Tinnitus Stops When I Turn My Head Upside Down. What Is Going On?

[L.ina]

I've had this ringing in my ear for a couple of weeks now, I've been writing about it in my introduction but things have changed since, or rather, my perception of the sound has changed. I've located the sound to my left ear and learnt some strange things about the loudness and frequency of it. Please help me figure out what's causing this sound - personally I don't believe it has anything to do with the ear, but I'm not sure of course and I have no idea what might be the culprit. I did have an MRI about a weak ago - showed nothing abnormal in neither of my ears.

The tinnitus was just there from one day to the other (freaking me out!) without me having done anything remarkable or out of the ordinary. No loud music/sounds, just being at home.

Even more strange is this:
I soon noticed that I could make the sound stop by pressing my finger into my ear canal. In order to keep the sound away I need to keep my finger in the canal OR plug it with an earplug that leaves no air in the canal (I use a soft silicon variant).
The sound first increases immensely when the air is pushed in, then slowly fades away and stops.

The sound also stops if I cup my hand over the ear and make vacuum occur in the ear canal.

I'm absolutely puzzled as I just noticed that my tinnitus also stops when I bend over to pick something up from the floor and stay down there for awhile - same thing if I lay flat down on my stomach on the bed and let my head hand over the edge - tinnitus is gone.

What on earth is going on?? I don't know if the sound or the tone itself has any clue to it but it is a ringing, almost rattling sound and it is SO annoying.
I just want it to stop and stay away for good and the fact that I can make it stop by doing the things mentioned above makes me think (and hope!!) that it is something that can be cured. I just don't know what!! Any thoughts?

Thank you in advance

 

[Kriszti]

I've had this ringing in my ear for a couple of weeks now, I've been writing about it in my introduction but things have changed since, or rather, my perception of the sound has changed. I've located the sound to my left ear and learnt some strange things about the loudness and frequency of it. Please help me figure out what's causing this sound - personally I don't believe it has anything to do with the ear, but I'm not sure of course and I have no idea what might be the culprit. I did have an MRI about a weak ago - showed nothing abnormal in neither of my ears.

The tinnitus was just there from one day to the other (freaking me out!) without me having done anything remarkable or out of the ordinary. No loud music/sounds, just being at home.

Even more strange is this:
I soon noticed that I could make the sound stop by pressing my finger into my ear canal. In order to keep the sound away I need to keep my finger in the canal OR plug it with an earplug that leaves no air in the canal (I use a soft silicon variant).
The sound first increases immensely when the air is pushed in, then slowly fades away and stops.

The sound also stops if I cup my hand over the ear and make vacuum occur in the ear canal.

I'm absolutely puzzled as I just noticed that my tinnitus also stops when I bend over to pick something up from the floor and stay down there for awhile - same thing if I lay flat down on my stomach on the bed and let my head hand over the edge - tinnitus is gone.

What on earth is going on?? I don't know if the sound or the tone itself has any clue to it but it is a ringing, almost rattling sound and it is SO annoying.
I just want it to stop and stay away for good and the fact that I can make it stop by doing the things mentioned above makes me think (and hope!!) that it is something that can be cured. I just don't know what!! Any thoughts?

Thank you in advance

I absolutely have no idea what causes this type of tinnitus, but I had it from 2016 3 times for a couple of weeks. I had similar symptoms as you. Left ear, low buzzing-humming-vibrating tinnitus, which stopped when I plugged the ear, cupped my ear creating a vacuum and talking. Must be something physical, but really don't know what. And nobody could tell me what's going on. MRI showed nothing, some ENTs and audiologist couldn't see anything. It was loud and extremely annoying. Couldn't sleep more than 1-1,5 hours in pieces for weeks. BUT. It went away completely. That's my bad luck that now I have UHF bilateral tinnitus, which seems to be permanent, but because I didn't have it after the first two bout of tinnitus years ago, I think it's coincidental. So, try to calm down, easier said than done, I know. It could go away.

 

[L.ina]

I absolutely have no idea what causes this type of tinnitus, but I had it from 2016 3 times for a couple of weeks. I had similar symptoms as you.

Thank you so much for answering @Kriszti
Did you mean that you have experienced this type of tinnitus at three different times and that it stopped all three times? Do you remember if you did anything special before it started, it doesn't have to have been anything out of the ordinary - just something that can give a clue to why it occurred...

My tinnitus is a little different from yours in that that it doesn't vibrate. I have that kind of tinnitus too, but on my other ear and I think it originates from my hearing loss on that ear.
Anyway, it's extremely annoying and before I found out that I could make it stop by plugging in an earplug and adjusting it so the vacuum maintained it woke me up at nights. I feel SO much for all of you who has this kind of terrible sound all the time. I'm kind of habituated to the tinnitus on my other ear and I don't have it all the time but mostly in the evening and early morning.

Take care!

 

[Kriszti]

Thank you so much for answering @Kriszti
Did you mean that you have experienced this type of tinnitus at three different times and that it stopped all three times? Do you remember if you did anything special before it started, it doesn't have to have been anything out of the ordinary - just something that can give a clue to why it occurred...

My tinnitus is a little different from yours in that that it doesn't vibrate. I have that kind of tinnitus too, but on my other ear and I think it originates from my hearing loss on that ear.
Anyway, it's extremely annoying and before I found out that I could make it stop by plugging in an earplug and adjusting it so the vacuum maintained it woke me up at nights. I feel SO much for all of you who has this kind of terrible sound all the time. I'm kind of habituated to the tinnitus on my other ear and I don't have it all the time but mostly in the evening and early morning.

Take care!

Yes, I mean it started in 2016 and except for 2018 I had it 3 different times. Out of the blue. The 2 bouts were not this bad than this last time. Totally screwed up my sleeping, and spiralled me into absolute panic mode. And maybe that contributed developing the permanent, bilateral tinnitus, I'll never know.

The only thing that I can think of that it's somehow anxiety related besides being something physically wrong with me, because all the times I was preparing for very serious exams, and in 2018 I had a passive term at the university, so no exams, no tinnitus.

In 2019, in August I had problems with both of my ears, pain, itchiness, excessive amount of fluid leaking from them, but the other two times, nothing, so I don't think that was the cause 2 months later. My hearing is worse in that ear, and from time to time I had some pain in it, but it was rarely serious enough to make me go to a doctor with it. And I was an avid earplugs user due to my upstairs neighbours being extremely loud, so when I had not so serious earpain, I thought that it was because of earplugs.

I also had some thumping feeling in that ear, so maybe some muscle twitching can be related too?

I think that it's somehow different from "normal" tinnitus, because it can be stopped, but no ENTs could say anything about why.

Check out @Optigirl19 posts as well, she had something similar for a month and hers went away too.