What Happens If You Plug the Good Ear and Only Use the Ear with Tinnitus?

What happens if you close the good ear with an earplug and only use the affected ear?

How good or bad of an idea is that.

I'm asking because I want to try it out but I don't know how dangerous it could be.

 

Bad idea because you are going to alter the ear pressure plugging just one ear.

 

Unilateral tinnitus can be a challenge.

Terrible idea to only plug one ear. The tinnitus will get worse in the bad ear if exposed. I am also quite protective of my good ear as I need to take really good care of that one too!

 

What's the purpose of doing that?

 

I did an experiment yesterday plugging both ears on their own to see how the other hears and feels things.

The good ear was normal but the other ear was hearing high frequencies sharply and lower frequencies a bit lower. But my face was also anticipating pain before it was happening.

I don't know much about this whole matter so I appreciate the answers so far, but I feel like mentally my ear has gotten used to annoying sounds to why it may have become muffled a lot of time.

I was thinking of facing the fear and making the ear stop fearing the sounds on its own without the other ear making me aware of the differences all the time. When I plug the good ear, the bad ear just sounds normal compared to when both ears are used where the bad ear feels bad.

Also strangely I feel no pressure whatsoever when the good ear is plugged. My ear feels incredibly uneasy when both ears are open but when the good one's closed it doesn't get to that stage of feeling pressure in the ear jaw at all.

Things stay sorta normal beside from the ear clearly hearing audio more distorted.

Thoughts?

 

I would plug both when indicated due to loud noises for protection and comfort, or neither.

You may also want to try musician ear plugs rather than the foam for lower noise exposures which may be more comfortable than what you are describing with nothing in, or the foa that is accentuating the symptoms in some respects.

 

I had T only in one ear, and I did the opposite. I wore an earplug in my bad ear, and didn't wear it in my good ear. Nine months after the onset of my T, T spread to the good ear too. I have no idea whether the fact that I would normally not have an earplug in that ear had anything to do with it.

I didn't find this to be a problem.

 

Even though one can hear people talking when one has earplugs in, sometimes one has to ask people to repeat themselves. It is easier to talk to people when you don't have an earplug in at least one of your ears.

 

Plugging the affected ear is like giving into the fear. Maybe that's why it shifted from one ear to the other. I mean think about this. You plugged the bad ear and it shifted to the other without there being a real physical or environmential cause ie loud noises. Imo this makes it clear that it is a mental condition that makes the ears behave in strange ways.

My findings lately have made me realize that everytime I base my actions on fear it tends to get worse. I work in construction as I remember telling you some time ago, and after days where im working really concentrated and focussed on my work, with protection I gotta say, I have sometimes felt like the tinnitus and hyperacusis had completely dissapeared. It is like me being without any awareness of myself throughout the many hours of work causes my ears to lose their tense.

So i've plugged my good ears for a day and a half and I thought i'd share some things I've noticed. I have been listening to sound regularly today on regular volumes. In the beginning I was very cautious about everything because my ears didn't like many of the sounds. Think about simple things like closing kitchen doors etc. So I was gaming with one ear tonight and the affected ear got muffled like crazy, i'm thinking because subconsiously my mind/ear still wants to have none of it. I find this quite interesting because I know the ear does it out of protection, but the volume (db) of the sound is far from damaging so there's definitely something mental at play here. Well not finished. After the ears opened up once I let it rest for half an hour, everything I did which involved what i'd usually consider as annoying sounds started to sound perfectly natural now. Closing the kitchen door without my mind even thinking anything and the loud noise of it didn't affect me at all now. It's like I stretched the tolerance boundary or something. I don't wanna say too much right now i'm gonna keep going and let ya'll know how this goes. I'll keep going like this for the next couple of days.

 

I paid attention to every case where T spreads to the healthy ear that was described on this forum. It is actually pretty common for this to happen. There is even a medical explanation. I don't remember the details, but basically this is consistent with the fact that T is made by neurons in the brain.

It sounds like you are suffering from hyperacusis.

It is a good idea to listen to your own body and learn from your experiences and to act accordingly. Having said that, I hope you increase the noise level very gradually. This way if you end up harming yourself, the harm will be minimal. Please share with us how your experiment turns out.

 

That's what I meant to say..

 

When I plug my good ear, it will make the low drone sound afterwards, drone goes away after sleep.

 

Did yours also eventually spread to the good ear?

 

I just found out something again from this whole one ear thing.

I'm listening to a music track that sounds different in both ears. In the bad ear I hear a soft high pitched chime bell kind of melody. Its soft but I hear it really clearly. So I turned it to the good ear and I don't hear it at all unless I REALLY do my best in paying attention. It's like both ears have totally different equalizations? Is that the word? Anyone experience the same?

I find this so strange. Clearly the ear is on a whole different focus or something. It would be like thinking your blind while actually not being able to focus on things the proper way. I really wonder if this can be changed.

I will say that when I started listening the track I was feeling a harsh/sharp pain. I decided to keep it on instead of giving into the fear and now it doesnt sound painful anymore but I do hear it clearly in the foreground. It should be in the background like with the other ear. I wonder how this can be done

 

I always thought that t will eventually spread to both ears in time, mine did after 3 months, previous to that i only had t in my right ear. Does anyone know anybody who has had t in one ear only for 10 + years?

 

You should plug both of your ears when you expose them to levels of noise that might aggravate your tinnitus.

I had unilateral tinnitus in my left ear (or tinnitus in my right ear was very mild to the point I didn't hear it in quiet rooms).
It has spread to other ear since then. I suspect it might be from additional noise exposures (MRI, train ride and hairdryer - all within safe OSHA guidelines).
After each exposure tinnitus in left ear came back down (somewhat), but tinnitus in right ear only kept on increasing. Right now when I'm in silence it feels like hissing in my right ear is louder than in my left ear.
I have perfect audiogram up to 16000 hz in my right ear and perfect OAE and DPOAE in both ears.
I'm not sure why tinnitus in other ear is increasing.

@Bill Bauer

 

I think it is easier for your hearing to worsen with the use of just one earplug, or covering one ear when noise is around. It's maybe a matter of balance, pressure, or has to do with the electrical transmission of sound from the cochlea and throught the hearing nerve. You can experience more h, fluctuating t, more pressure, etc

I dont recommend using earplugs in just one ear.

 

Well after a couple of days I can definitely say that this doesn't work. It also ain't damaging thankfully so it was a nice experiment. It is a good way of getting your mind off the condition and making you feel like the ear is in a normal condition. That helps in some sort of strange way.

 

Thanks for the followup. Ear protection for both ears, or neither does make the most sense.

 

if you wear hearing protection in only one ear, does that make the other ear more prone to damage by disabling the unprotected ear's natural mechanism to protect itself? Or can the ears judge dangerous sounds independently?

In other words, If you only have one earplug in a loud environment, is it better to have no hearing protection or at least one ear protected?