Very Difficult to Mask Many of My Tinnitus Tones Now

I have so many tones now, setting a masking sound may mask a tone but then it spikes the other, they are all loud and intrusive, it's very hard to set sounds to mask them all, I usually have 3-4 media players running on my PC, a very difficult situation.

I sometimes have to use pure tones matching my tinnitus frequency.

Are pure tones bad for hearing? Because they naturally sound sharp.

 

I don't know much about pure tones. I wish I could help. Is there are reason for these recent increases?

 

I took a couple of Tylenol pills 2x500mg within 24h 3 weeks ago,that normally should not harm but it did in my case giving me two new low frequency tones two days later. Then one 0.5mg Xanax pill before yesterday seems to have spiked some tones. These are the only reason I can think of

 

Shocking...

Thank you for sharing this with us, and I sincerely hope that this is only temporary...

 

It is not the first time I had issue with Tylenol 4 months ago I had a cold and took some at it seemed to spike my T but did not give my new tones, the spike seems to have gotten better over the next few months but its a different monster this time.

 

HI @Eric N

It must be difficult for you managing multiple tones of tinnitus and it's unfortunate that you are having to endure this misery. If you can give me some more background on your tinnitus, I think it would help me advise you on a way forward to hopefully give you some relief.

I see that your tinnitus was originally caused by "loud noise/sound". Have you had any treatment at ENT or been referred a Hearing Therapist or Audilogist for tinnitus treatment and management? Do you experience any hyperacusis sensitivity to sound? If so have you had any treatment for this?

You need to be careful of using "masking sounds" as this can spike the tinnitus as you have found. Try not to mask any of the sounds - instead, I suggest that you use a sound different to what you are hearing: nature sound for instance, and set the level slightly below your tinnitus sounds. This is known as "sound enrichment" if you don't already know ( but suspect you do) and is the preferred method advised my Hearing Therapists and Audiologists, instead of masking the tinnitus with a sound/s so that it can't be heard.

Masking tinnitus is not easy and when attempted is usually unsuccesful. As soon as the masking sound is removed or stopped temporarily, the brain focuses back on the tinnitus and it often appears louder and more intrusive.

Do you listen to music through headphones or use a Headset to listen to Audio even at low volume? When "noise induced" tinnitus spikes or becomes worse the usual reason/cause is due to further sound exposure. If you have hyperacusis and this hasn't been treated, depending on how severe it is, this can make you more sensitive to sound and even cause a person to develope multiple tinnitus sounds over time because the hyperacusis hasn't been treated.

All the best
Michael

 

Please take a look into supplements that help reduce / protect against ototoxicity. I recently made a post about this in alternative treatments. You seem to be very sensitive to medication so it may help you.

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/thread...noise-induced-hearing-loss-ototoxicity.31941/

Stay strong Eric! We all understand what your going through. From what I have read about experiences from other posters, people who have medication spikes are more likely to recover from them given time.

 

Hi I have been taking n-acetylcysteine and vitamin E 2 days or so after noticing the spike from Tylenol, after a week of taking the supplements I have not noticed any improvements from them. Doesn't ototoxicity generally start with high-frequency hearing loss? these new tones are extremely low frequency I'm talking like 125hz and they mix and distort with other sounds so for example my fridge now sounds awful because of the low frequency sound mixing with it. But I don't notice that I have a difficulty in hearing.

 

Hi Michael,

Yes I've seen all the Specialists one could possibly see, basically the messages from them is to try and ignore it and just put some background sounds to distract myself.

I believe my tinnitus is noise-induced it started 6 years ago while I was using earbuds which I had been using a lot at the time, it was stable for the next four years until I had an MRI which nearly doubled the intensity and made it unmaskable. This incident probably made my hearing much more sensitive to Future problems like I'm having now.

No I don't use earbuds anymore I don't think I have hyperacusis in the sense that loud sounds hurt but my tinnitus is very reactive and it's difficult to listen to music because it will just mix with it and this all happened after the MRI.

I don't normally use pure tone sounds to mask my tinnitus I usually find videos on YouTube like ringing Bells, as long as the soundtrack has similar frequencies to my tinnitus it does the job but now it's much more difficult because I have so many tones across all frequencies.

My audiogram is more or less normal up to 16 khz

 

HI @Eric N

Thank you for the additional information as it helps a lot. You may not believe that you have hyperacusis but I think you do and this is the reason for your oversensitivity to sound. Hyperacusis comes in different levels of severity. So whilst you may not experience any pain from sounds your hypersensitivity to them suggests to me that your auditory system needs to be desensitized, especially as you were sensitive to the MRI machine.

You have had this oversensitivity for some time and therefore, it may not be easy to treat but I still think it's possible with the right treatment. Although you have seen specialists which is good, you haven't mentioned whether you have tried TRT? I know you have probably heard of this treatment and what it involves and the scepticism that surrounds it. Please don't be adverse to trying it based on opinions from people that have never had the treatment. I have it twice in fact with good results. My hyperacusis was very severe 22 years ago and it was completely cured with TRT and the wearing of white noise generators to desensitize the auditory system. I believe this treatment would help you. However, it is expensive and it must be administered correctly for it to work, especially someone as yourself that experiences multiple tinnitus sounds. It will take time and counselling will be needed.

Please consider my advice and at least look into finding a Hearing Therapist or Audiologist that specialises in TRT. Please click on the links below and read my posts on TRT and the "Proper" way it should be administered to get the best results.

I hope that you start to feel better soon.
Take care

Michael

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/what-is-trt-and-when-should-it-be-started.19024/

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/trt-as-i-see-it.19555/

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/what-happens-in-trt-sessions.18195/

https://www.tinnitustalk.com/threads/hyperacusis-as-i-see-it.19174/

 

@Eric N I have used pure tones in the past. While some say that it gives them temporary relief, I find that it makes my tinnitus worse.

 

Hey @Eric N, I hope this all gets better for you. I don't know if pure tones as a masking tool is good or bad...does that mean you're playing a sound at a specific frequency? Or can it still cover a range or be like a chord or something? Anyway, maybe you know of apps like this but I use one called "Sleep Pillow' (available for both Android & Apple...maybe $10). I like it because you can mix up to 3 available sounds, which may help in your case. So you can have a water sound, a wind sound, a cat purring all together...or whatever.

 

sound at the specific T frequency and I have a program that does it in pulses two second on two seconds off it usually causes restitution inhibition but at certain times it can spike T even if the volume is low

 

Ok. Well thanks for the clarification. "Restitution inhibition" is something I haven't heard before but by looking at the definition of each word I guess it means it is preventing your hearing from being restored.

 

I wouldn’t use pure tones at all, seems dangerous. I don’t think the ear is meant to sustain any certain standing frequency over a long period of time. I could be wrong though,

Having said this,I might actually try it if I thought it safe. Maybe someone else can chime in. I would use a loud pure tone to distract me from the other tinnitus tones that I really hate if it were safe. Just seems to me that it would be a quick way to burn your hearing out at that particular frequency.

 

All we can do is hold on until and if they approve fx322. That is our only hope. Hopefully it does work and is safe and they open up the next trial phase and we can all get in, those of us with ototoxic and noise damage.

 

I have about 3 sounds that are all pretty loud with loud head T as well. I usually open my window and leave the tv on in my room. I tried masking it for a while then I kinda quit. Before I go to bed I try to stretch to some ocean noises (that don’t mask my T at all). I just noticed that I’ve started to go to sleep and even take naps the minute I stopped stressing myself out about how I can’t sleep.
My thought process is “oh crap it’s really loud! But I did sleep through an entire super bowl party once with my entire family at my house.” I’ve kinda convinced myself that it’s no different than that. After a minute I start fake yawning and then that triggers me actually yawning. Next thing I know it’s morning again and I have to go back to hell (life).

 

I avoid pure tones because they focus energy on a very narrow area of the cochlea (whatever area corresponds to the frequency of the tone).

Have you considered not masking your T?

 

That used to work but I don't its possible now, I hope of not developing H I feel my eardrums are slightly clenching to certain sounds like keyboard button press I don't know what is happening to me

 

Why is it not possible now?

 

gets to loud. I am worried about now about getting H any way to stop this? something feels weird for sure

 

Have you been to doctors to rule out any other possibilities? Have they tested for meniere's disease?

 

What doctor you mean an ent?
How do you test for that?

 

I highly suggest you go to an ENT and discuss what is going on with you and say you want to exhaust all possibilities. You want every test done to figure out whats going on. @glynis has meniere's and would be able to talk about that better than I can.

 

@Eric N ,
If you had symptoms like
Nausea
Motion sickness
Bouncy vission
Headache
Vertigo
Ear pressure
Tinnitus
Hearingloss
Balance problems
Eye twitching
Head tinnitus ear tinnitus
Severe Tinnitus
High and low tinnitus

Then ENT would start with a hearing test and MRI,Blood tests.
Balance tests and more to rule out other problems one by one.
Hydrops
Labyrinthitus
Meniere's Disease

It can take over a year to diagnose Menieres .
keeping a daily record would help the medical profession to see what you go through.

love glynis

 

hi @glynis
I did most of these tests.

I am still getting worse every other day I feel I am getting new tones.

I think now it may be the Vitamin E and NAC I am taking could be contributing to make it worse?

I have been taking 2x400 IU of vitamin E every other day and sometimes every day, that seems to be a high dose after research

Anyone have issues with theses supplements?

 

Maybe if you stop the supplements it might help?

 

Hey glynis. This may be a little off topic, but do you know if ear infections can trigger these problems?

 

I have multiple tones too. It's different for everyone, and I know it's easier said than done, but I've found it better to just try to get used to listening to the tones than trying to mask them.

When you say masking, do you mean masking to the point where you cannot hear the tone, or just distracting away from the noise? You shouldn't be masking to the point where you cannot hear your tinnitus.

 

I keep the noise in the room to around 40 db that's helps masks some of the sounds completely others not it really depends on how badly it's spiked