new here

[Jb2309]

Hi everyone, I was signposted to this group by my GP so just sighed up. My T started after having covid. I was diagnosed with long covid this year which has been terribly life altering. I Have not been able to return to my job as a nurse which is sad. I suddenly developed tinnitus in just one ear earlier this year, which is very difficult on top the chronic fatigue I suffer with. Maybe a trauma response causes it as I had been very unwell with Covid leading up to it starting. Is anyone here only experience T in the one ear? I’ve never experienced T before and it’s been really anxiety provoking as it affects you when you try to sleep. I hope everyone is doing ok today and coping

[Happyrosie]

hello Jb and welcome to a place where no-one wants to be.

Before I go any further, I need to say that tinnitus is very common and many people just treat it as part of life. and those who have been helped here on this forum may not check in here again as they don’t need to, and indeed doing so might remind them of something they’d prefer to forget.

There are many ways of dealing with T - but NO cures. If you delve deep into the internet you will find lots of people wanting to sell you things. Resist them!

My advice to you would be to browse the website of Tinnitus UK. It’s full of information. Some things suit some people other things suit others … but breathing techniques are simple to do and may be very effective in helping with the anxiety that T loves to cause.

you might like to look through posts here for help, too.

Other posters may put their own take on things.

[perlcoder]

Hello Jb

I won't repeat Happyrosie's excellent advice in different words, but in answer to your question I can say that I have had T for more than 20 years and that it predominantly in my left ear, in which I have hearing loss. I say predominantly because (without pretending to understand the details), it is my experience that our hearing system is such that there is usually an element of crosstalk between the ears so that a sound is seldom exclusively anchored only in one. In my case, for example, I use the masker included with my hearing aid (I only have an aid in that left ear), and it often happens that when the masker is switched on the T shifts to the other ear - but usually as a quieter version of itself. Similarly, I am a side sleeper and do prefer to sleep on my left side - if I wake in the night the T will in all probability be entirely in the right.

Best wishes.

[Cookie24 in reply to perlcoder]

Does the masker help? I have a high pitched eeeee sound in right ear only.

[perlcoder in reply to Cookie24]

It certainly helps me, as always with T I know of other people who have not found maskers useful.

I have had the hearing aid for about 7 years now. I will say that during that time my T has gone from being a hiss that could be closely matched by the masker (tuned by my audiologist), to a variety of sounds of different frequencies - not all at once, but varying during the day and night. The masker no longer covers them all - it is miles from some - but I am used to it as a sort of comfort blanket. When it is on, I can, as it were, choose to listen to it rather than to whatever my T is doing at the time, and this helps. Nothing is perfect, it surely is not a cure, but it is a valuable weapon in my armoury.

I am due for a hearing test after Christmas because I am sure that my hearing (particularly in the T-affected left ear), is deteriorating. I may consider one of the aids that allow the user to vary the masking, rather than relying on the audiologist. I will look into the options.

[Cookie24 in reply to perlcoder]

Thanks for your response

[doglover1973]

Hi  Jb2309 Welcome to the forum 🙂

I've got post viral fatigue - like you - though I got it long before Covid. Initially I had T in just one ear too. An ENT specialist told me the same virus may be the cause of post viral fatigue and T . So it's likely your T is all part and parcel of long C.

It's not easy managing chronic fatigue and T together because keeping busy all the time isn't possible. The key for me is relaxation. Try to relax as much as you can. This will calm T down.

I hope you feel better in the long run. Take it very steady.

[Kellythecat-74]

Hi Jb2309, I also have T only in my left ear . Sometimes it seems like both ears when it’s very high , but I know it’s not both . I use an earphone on a talk program just for that ear .I try and keep it low level . It does help . My theory was that if I could ignore the voices , then my ear could ignore the noise ( habituation) , it hasn’t worked yet . However I can get through the day fairly easily . Night is harder, maybe because we aren’t busy doing other things and we are winding down . I do keep a radio on all night ,and use an earbud in that one ear . It seems to work ok for me .

Maybe 24/7 voices all day and night stops habituation , but hate having to listen to the high pitch screech all day and night .

[Seabob]

Hi - am sorry to read you're having to deal with this, it's incredibly hard, please get it checked out at Ent, my T started a few months ago but I had ear pain four years ago, just diagnosed with TMJD - I had an MRI and CT scan as I have aura migraines, nothing untoward showed up but the CT showed the problem, can I recommend Julian Cowan Hill on You Tube he is a voice of calm and very helpful as he experienced T himself, I am still dealing with the stress of T but understand like any new condition it takes time and there are things we can do, another recommendation is not to go on forums where you will find a lot of negativity, I did and it really scared me and put me in a very low place, reach out to positive forums (like here), all the best to you X

[Cookie24 in reply to Seabob]

Agree with you about forums. When I first got tinnitus some forums scared me.

[Seabob in reply to Cookie24]

Exactly, for me i was desperately looking for help - some of these forums have posts that are years old, most people unfortunately don't post when they are either recovered or dealing with things better as they obviously have moved on.,i got myself in a very negative frame of mind and you need as much positivity as possible around you.

[AussieHeart]

In early 2020 I experienced weird symptoms which looking back could have been COVID. It was too early then to be tested. I ended up being dx with atrial fibrillation a year later but prior to that an audiologist test showed some hearing loss in my right ear. She thought it may be Ménière's disease but didn’t refer me to an ENT due to AF finding (those weird symptoms were put down to heart-related). So for almost four years my pulsatile tinnitus remains, sigh. My GP won’t even discuss this ongoing issue with me. My advice is to be proactive when this condition first hits and get to an ENT. Run from audiologists

[Bellyboo in reply to AussieHeart]

Hello. As a 40 year T sufferer I concur with running away from most private audiologists….use the NHS but prepair to wait