Weird Tinnitus-Related Habit: Putting Cotton Balls in My Ears for Most of the Day

Hey guys, so I've been posting on here quite a bit recently purely because my tinnitus has become really bad in my left ear this year following an episode of fleeting tinnitus which may have actually disguised itself as SSHL, as after that event I had an audiogram done and I was told I had mild hearing loss in my left ear.

Now for whatever reason I find myself for most of the day putting cotton balls in my ears, I guess, to dampen sound? Which sounds a bit stupid because you'd think I'd want to hear as much as I can but I find if I take them out I always panic when I realize just how loud my tinnitus is over normal everyday sounds (almost like I'm hoping when I take them out my tinnitus/hearing will be a little better). Sometimes my tinnitus gets louder when I hear a certain frequency of sound. I do find that in crowded places I can't separate sound as well as I used to. As a result, mixed with my own anxiety, I resort to this coping mechanism of stuffing cotton balls in my ears.

Does anyone else have any strange tinnitus habits? Today is one of those days where I'm struggling to cope. I know I'm "lucky" enough to only really have it bad in one ear but it's still an absolute nightmare. Sadly, I think the root cause is my hearing loss and of course if you can treat the cause, the symptoms should go away (even though my audiologist and ENT waved it off as mild and negligible), but, as far as I know, no hearing loss regenerative therapies are going to be around anytime soon though

 

I find myself doing a tinnitus relief move I saw on YouTube by putting my hands over my ears really hard to create a suction and then flick the back of the bones behind the head. It may be placebo effect but it helps and I do it all the time, ugh.