Tinnitus Worsening Despite Hearing Protection and Quiet Environment

[frank126266]

I've had tinnitus for a while, and it's getting worse each day.

Last night I was teaching a jewellery class. It wasn't noisy, and I wore industrial clamshell hearing protection. The hearth noise was about 75 dB, and occasionally someone might lightly hammer to shape a ring, but it wasn't loud, especially with protection. Overall, the class was fairly quiet.

Despite that, I woke up with extreme noise and torment from the tinnitus. I haven't been exposed to anything that would be considered loud. Even the drive home was just 10 minutes, and the car is quiet too.

I'm at the point of giving up. Things aren't getting better. I'm feeling desperate and now even paranoid about the noise from my car.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

 

[Jupiterman]

This seems very simple.

If you want to avoid continuous worsening, then you'll need to consider avoiding all the noise that clearly makes it worse.

Even with ear protection, sound still travels through the skull—this is called bone conduction—to the inner ear.

 

[Meyer37]

Very similar situation here after having tinnitus for 10 years, and I just don't understand it.

I'm very careful with my hearing. We have a baby, and she makes noise. I wear low-occlusion hearing protection at all times around her and remove it otherwise. If things get loud, I wear Peltor headphones with earplugs, and I've also significantly dampened the environment. I hire extra care for several days at a time.

It's so frustrating. I've always been careful with my hearing, and it means absolutely everything to me. I've given up activities that define who I am — playing piano (I'm a musician, with two degrees, and music is my life) and riding my bike. Yet somehow, tinnitus continues to get worse.

Focusing on it, or even on something like your car, can make the physical symptoms worse. You start anticipating pain, which can actually bring it on.

Not focusing is easy in theory, but hard in practice. I'm now wondering if a lack of exercise — like not riding my bike anymore — or neck tightness could be contributing to the problem.

Someone recently posted a chart showing the frequency curves of different hearing protection devices. Earplugs can actually increase low frequencies because of the occlusion effect. So if you're sensitive to low frequencies (as I am) and using a hammer, it might be sending even more low-frequency sound to your ears via bone conduction. That doesn't mean removing protection is a solution, unfortunately.

ChatGPT says that higher frequencies (above 6 kHz), as well as sharp transients, can partly bypass hearing protection through bone conduction to the skull "in certain conditions." That makes a lot of sense in my case.

Is the hearth a very sharp sound, or more like white noise?

 

[Ken219]

I've had tinnitus for a while, and it's getting worse each day.

Last night I was teaching a jewellery class. It wasn't noisy, and I wore industrial clamshell hearing protection. The hearth noise was about 75 dB, and occasionally someone might lightly hammer to shape a ring, but it wasn't loud, especially with protection. Overall, the class was fairly quiet.

Despite that, I woke up with extreme noise and torment from the tinnitus. I haven't been exposed to anything that would be considered loud. Even the drive home was just 10 minutes, and the car is quiet too.

I'm at the point of giving up. Things aren't getting better. I'm feeling desperate and now even paranoid about the noise from my car.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

Frank, you've had tinnitus since 2010. Have you ever experienced a spike before?

 

[delta784]

I've had tinnitus for a while, and it's getting worse each day.

Last night I was teaching a jewellery class. It wasn't noisy, and I wore industrial clamshell hearing protection. The hearth noise was about 75 dB, and occasionally someone might lightly hammer to shape a ring, but it wasn't loud, especially with protection. Overall, the class was fairly quiet.

Despite that, I woke up with extreme noise and torment from the tinnitus. I haven't been exposed to anything that would be considered loud. Even the drive home was just 10 minutes, and the car is quiet too.

I'm at the point of giving up. Things aren't getting better. I'm feeling desperate and now even paranoid about the noise from my car.

Any advice would be greatly appreciated.

How old are you, Frank?

 

[kingsfan]

Were you talking while wearing hearing protection? That could trigger a spike. Even the sound of metal clanking—despite being at a reasonable volume—could agitate those hypersensitive fusiform cells.

As long as you're keeping the environment below 80 dBA and wearing hearing protection, I really don't think any spike would be permanent. Some sounds just tend to irritate our tinnitus.

For many people, spikes occur a day or two after the noise exposure. I would continue monitoring the environment in the jewelry class with a dosimeter.

 

[frank126266]

Thanks for the replies.

I've only recently started experiencing harsh, continuous spikes that seem to be accumulating. I'm 58 years old and have seen an audiologist. My ear health and hearing are considered normal for my age.

I wasn't the one hammering. The student was using a wooden mallet rather than a metal hammer. There was no high-frequency percussive sound, and it really didn't seem too harsh, especially with industrial earmuffs on. The room was relatively quiet otherwise, with around eight people working on their craft.

It just seems unreasonable for that to be the cause. I have doubled up on protection in the past and still felt a slight spike afterward, so I'm beginning to think it may not be purely sound-induced. I also sometimes wear custom ACS Pro 26 plugs, but even then, after a few minutes, any sound still feels loud.

The hearth sounds like white noise when I'm wearing protection.

I'm not sure occlusion is the issue, since I've worn earplugs while surfing and road biking for many years without any spiking.