What Are Things I Can Take After a Loud Event Causing a Spike?

I encountered someone unexpectedly using a power tool and it's caused a major spike. Is there anything I can do or take to help minimize the long term damage aside from taking steroids?

 

I'd be taking n acetyl cysteine (precursor to glutathione - antioxidant) and magnesium if you think there is a potential for damage. I'd also consider taking nicotinamide riboside if you can get some.

I had an awful spike years ago (was taking time off from work to relax) when a solid wooden door slammed shut right near my left ear. My ear felt immediately muffled and my tinnitus of course kicked up. Full on panic my end. My audio said the muffled hearing was due to protective spasm of the muscles in the ear, and not hearing loss. I had another audio for reassurance with no detectable change in my hearing, and my ears eventually settled back to baseline.

If you can, try to give your ears a rest from noise, and as much as you can, relax. (easier said than done). If relaxing with a spike is next to impossible at the moment, maybe try some valerian, passionflower, or distraction/cbt mindfulness apps such as buddhify and headspace.

Out of curiosity, do you have an aversion to taking steroids?

 

Hi @DebInAustralia , thank you for your reply. I will look up those things and see what I can get a hold of.

The issue I have with steroids is they kick up my blood sugar very easily because steroids reduce the effectiveness of insulin greatly in me so my body tries to flush out all that sugar so I end up going to the restroom every 10 minutes until I am severely dehydrated. I tried two different kinds before when I initially got T. My doctor told me to stop taking them both times.

 

I think I’ve worked out that this is what has been repeatedly happening to me. One ear is particularly hypersensitive and seems to swell/seize up resulting in conductive hearing loss in the lower frequencies (as opposed to sensorineural). I get an imbalanced sense of hearing as the lower end vanishes from one ear accompanied by a kind of woosh/ whurr. If it is a protective middle ear thing, the hearing should improve once it calms down (but I don’t know for sure). It make sense the low end is affected more because those hair cells for low end are further in the cochlea and if the middle ear is not relaying the sound properly then it’s going to go first as there’s more distance to travel. That’s my layman’s attempt at a possible explanation.

It just happened again a couple of days ago after making so much progress - lower T, less spiking, reduced H, improved sound tolerance. The noise (a truck) that triggered it could not possibly have been loud enough for long enough to cause damage, as I blocked the ear quite quickly, but somehow my ear didn’t like it. Maybe it was also from walking around on a windy day. I didn’t even get a bad T spike - only slightly elevated. But it is back to being reactive T, but my sound tolerance is still ok-ish. Getting a lot of head pain and jaw pains too.

I took the last of my prednisolone just in case, plus mag and NAC, vit c and zinc. The low end came back the following day and muffled hearing went away.

It’s possibly part of TTTS according this site:
http://www.dineenwestcottmoore.com.au/specialist-services/acoustic-shock#what-is-as
This explains it well.

No idea how to prevent it apart from keeping clear of unexpected loud noise (my unlikely dream scenario). I want to try TRT but not available where I am living currently.