Was Recovering, Then Saw a Movie... Mistake?

I've had tinnitus for just under 2 months, and in the last few weeks it's been getting better (lower volume, more of a hiss than a high constant tone). My tinnitus doctor said it would be ok to see a movie as long as I wore hearing protection, so I watched Ready Player One last night with foam earplugs AND 3M earmuffs.

I used my phone decibel meter and the movie never exceeded 84 db (and that was rare). Most of the deep explosions were around the high 70s. However, tonight my tinnitus was extremely loud and I had to take Xanax for the first time just to sleep. Now in the morning it has quieted down some, but is still higher and louder than usual (the mornings are usually really quiet).

Hoping I didn't mess up my recovery...should I see a doctor and get Prednisone or is that not necessary?

Thank you

 

I wouldn't. Just relax and take it easy.

 

Thank you...I hope it will calm down to normal levels again soon. Keep trying to tell myself that it was no louder than driving a car on a rough highway which I do weekly.

 

It's fine, you had plugs and muffs, I even think your T could spike because of the protection.
I sometimes get increased T afterwards when wearing earplugs (while sound levels are low enough).

 

spikes sometimes happen after wearing ear plugs. You used way too much hearing protection.

 

It could have been anxiety thinking of if your ears would be ok.
Well done for using protection and in sure you will be fine.
Have a lovely Easter break...
Love glynis

 

Thank you all so much for the reassurance. I'm sure a lot of it was just my anxiety making things worse - I'll give it another day or two to calm down.

I am trying to tone down the ear protection...still just paranoid about making any more stupid mistakes. Didn't know it could actually cause spikes on it's own though!

 

Maybe try noise reduction plugs instead of foam plugs so your ears don't get a pressure rush keeping foam plugs in.
Reduction plugs let a safe sound limit in your ears and for myself I find them better.
Love glynis

 

Don't worry it happens to me daily, I love movies used to watch movie daily from my phone, but I connect to my bluetooth speakers and kept them at a distance, i get the spike kind of like medium one, but it sorted out till the morning, then again it goes like this daily, it does not effect your recovery, I am 4 months in and it's been the same since last two months, I get these spikes from the movie on the daily basis, and my tinnitus is going down gradually If I compare my tinnitus from four months ago, so don't worry, I cannot live without movies, it's the only time pass i have when I am alone.

 

Thanks Glynis - yeah my plan is to transition to earplugs with lower NRR over time (the ones labeled "high fidelity") so that I get used to normal sounds levels. They're also nice since they mask the tinnitus better (the foam ones block all the high notes so that the tinnitus becomes really apparent); it's just in this case I stuck with foam to block the bass as much as possible.
On an unrelated note, I like the foam ones in that they get deeper into the ear, so speaking with them doesn't make my voice sound so loud and echo-y - unfortunately they make hearing others talk that much harder lol.

 

Thank you - yeah I love movies, and I really wanted to see this one to prove that I won't let tinnitus control my life. At least the spike still seemed to be lower than the 'normal' back when I first got tinnitus, so that's a relief. I actually feel like it's made a lot of progress in the last two weeks (considering hte first 5/6 weeks were pretty much constant) so I'm just hoping that trend continues at this point until it's completely gone.
Really glad to hear your experience with this - thank you for sharing.

 

His experience (as well as the experiences of countless others who shared their horror stories here) prove that it is NOT FINE (yes, even though he wore ear protection that provides a false sense of security).

You can ignore reality, but you are not going to be able to ignore the consequences of you ignoring reality.

 

If the app you were using was accurate (there's only a few that are, and only on the iPhone, too many variables for Android devices), there's no way you caused damage. 70 decibels is well within the safety threshold, even if you only got a 20 decibel reduction from your protection, that's only 50 decibels! Most conversations are louder than that! You're fine, don't listen to Mr. Bauer, he's a pseudo "expert" around these parts.

 

I am NOT an expert (neither are you). But I Have been reading this forum, and not just moving my eyes, but actually paying attention to what it is people have been sharing with us.

Below are a handful of posts (a tip of the iceberg) that people like Azeroturner are ignoring for some bizarre reason:

To see the original message, just click the "up arrow" to the right of "username said:"

 

Double protection for sound levels that didn't even touch 80 decibels, there is absolutely no way that hearing damage was caused. If that were the case then we'd all be deaf Bill. Spikes are often times brought on by stress, anxiety, diet, and sleep quality. Just because the OP had a spike the following day does not mean it was a result of the movie theater.

 

Hey everyone. I appreciate everyone's feedback here, and I think it just goes to show that many of us have different experiences and will to some degree have to listen to our bodies.

I don't want us to argue too much about this - we are all here for support, and I am grateful for everyone's responses. Regardless of whether the movie was a good idea or not, for now I realize all I can do is remain positive, hope for the best, and try to relax in case the anxiety/stress element is making it worse. Whether by sound or anxiety, I will be avoiding movies for a while to give my ears more time to recover without causing myself any more panic attacks.

As for my tinnitus, currently it seems like it's similar to my 'normal' - that is, it's semi-loud, but it usually gets much louder towards the evening anyway (which it is right now). Hoping that it returns to being really static-y/quiet by the morning again, and then I'll know that at least I'm back to baseline.

I've been meaning to write a more comprehensive update of my journey so far anyway, with what I've learned in talking to doctors and my own experiences, so I hope to share more good news by then.

 

I will reply by quoting @Alue 's old post (that I had already quoted above). I guess I will underline some relevant text in that post:

 

@AZeurotuner @Bill Bauer

I've been getting a roaring sound in my left ear lately. Just comes on and last for a few seconds then goes away. Thank God. scary.... Worse than the T I have now I would guess.. I mean if it didn't go away...Didn't do anything to make this happen. No loud sounds, diet or drugs Etc......nothing has changed... Some of this is a mystery..... They still can't find a cure.

 

People on this forum refer to the above as "fleeting tinnitus". Search this forum for more details. Most (including me) agree that it is harmless. It could even be our body's way of trying to recalibrate and to get rid of T. This hypothesis seems to be consistent with the fact that people with T get fleeting T more often than people who are not suffering from T (who get it too, but a lot less often). So don't worry about it. Tell yourself that you will worry only if it doesn't go away within 60 seconds.

 

So you're comparing 70 decibel peaks wearing double protection to a sustained 90 decibels with just ear plugs? Nice argument Bill...

 

Alue said that "it was probably less than that (90dB)". Also ALUE HAD BEEN WEARING EARPLUGS, so he got a permanent new sound after being exposed to sound that was QUIETER than 90 - (31-7)/2 = 90 - 12 = 78 dB.

That double protection will do less than you expect. X4A 3M muffs are 27 dB. Using the formula "take the NRR number (in dB), subtract seven, and then divide by two."
https://www.coopersafety.com/earplugs-noise-reduction
https://multimedia.3m.com/mws/media...how-to-use-the-noise-reduction-rating-nrr.pdf
the actual protection is (27-7)/2 = 10. It was double protection, so add 5. He mentions the movie getting as loud as 84 dB. Those cell phone dB meters are notoriously inaccurate, it could have been 95dB, resulting in around 80dB exposure.

I am not sure why we are trying to estimate his exposure. Given that the original poster and Alue Got hurt (and Alue got a New Tone), the quieter the sound the worse is the news for all of us.

 

Double protection just changes the noise by 5dB (which is less than the margin of error on those cell phone dB meters).

 

Actually no... There are apps that are pretty darn accurate. Soundmeter for example, has a margin of error of only 1.75dbs, which was confirmed by the CDC. And the correction factor assumes an extremely poor fit for muffs as well as plugs. If muffs only provided 10 decibels of protection then everyone who target shoots would be deaf. I can put music on at 60 decibels and BARELY hear it playing with x5a's on, surely I'm getting more than ten decibels of reduction.

 

Since this is the formula that 3M recommends one use, such a fit is not rare.

But there are apps that are not accurate. Why are you assuming that he had one of the accurate ones (especially GIVEN that he has been having problems after his experience).

When I wear X5A, I can hear people talking quietly on an airplane in mid air.

I admit that the point above is a good point.

 

It's very interesting because it shows that T flair-ups can happen fairly spontaneously. Had you lived anything eventful it would have been easy to fall for a bogus causation. For example, if someone had whispered in your ear, you could have easily imagined that the whisper is what caused the roaring.

It's so common to read testimonies in here such as "I did <insert innocuous action here> and my T is now spiking! Be careful! Never do it! It'll ruin your life", that one has to wonder whether the mind has to find a culprit for the sake of fighting the cognitive dissonance that a lack of understanding brings upon us.

 

Do you have a source for that? It's not the first time I see it mentioned and I'd like to understand its explanation.
(I don't mean links to pages that rehash this - they often claim 4-8 dB or 5dB - I mean the actual computation or scientific explanation)

 

Here are those formulas on the US Department of Labor's Occupational Safety and Health Administration's website:
http://web.archive.org/web/20150406...sta/otm/noise/hcp/attenuation_estimation.html

==
https://www.earsandears.com/noise-reduction-ratings-nrr-safe-noise-levels/

WOW - the above implies that dual protection adds only 2.5 extra dB of protection...

 

3M is a reputable company. I doubt they would rehash information that makes their products look bad for no reason.

 

I didn't mean it that way: I was interested in the physics behind it.

 

Thanks, but like I said, I'm not interested in pages that say "do this", but rather interested in how they came up with this formula (ie the physics behind it). I've found a lead here, which points to a formula by "INRS (Damongeot, Lataye, & Kusy, 1990)" - so that's my next step.