I don’t often post as I had learnt to habituate fairly successfully. However, I went to a party on Saturday and since then the ringing has been loud and constant.
As if learnt to habituate I forgot about bringing my sound mufflers. Although it was a little difficult to hear people talking it wasn’t impossible and it didn’t seem to loud on the dance floor.
Has anybody else had a similar experience and if so:
1. have I made my ears worse?
2. will they return to their usual levels ie varies from low to moderate?
Any help much appreciated.
Luverly Lucie x
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LuverlyLucie
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Hi Ingrid. I’ve not heard of that before. I’ve always found loud sounds made it worse. I wore my masker on Sunday and had it at the highest level but that seemed to make it worse.
Weirdly Monday was a good day so maybe that was a delayed reaction to the masker. LLx
When using white noise generator/s previously known as a masker. The volume should be kept slightly below the tinnitus and not mask or cover it up. Any attempt to do this is usually not successful and you risk making your tinnitus worse. Masking tinnitus will usually make habituation more difficult, because the brain cannot habituate to tinnitus unless it can hear it.
Hearing Therapists and Audiologists that practice tinnitus treatment and management with tinnitus patients, advise that white noise generators, known as "sound enrichment". Their volume should be kept slightly below the tinnitus.
All the best.
Michael
The symptoms you describe Lucie are not uncommon for I have corresponded with many people that have habituated, and noticed their tinnitus has "spiked" after attending a venue where loud music has been played. This can happen with or without wearing "noise reducing" earplugs or other forms of hearing protection.
If external sound is loud enough it can pass through the head/skull and reach the inner ear and irritate the cochlea and spike the tinnitus. It is for this reason I advise anyone that has noise induced tinnitus, not to use headphones even at low volume.
Hopefully your tinnitus will return to previous level. Please keep in mind this is a warning that your auditory system doesn't like being exposed to loud sounds. If you are not careful, this could happen again and your tinnitus may not return to its previous baseline level. Sorry to sound so sobering but I have a lot of experience dealing with people with noise induced tinnitus. My tinnitus was noise induced.
Please read the post below and I hope you find it of some help.
I wish you well .
Michael
Tinnitus, earplugs and nightclubs.
Someone that has tinnitus I believe they should try and live a normal life as they possibly can. This includes going out to clubs, concerts and other venues of entertainment where music is played if they wish to. For some, tinnitus can be difficult to live with without putting further restrictions on their life. However, I also believe taking the necessary precautions is absolutely vital, in preventing noise trauma to the inner ear, which could make the tinnitus louder and more intrusive.
Unfortunately, in some instances a person can be left in a hit or a miss situation, as there is no way of knowing if they have put themselves in harms way until after enjoying a night out, find their tinnitus has become louder and more intrusive over the coming days. One hopes this will be a temporary spike but there is no guarantee this new level of intensity won’t become permanent and could require a visit to ENT.
One way of protecting the inner ear from loud sounds is to wear noise-reducing earplugs when going to nightclubs or concerts. They will reduce external sounds, in this case music and fortunately won’t impair sound quality, which is so important to most people attending these venues. The earplugs are available in various degrees of attenuation from as little as 9 decibels right up to 25 and even higher. If money is no object, one can buy custom moulded earplugs with the full knowledge they are getting the best ear protection that they can afford.
A word of caution to anyone that might not be in the know. I believe no level of ear protection is one hundred percent safe; so one still needs to be careful when attending nightclubs and concerts and not get carried away in thinking, wearing earplugs is completely safe so anything goes and you can stand next to the speakers all night or right up near to the stage where the music is booming out. Some people might not be aware, if music is loud enough it can still be transferred to the inner ear and reach the cochlear and cause damage via the Mastoid bone.
This is a hard piece of bone behind each ear. It is honeycombed and has air pockets within it. Please don’t think that it’s only midrange and high frequencies that can cause harm. Low bass frequencies, which cause vibrations, will do the same.
Go out and enjoy yourself and have fun but at the same time be prudent and respect your hearing.
Hi luverlylucie every time I have an afternoon or evening out the next day I wake up to loud tinnitus noises and these remain with me all of that day and sometimes the following day too. When I’m in a noisy atmosphere like in a pub and whether music is playing or not I’m distracted from my tinnitus noises. It is only when I wake up alone in a quiet bedroom that I hear the tinnitus noises at their worst. However, the next day or the following day after that the tinnitus usually calms down again. I keep records of when my tinnitus is bad and often this occurs 4 or 5 times weekly. So you are not alone in experiencing loud noises the day after a night out.
This happens to me too. After attending an event which can be wonderfully distracting with things to look at and think about, I sometimes get spikes that last 3 - 4 days. Although I've come to expect it, I'm trying not to let tinnitus control my life and putting me off from the events I enjoy attending. I hope it settles down for you.
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