I've now had tinnitus for six weeks. It's very high pitched (like one of those sonic cat scarers) and sounds like it's in my head rather than in my ears. I've also had on and off daily headaches for nine weeks. Been to the docs and she doesn't care - said the headaches and tinnitus weren't related. Just looked in my ears and said they were fine. That was it.
I'm hoping this isn't permanent - please give me some hope? It's constant (and wakes me up at night) but does change volume. I've also had it ring in one ear at the same time it's ringing in my head but that lasts only seconds, thank god, then disappears, but the head ringing remains. It's also two tone in my head - the screamy sonic one, which is intolerable, and a low one which I can ignore.
No idea what's caused this, other than we had a shock bereavement in the family back in September, so I've been stressed. Please please tell me this sounds like it's not permanent. Sometimes it's so loud it's like I can feel it in the back of my throat.
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guineapig10
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Hello guineapig10 Welcome to the forum. I'm sorry for your loss. Any kind of trauma can trigger tinnitus and may account for the headaches too.
The first step is to ask your GP for a referral to ENT. They can investigate the problem for you. The second step may be to have counselling to help you process your loss. The third step is to relax as much as possible. If you can keep calm there's a much better chance that T will settle too.
Whether your T will go away I don't know. The best thing to do is take one day at a time. Please know things almost always get better.
Thanks. My GP doesn't care. She just shrugs her shoulders and says they can't do anything about tinnitus (which I know, but I'd like to find out if there is an underlying cause!) and about the headaches all she's said is 'it's probably nothing.' I've put in a complaint.
Generally speaking GPs don't know what to do. All you need is a referral or - if you can afford it - pay £195 to see a private ENT. They can then refer you back to audiology at your local hospital where everything else will be free. This is the best place to access help with tinnitus.
Just adding to, and agreeing entirely, with all that doglover1973 has said :
(1) Apart from the headaches, the onset of your T is entirely typical. In the absence of physical trauma, it appears from nowhere and without explanation. Recent emotional stress is often present and is thought often to play a part, but there is no necessary connection. The miserable, barren, game of "What brought this on? What did I do?" is one that most of us play. I have a particular grudge against a pair of wonderfully loud Wharfedale headphones the size of pudding bowls combined, with Emerson Lake & Palmer in the days before we took the care of our hearing that we should, but it could be something(s) else entirely. If the recommended consultation with an ENT plus any tests does not reveal a cause (which it rarely it does), nothing will.
(2) Multiple tone, multiple location, multiple perceived volume, T is also common. Mine is definitely related to hearing loss. I have had it for almost 24 years now. It began as a hiss in that ear, but it can jump sides, seem to be central, on the top of my head or at the base of my neck. Hissing, ringing, air-brakes, jet engines, welding torches, are all common amongst sufferers, and I have some of them. Other people have only one. For me, this game of hide and seek is at its worst in the night or any other quiet environment. Its only significance is that my brain is trying to make sense of my hearing loss, and to warn me of dangers that do not exist in the real world. It can also cease entirely for a day at a time - even now - particularly if my concentration had been focused elsewhere.
I mention all of the above, not to scare you, but (I hope), to help you understand that whatever you hear is not unusual, not fatal, and not dissimilar to what very many of us encounter and learn to live with (24 years and counting ....). Try to relax, take lessons in it, find a better doctor if you can, and your T is still sufficiently recent that it may resolve naturally if you can manage (I know how terribly hard it is), not to obsess over it.
Thanks. Definitely need to find a better doctor somehow, mine is awful. Don't think there's anything wrong with my hearing (I'm 40) but willing to get a hearing test to rule it out.
You are welcome - and I believe that there is good research to support the idea that T can be caused, and certainly exacerbated, by the decline in hearing higher frequencies that most people don't even miss in daily life.
Best to assume the high pitched animal deterrent noise isn't going away soon. So, I recommend you put in something to 'get away from it' at sometime during your day, at least at home. Wireless headphones has done it for me. If you need any advice about that, click on my username. You'll find a post from me regarding how to go about it.
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