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[Gloomster]

I first posted here about a month ago, after 8 quiet years my dormant tinnitus roared back into life , I can only guess why. Devastated though I was, at least I was fairly well informed. I tried to do the the right things, accept the noise, stay positive, avoid midnights panics, and after only a few weeks I was congratulating myself on how far I had come.

I was sleeping , able to concentrate and in any few days the times when I was really miserable were , I felt , reducing . I was starting to think about other things far more ....and then

Again I don't really no why but it got worse, about a week ago .Right now I am at the end of my second day of a howling gale whirling around my head. I know the only answer is to go back to the plan keep going and eventually it will get easier but right now I feel so low

So recovery will not be as easy as I thought and it seems it will not be a straight line either. I still have hope and determination but sometimes its so hard

May seem a bit pointless posting thusly but helps me a bit

Salutations

[Chocolate135]

Hi.. Sorry about that but have you tried any of the new Tinnitus masking videos? I think I told you about 'Tinnitus Scrubbing" and "Tinnitus Sound Therapy".. but there are now new ones like "Tinnitus Descender'... even "Tinnitus Crickets"..My Tinnitus also comes and goes. It's louder now but sure it will get better like yours will..

Meanwhile the videos help and other "outside noises"..

[Gloomster]

Thanks ,,,....today not quite so bad - I try all sorts of sounds , I cant actually mask it it would have to be so loud it would be dangerous .I have babbling brooks and what not, on in the day when I work at home. Helps a bit maybe but not a great deal

Time and retraining are where I put my hopes I have been referred for Cognitive therapy and I hope if I keep going and trying, a year form now things will be as lot better

I`m sure they will be

[Persevere99 in reply to Gloomster]

Hi gloomster

Sorry to hear you’re going through a rough patch.

I ‘had T’ for many years, had to take benzos to sleep.

Then, 5 years ago, I finally realised that if you concentrate entirely on anything bad, T for example, for sure it’ll seem like the end of the world.

So, I started thinking about others and the far worse problems they had to face.

And, slowly, the rating I formerly gave my T fell from 50 to Zero and No benzos now for many years.

Please see my own T post for the detail.

All the best

Persevere99

[doglover1973]

Hi G. I agree. Recovery isn't a straight line. It can be very up & down. I was feeling better over the summer but the Autumn has been a struggle so far . It's not easy - as you say. One of the things that helped me was CBT . I still draw on the things I learned over a year ago. It sounds as you're waiting for a referral at the moment. The waits can be long. If you have the means it might be worth going private.

[AldoArgentina]

Hello! I had very loud T for years, with extremely crazy spikes with suicidal thoughts! I began to search frantically on the web because science does not give me any answer.

If you TRY ALL of this, I'm sure in two or three month you’ll be much better!!

1.- Mother tincture of Passinflower plant at night, but you don,t have to take medicine for sleep! 

2.- Magnesium L-Threonate (only this Magnesium works well with T.) in the morning and five hours before sleep.

3.- GABA with Gingko Biloba and L-Theanine before breakfast.

4.- Control your blood pressure and detects if you snore or have cervical problems.

5.- Protect your inner ear all the time you can!

Keep in touch and best wishes!!

[Gloomster]

My GP assured me the wait was not that bad actually ( to my surprise)- I cant really justify private help at the astonishing cost I have seen

[doglover1973 in reply to Gloomster]

That's good news G. I paid for 6 half hour sessions @£22.50 each . It was well worth it for me. The hospital services here are so slow. I would still be waiting.

[Gloomster in reply to doglover1973]

That seems incredibly cheap , I thought it was vastly more than that ?

[doglover1973 in reply to Gloomster]

It was at a health centre. There were lots of alternative therapies. I chose CBT because people on the forum spoke highly of it. . The counsellor usually did it by the hour (£45) but I asked if he would do half hours . It was ideal for me. You could check out BACP for a counsellor local to you.

[Ravks]

Hey Gloomster,

Sorry for what your going through.

I don't have much advice as I have recently started my journey with T and finding my way with it. I do listen to meditations, frequencies and sounds of water flowing which help. The rest I am trying to remain positive have a baby that depends on me to remain sane, feed her, take care of her etc .

You are not alone, should you need to talk we are here 💜😊 x

[surreycccfan]

Hi, sorry to hear you have had spikes and your post is not pointless, this forum is also for empathetic support and many of us have felt like you do, so well done for posting. I totally agree that it is not a straight line. I know when I had spikes and/or set backs I actually used this understanding to help me cope, I know it sounds odd. I think it is very easy to catastrophise and feel like we are back to the start of our journey with our T when these type of events happen. However, after the first couple of spikes I realised that this path to living well is not linear and straight. This helped me reframe and see that yes I had a set back but this had happened before and it did get better, I know it doesn't feel like this when the spike is happening but this type of reframing helped me reduce the feelings of anxiety and helped my low mood. I would use APPLE CBT model to help me reframe plus I would always use a mantra of 'this will pass, it has before and it will again' to help calm my nervous system and emotional reaction. I hope your T calms down soon. Stay safe

[Gloomster in reply to surreycccfan]

I do something a little bit like that in fact I have growing collection of phrases that help a bit

There is no noise its just nerve disturbance , its not the noise its the reaction and that will get better

In 6 months however it feels now it will be bothering me less

[Fridays_Child_62]

I think we have established in the past that there are similarities in our experiences of tinnitus. Mine was manageable for about 25 years, apart from the occasional short spikey period, but at the start of this year it stepped up and hasn't come down again. I say hasn't come down but it is variable on a number of different timescales. It varies within a day but more notably it varies from day to day, usually alternating in texture between screeching and hissing. But I also find that it varies on a timescale of days or weeks - so I can go a few days when it's not so bothersome and I don't think about it so much and then it becomes aggressive and intrusive again for a few days. So I think you may be going through the same kinds of variations.

There is a tinnitus reduction technique that is well-known on the Internet and you can find Youtube videos for - it involves flicking the back of your head with your fingers. It might actually work but is temporary relief. I find that I can achieve the same effect by making clicking or clucking noises with my tongue. I'm not sure why this works. Perhaps it's something to do with the brain receiving sound via bone-conduction rather than the ears. Or perhaps it's just the nature of the sound - generally short, sharp sounds like birds tweeting or a loud ticking-clock can ease my tinnitus, although I'm not sure why.

[Gloomster in reply to Fridays_Child_62]

Hallo Friday`s child very kind of you to post , yes that does sound a lot like mine ( uncannily you might say ). I discovered the other day that doing progressive muscle relaxation and sounds therapy for a 15 mins or so actually get an apparent noise reduction and certainly helps calm

I am sorry if I didn't notice before but I am fascinated to hear that someone has an experience so like mine the noise you describe sounds similar and I also fret about cycles of up and down. I get very low when I think I am due a good day and it does not arrive

Sometimes its just the obvious ..I watched England beat Senegal last night and just for once all my boys were at home ( I have three teenagers ) and just being all together was such a happy feeling my T didn't bother me at all . At other times,......its not so good but just doing something you like doing helps .

[Fridays_Child_62 in reply to Gloomster]

Sometimes I am expecting a good day but I get two bad days in a row. But it can also work the other way and I get two good days in a row. I read in a book about tinnitus that such cycles are quite common, although I hadn't really experienced them until this year. About three years ago, I had a rough period and I think there was some periodicity then too, but that subsided after a few months. It hasn't this time though.

You being fairly oblivious to your T while watching the football with your sons is probably because of the distraction. Part of the problem is the brain homing in on the T and fretting about it - our emotional response. However, my T reacts to sound, so I may not have been so good in that situation. Having said that, I had an interesting experience recently while having lunch with my sister in a cafe. While waiting for the food, the cafe seemed very loud with people talking and my T was up - I think this was a spot of hyperacusis. After eating, the noise is the cafe didn't bother me and my T reduced. I don't know whether this was due to the distraction of the food or that the food somehow calmed my T (and hyperacusis). I have known this before, although sometimes eating can increase my T. It's all very difficult to make sense of.

[Gloomster]

Sometimes I am expecting a good day but I get two bad days in a row.

Me too.