lost now. How do I deal with this and block out the sounds? How do I habituate myself to this new life and reality. I've noticed that last couple of days that I've started getting migraines now from the loud ringing.
I'm contemplating changing careers to something that doesn't involve any sound whatsoever. Any ideas? haha.
Thanks everyone. Looking forward to hearing from you guys.
Hi everyone,
I'm Angelo
I am a sound designer, musician, composer, sound fx editor. You can see a pattern here.
Everything I do involves sounds.
I've been doing all things sound related for over 20 years now. Now at the young and tender age of 45 ( I'm being sarcastic, of course), I have developed some form of Tinnitus or Noise Induced Hearing Loss, as my unhelpful ENT and physician have informed me.
Briefly, around the end of Feb, I was working on the final episode of a soon to be cancelled TV show. As all big finales go, this one spared no expense. It involved an Apocalyptic battle involving machine guns, swords, horses, flame-throwers, fights, bodyfalls, explosions, ... you get the picture.
I have a tendency to monitor my work fairly loud and this time was no exception. I edited for hours putting this episode together.
The next morning, I woke up, went to use the bathroom and while urinating, I noticed a weird distortion accompanying the sound of my pee going into the toilet.
I was shocked. I freaked out. What the hell!? In a weird intuitive way, I kind of knew what it was and that I was screwed.
As most of us I'm sure, I panicked. Basically what is going on with me is that I hear a ringing, distortion, buzzing, rattling, resonating sound in my head/ear only when I hear sounds.
So, I don't have the traditional tinnitus described as a constant ringing.
My ringing is when I'm talking or someone else is talking. Even worse, when I hear music, strings, piano, what ever.. there it is. AND it's AS LOUD as what ever I'm listening to.
It's distracting, frustrating, anxiety-inducing, and just maddening. It also throws me into a depression. Also, I'm beginning to notice that I'm isolating myself a lot.
Anyone else have this type of ringing??
I've been to an ENT. They put me on a steroid regime to rule out an infection or some sort of inflammation.
Didn't help
Went to the House Ear Institute here in Los Angles. This is a world renowned institute that specializes in all things related to hearing. I had my hopes up.
They had me take an MRI to rule out a tumor. No tumor, thankfully.
Then I had audio exams. I was shown to have lost some of the high end freq in my right ear. No surprise.
They said I had Noise Induced Hearing Loss. They wanted to see me back in 8 weeks. 8 weeks later I went back had another exam with the same results.
They couldn't do anything for me. All they said was I need to protect my ears from here on out. Monitor at low volumes. I got custom ear plugs so I could at least block out or mute some of the sounds so that I don't hear the ringing.
But it's not comfortable and impractical.
So that's it in a nutshell. I feel lost now. How do I deal with this and block out the sounds? How do I habituate myself to this new life and reality. I've noticed that last couple of days that I've started getting migraines now from the loud ringing.
I'm contemplating changing careers to something that doesn't involve any sound whatsoever. Any ideas? haha.
Thanks everyone. Looking forward to hearing from you guys.