Tinnitus Week 2018 / Day 2: How Do You Manage Your Sleep with Tinnitus?

Today's question is similar to yesterday's, but this time we ask you about who do you manage your sleep with tinnitus?

Do you use sound enrichment at night? What kind of sounds do you prefer most? Do you take any supplements for sleep? Or any drugs? Or is getting a good night's sleep no problem for you at all?

We want to get you talking about tinnitus and in doing so, help others who may be needing some support. So together with the other international organisations involved in Tinnitus Week, we will be posting a question a day.



Comment below. You can also respond to our Facebook post.

 

I am in Thailand and do not have good English. I have been suffering with tinnitus for 3 months. I read this forum everyday to get support from many of you. I would like to answer your questions as follows
1. I have to open app with iPad with my sleep every night
2. I take 1 rivotril before sleep

There is less information about tinnitus here in Thailand and no any clinical treatment. I just try to live with it like most doctors said.

 

First and foremost my nightly ritual is to drink some Sleepy tea from Bigelow Benefits. It's a chamomile and lavender herbal tea that I drink about an hour, hour and a half before I actually lay down to sleep. It definitely helps knock me out as shortly before I lie down I usually notice myself start to nod off pretty hard.

When I get into bed I sleep the vast majority of the night on my back with a pillow under my knees. The only other thing I do, as I mentioned in the previous post, is I use a Lectrofan machine to play some noise. At first I was using a higher pitched white noise but now I've taken to listening to one of the fan noises on the machine.

 

In the beginning I used sounds of all types and OTC medications, Benadryl, Melatonin and Costco sells a good OTC sleeping aid. For reasons I don't understand, don't want to question and am grateful for, I am now sleeping well with no help. The only problem is as soon as I wake up I have to get up because the tinnitus is very loud in the morning until I get in the shower and start doing things.

 

Relaxio app
Melatonin
Magnesium
TRT

 

Here, here @Ambassador.
Tinnitus is a bitch in the first couple of years as far as sleep is concerned.
Then it becomes a lullaby. I use nothing for sleep and i have my old pre-tinnitus sleeping pattern going again.

If you MUST use something, just get some melatonin. 1mg is more than enough, 1 hour before sleep. If that doesn't work, work on your anxiety, reflect on life and time will get you back on track, eventually.

 

Started off with sound therapy and now on a low AD for sleep and works most nights.

 

1. Be very comfortable - buy a bed that you'll love, buy pillows that you'll love. Maybe hug/hold your wife/husband/teddy bear
2. Make sure you are tired - have a productive day that includes some physical activities, the more we do the better it is. If you have a productive day, then when it is bedtime your mind/body is tired and there is a great chance of falling asleep.
3.Possibly use a dream machine or some nature sounds in the background and low volumes.
4.Meditation - let the mind drift into the beauty of the sea or the majestic mountains
5.Drink a nice warm glass of milk
6.Smile and have good thoughts and feel proud of your accomplishments for the day

All of this helps me on a daily basis

 

Make myself exhausted by killin it during the day. Seems to work.

 

I don't take anything, but i pray before i go to sleep.

 

I second @fishbone on the value of a comfortable bed and pillow and having a productive day. Even without tinnitus, those are important for achieving a good night’s rest.

I use sound enrichment at night, typically crickets.

 

I use over the counter sleeping aids, hot shower, eye mask, breathing exercises, sound machine on ocean, and fan. It works for me.

 

I use a sound machine and OTC sleep aid plus Melatonin.

 

Nothing special needed, just relax.

 

Exercise during the day, lots of fresh air.
Sound enrichment at night...rain fall, waterfalls, wind blowing, any nature sounds on my iphone under my pillow.
Chamomile tea
.5 mg Ativan if needed
1/2 glass of red wine if needed
I have had Tinnitus for 10 months.....sleep is still my biggest challenge.

 

Comfie bed and pillows. I usually go to sleep with Mozart (Mozart for Meditation Cd). My bigger problem usually is waking up a few hours later and not being able to get back to sleep. For that, i have a sound machine, a tablet which i use to play utube audio talks, and my phone nearby if i give up on sleep. I take 3 mg of melatonin almost every night. For "must sleep" nights, i use one of the anti-histamine sleepaids, and if really desperate, i have Remeron from my dr. I only take it maybe once a month .
And some nights i just stay up until i pass out (from lack of sleep, I dont drink), one of the benefits of being retired. Needless to say, I and all my electronics sleep alone!

 

Remeron
Melatonin
breathing technics

 

Magnesium, Good night tea with lavender,chamomile, and hops, 2 grams melatonin, and valerian.
All this helps me to sleep pretty good. Also my T goes down in volume when i'm laying down, thank God for that.

 

Sleeping is not a problem for me... At least I am lucky for that !

In fact I often don't want to wake up and hear my T again...

 

I am in my 10 th year with very bad tinnitus. I learned how to sleep even with very loud tinnitus. How do i fall asleep? I don't know. Although i hear very loud tinnitus, my brain is so used to hearing that, that it falls asleep when some conditions are met (me in bed, with the intention to fall asleep).
That does not mean that tinnitus is not a huge problem for the sufferer. It means that the innate power of adaptation of an organism is so big that, if it has no choice, an organism adapts itself to hellish life conditions.

 

Nothing just go to sleep

 

tl;dr: pretty much nothing, hopefully it stays this way.

Before I had tinnitus, I used to daydream myself to sleep and thinking about all kinds of things till my mind got tired.

Now I do the same but with some slight difficulty trying to push the noise in the background. I don't want to sleep to music nor any background noise, if something's in my mind, I want to be able control it.

In the end, my goal is to deal with tinnitus easily in complete silence no matter how loud it gets, and I have the confidence that I can do it, I've always been stubborn about mental things.

Also as earlier mentioned the noise can be a "lullaby", focusing on it somehow works as well, but I still prefer my good old mind games

 

I have had tinnitus for over 30 years with break of over 15 years total habituation then it came back after period of severe stress and ill health i take benzo during day with dose at nite. But i find now that no matter how loud it is i have to have quiet dark and quiet weird i can listen to it and go to sleep but if it there which it always is when i wake it drives me mad. I am having trt at min.

 

A tiny dose of Remeron at night and lots of cat videos during the day.

 

I usually just fall asleep to the TV or nothing at all. My tinnitus isnt that loud.

It it gets bad, I usually take a quarter or half of a valium pill. That knocks me out within 15-30 mins and gives me a solid 6-7 hours.

 

For the past 11 months I've been sleeping with a fan on. But lately, when I'm in a positive mood I find the sound comfortable and sleep fine without any white noise.

 

A small bedside fan. May need to get a louder one as it no longer seems to mask the tinnitus since it may have gotten worse the few years I've had it.

Otherwise, I personally use marijuana at night. Now, I don't recommend just anyone use it (its not for everyone), but for me, as someone that has used marijuana even before the tinnitus, I'm used to its effects. Also helps me with the anxiety (which I also had before tinnitus, now worse because of tinnitus) too, and I'm able to fall asleep and stay asleep pretty easily with this routine every night.

 

Since I am suffering from a moderate/severe hearing loss, WNG or other sound sources does not apply to me. Luckily, I have been able to sleep during my 22 years of T even though I have severe T that fluctuates by the hour.

My emergency routines on bad nights is to do some meditation and relaxation techniques. In worst case, I would go for a small dose of clonazepam.

 

Sleeping has never been an issue for me.

 

T doesn't bother me too much most of the time when sleeping, if not Melatonine works very well.