Momentary variations of hearing and pitch of tinnitus

[Hedgehog75]

Hi!

I’ve been suffering with tinnitus in a more severe form for just over a year now. My tinnitus is a loud high pitched tone which my brain says is coming from my left ear but I think it’s in the right as well. Difficult to tell!

Sometimes, however, I have brief moments where my hearing in one ear will suddenly feel like it’s gone muffled and the tone of the tinnitus drops to quite low. These beautiful seconds of respite happen few and far between and last very briefly. The blocked feeling disappears and the tone restores to its familiar high pitch. I wondered if anyone else experienced a similar thing?

🥰

[19marv19]

Hi Hedgehog, similar ish.Mine is definitely in both ears, but a lot more in my left too. Very high pitch.

Like a washing machine on the spin cycle, but at a very high tone.

It's like I can hear the high pitch in my right too, though it is doing a poor job a competing with my left.

Occasionally my hearing improves little in my left, often accompanied by pops or other noises.

When that happens the T does seem to lessen.

I hope you have some improvement soon. 🙂

[Threeminuteboy]

Yes I've had that , my left ear suddenly feels blocked or muffled , the T volume goes down and then a few seconds later the muffled sensation feels like it moves through my head to the other ear and goes . The volume of the T goes back up to its normal level .

[Rustreloaded in reply to Threeminuteboy]

Very similar to me in that the change feels as though it moves from my less affected right ear, through my head to my more affected left ear and then disappears, leaving me feeling a bit off balance for a second or two.

[Lefty51]

This is very much how T affects me, too. Mostly in the left ear (Hence Lefty51), but during and after periods of stress it can feel in the right ear as well. Normally a fairly high pitched hissing sound, but sometimes changes gear to a lower whistle for short periods. This has being going on for about 15 years now, but has more or less stabilised and I have pretty well habituated to it by now. Perhaps one day we'll find an effective treatment...!

[Cookie24 in reply to Lefty51]

How long did it take for Habituation? I Does habituate mean it doesn't bother you too much? I am new here and it is awful for me Sometimes puts me in a crying jag.

[Chumpiechops in reply to Cookie24]

I would say habituation doesn’t have a set time frame, I was diagnosed with T in June last year and while the first few months were pretty rough (anxiety and panic attacks) with the help of a wonderful doctor, and some low level anti depressants, I am in a much better place.

We all have different experiences of T, I hope you get the support you need 🙂

[Cookie24 in reply to Chumpiechops]

I am in the panic/anxiety place. I have two other medical conditions to deal with and nw this.

[Lefty51 in reply to Cookie24]

Hi Cookie - my T crept up on me over a few years, probably concurrent with having my ears de-waxed every 12 (-but now every 6) months. As it was a slow onset, I just got used to it as it developed. A couple of years ago, I saw a therapist who suggested keeping a T diary, which I did for 12 months. I gave the 'normative' level a numerical value of 5/10 and noted when it increased - sometimes up to 7 or 8/10 - and occasionally decreased to 4. Highly subjective, I know, but it helped me to recognise the normative level of 5/10 as something I had to live with. Now, the T doesn't bother me much during the day time, when there is usually enough background noise to mask it and, so far, has not been a problem with sleeping. I'm keeping my fingers crossed that the normative level doesn't get consistently above 5/10!!

[Cookie24 in reply to Lefty51]

Thank you.

[Hedgehog75 in reply to Cookie24]

I am so sorry to hear you feel very unhappy at the moment. I can sympathise but also know everyone’s journey with T is different.

There is such good advice in this forum so keep checking in. But you must trust that you will feel better. Talk to people on here and reach out to those you love. Acceptance of T is essential to moving on from the grief and anxiety. Once I accepted it was here to stay and that the cause was a mystery in my case, I could start to concentrate on not letting T completely take over.

In the early days I found a Tinnitus Sound Therapy/Tinnitus Retraining Therapy by Dr Hannah Liebig on Audible to be strangely helpful. Really weird collection of 7, hour long ‘music’ pieces that cover the T and sometimes made it like it wasn’t there. But everyone is different. Might be worth a go for some temporary relief.

I wish you all the best.

[Cookie24 in reply to Hedgehog75]

Thank you for your gentle words. Will you send a link for the sounds that you use?

[Hedgehog75 in reply to Cookie24]

I’m very sorry it took me so long to reply. I am finding it difficult to send a link from my Audible app but I am trying to send a screenshot of the collection so you can search for it.

[Hedgehog75 in reply to Hedgehog75]

I can’t get it to upload the photo!!

How are you anyway??

I’m having a horrible few days of the tinnitus. My husband even said to me the other day that I was very loud in conversation. I felt like I was struggling to be heard over the noise in my own head! Bonkers.

[Threeminuteboy in reply to Cookie24]

I’ve had it bad for two and half years but in the last six months I’ve got much better at ignoring it , so habituation can take any length of time I guess , the noise is always there but a lot of the time i’m not focusing on it so it feels like it’s gone down in volume . It’s a battle of the mind to train yourself not to react in a bad way to it .

[Kellythecat-74 in reply to Threeminuteboy]

my first T started 20 years ago. not sure how long it took to habituate ,but definitely the last 15 years I can honestly say it was so quiet I hardly ever noticed it . This new one or old one made louder caused by atorvastatin , hopefully will go the same way.

[Rustreloaded]

Yes I get momentary changes although not very often, maybe two or three times a month, sometimes even less, I have a high pitch constant whine in my left ear, when the tinnitus first started suddenly it took me a while to place where the sound was coming from, at times it felt like it was coming from the middle of my head. However since the sound seems to have settled in my left ear for the past few years I occasionally get a sensation as much as a sound which originates in my right ear, it sounds like a rushing of pressure, leaving a hollow feeling behind it and moving from my right ear o the left and leaves me with a brief feeling of being off balance. This is going to sound crazy but the nearest way I can describe it as an auditory sensation is that bit at the end of the Have A Cigar track on Pink Floyd's Wish You Were Here album.

[Hedgehog75 in reply to Rustreloaded]

I just listened to the track to understand what you mean! 😄 I get it 👍🏻. Thank you for your story.

[Kellythecat-74]

I know my T is only in one ear , but if it gets a bit louder it seems like its both ears .