I’ve decided to take a new approach and thought I’d share.
I’m work as a singer, and loud gigs finally caught up with me and I developed a mild tinnitus 2 years ago.
Since then I’ve been battling it. Have spent over £1000 on custom moulded pro earplugs, and must have tried every other type to reduce my noise exposure.
The result? Still my ears ring, and I believe have become more sensitive to noise through over-protection. Add to this the stress and depression about potentially losing my singing career.
Then I realised something, many of the situations I tried to protect my hearing in were not really very loud. Even my gigs, which are usually in care homes are not excessively loud. Or driving in the car with a window down. Loud but not excessive. I refused to believe these relatively ‘low volume’ situations were actually cause long more damage to my hearing. Yes they were spiking my tinnitus and my ears would ring afterwards.
So, my new solution is to STOP protecting my ears unless the sound level is dangerously high. So most of the time I plan to use no protection.
Yes I know my ears will ring more. However, the ring is going to be more constant. I believe this will plateau.
Then the magic thing can happen - HABITUATION!
Once the ring is at a constant level it getting worse and my hearing is not being damaged. I think I will learn to live with it. And ignore it.
Yes I wish it wasn’t there, but the brain is amazing and I think after a while I’ll just tune it out.
I feel better about it already in some ways. Now when I’m hearing the ring, I feel like encouraging it as if the more my brain hears it the closer I’ll get to ignoring it.
Hope this resonates with someone out there, and good luck with your own journey.
Written by
Fulltimemuso
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Well done mate. That's what it's all about; Habituation - it's a bitch getting the habit of it sometimes but stick with it. As a mate said to me: "The T can try and rule your head but it can't rule your life!".
This is my path too. Well done and feels like you are writing the words I had in my head without realising: habituation. I haven’t tried Lenire as I know I cannot commit to 2 x 30min sessions a day for 16 weeks. I struggle to remember to take my medecine for 3 consecutive days!
Triggers for me are lack of sleep, loud environment, alcohol and an extenuating day so that’s what I am concentrating on: getting back to sleep at 3am, ear protection on planes/trains/concerts, a glass of wine once in a while (and only 1), a rest after a long day.
I still have my “do not mess with me or else” days but learning to not react to them too much
HiI think this mirrors to a degree how I managed to move forward.
I had to stop trying to fight it I think. Early days I was constantly looking perhaps expecting a clear diagnosis and a fix of some degree
Getting past that and starting to live with it was significant. As part of that I went back to things like going to football and cycling and it was ok.
I agree with you about the brain. Human development has seen our noses grow prominent and the nose is now in our line of sight. That we can't see it is down to brain adapting.
The other thing is what is so great about the sound of silence! I never cared for too much of it before tinnitus and if I was cured tomorrow I'd still hold same.
Not in my case, I have been careful with loud noise over the years and my Tinnitus has gone much louder, it is know pretty brutal, although everyone's tinnitus is different. Anything over 85Decibels is considered as wear & tear on the hearing and future damage & even a recent report was advising over 70Decibels is also future risks. Tinnitus Spikes & louder ringing after noise is a sign of possible further damage. Over protecting the ears can also cause them to be extra sensitive to loud noise and easier damage & also you need periods of rest for the ears. I cannot get my brain to habituate to the louder tinnitus I have at the moment and it maybe a longer process, before that, I had tinnitus for 20+ years. You need to measure & monitor the sound environment, not over protect the ears, but, remember that too much loud noise also risks the tinnitus becoming a lot louder with more damage. I understand where you coming from and your future plan to ignore it, but, get a decibel meter and measure noise and you will see how loud somethings can get. I also used to do some singing recently in my own time and I think this extra loudness from it has caused further damage to my hearing & also my tinnitus. I thought my ears were safe and my tinnitus was not going to get any louder, but, maybe my screeching singing was the cause for my recent increase and damage & or it was natural ageing. I do know a lot of people that have carried on with loud noises and there tinnitus has increased. If you wear decent hearing protection that is custom moulded, it means you can hear proper sounds & it decreases the noise above certain levels, many DJ's & singers wear these all the time, they won't over protect the hearing either, but, it will protect the spikes in decibel levels and then keep your ears safer. Although, you mention you have tried custom moulded ear plugs, so I am not sure why these are not working for you as well as they maybe should. If the protection level in the ear plugs is too strong, then maybe, that can be an issue as well, as you can get them with just a little bit of decibel protection to a lot or maybe you need to look at another provider for ear plugs. Good Luck.
Thanks for all this input. The issue with the ear plugs is when you are singing it causes a loud booming voice effect. Alterations can be made to reduce this, but it's still a bit of an issue. I just have to use them when things get louder and then sing more quietly.
Good shout about the decibel meter though. Definitely going to grab one of these.
Iv done the same, but iv also done it with everything,food and drink etz, my son is in a band and iv been to some of his gigs, i do get nervous but iv not let it put me off, i do make sure i am not to close, its the only way to go to beat tinnitus ( good post )
I too have come to a decision to accept T and handle/deal with it without all the negative thoughts which quickly got me no where. Once I just accepted the new reality I was much happier. Thank you for your comment.
Living with it is certainly the way to go for most of us. However. Use your earplugs when it's at all loud. Gigs in care homes are probably louder than you think. Small space for one thing. Your hearing will deteriorate between noise and getting older 😂 which will happen if you're lucky. Protect those ears. They're already damaged, so while everyday noise is OK, other loud noises are not.
Yes generally the plan is to use protection when it's very loud. My precious instinct has been to use protection pretty much all the time, but I actually don't think it is working. I think it is making my ears more sensitive.
So, I think one way or another I'm going to have the tinnitus.
I think 85 decibels is when they suggest you start using protection if it's prolonged. Many things at that level don't last long - hairdryer, truck passing etc but I did wear protection for vacuum cleaning!
i relate to this , been deaf all my life now post 60yrs my tinnitus is ever more present after poor night sleep , following day always T is louder and makes hearing speech more difficult esp when no distracting background noise . i know there no cure , so i just try harder to mentally push out of my mind.
Hiya fulltimemusco. Can we have an update as to how's it going ? I'm 3 weeks into covid and my sensitivity to sound is getting worse. 15 min car journey with ear plugs causes major spikes. So once the covid inflammation dies down I'm going to try your approach I have to otherwise I may get housebound. My T is already very loud and I'm scared that all noise may make it worse as it's doing now. But I have to fight this. Any positive story will be helpful. Do your ears feel full and sore with noise exposure.
Firstly, I bought a calibrated (but low cost) sound Db Meter. I wanted to make sure I wasn;t exposing myself to anything too loud without realising.
Very interesting! Of course I know it's only a guide, but it was quite revealing.
So the loudest thing on my gigs is my voice (amplified OR acoustic!), which makes a lot of sense if you think about it. It has to cut through the music.
So if the music is ticking along at 70 - 75dB, my voice would take it easily over 85 - 90 db. It's actually helped my singing to control my voice volume and sing more consistently. By using a more controlled vocal technique I can just about keep things below 85dB for most of a care home gig. Often it's way down in the 70-75db range.
So generally, I'm starting the gigs with no ear plugs and trying to keep the volume controlled. Often as the gig progresses, the volume needs to come up. At this point of the sound level is going into the 85dB + range a lot I'll put in the custom earplugs. A bit of a relief and I try to sing in an even MORE controlled way to combat the 'occlusion/booming effect'.
Some gigs I will play on acoustic guitar and try to sing in a controlled way, not using earplugs. This can work, but even an acoustic guitar gig with a pick and lively songs can get to earplug volume. Easily.
Obviously my T is louder sometimes. After gigs. Also, I get more of the random worrying high pitched 'pings' that quickly fade. Apart from the pings I'd say the general T level hasn;t changed too much, and I am starting to ignore it more. I'm certainly less worried about it.
I can accept it will always be there, and even the 'pings' might always happen. Protecting my ears ALL THE TIME was not working so I think this is better. I'm enjoying the gigs again.
The sound meter was a good purchase! It gives a bit of confidence of how loud and damaging tings really are. It surprises you sometimes. For example, the car with the window down and radio on would easily be a constant 90db. Now I wear ear defenders if I'm on the motorway!
Anyway hope that helps anyone following this. All the best
You mean in a normal passenger plane? I'm not sure if it would quite get to that level. When I'm singing it's like there is a big boost of sound at that moment which takes the meter over the normal level.
If I'm honest, I find it hard to believe that me singing acoustically just at a moderate volume would be enough to create hearing damage. It would seem strange that our bodies had evolved to damage themselves when just operating in a normal range!
A few weeks in now, I would say the general background level of tinnitus has definitely gone up a bit but not too significantly. I'm hoping that if I can convince myself that sticking below about 85Db will be ok for my ears in the long run, I can then ditch the sound meter and relax a bit.
The aim is to habituate.
I'm getting a few 'pings' here and there which go quickly. However, last night I had a really weird one.
It was like a sudden low frequency fast pulsing sound. Almost like something was 'finger drumming' on my ear drum. just came out of nowhere, and never heard this (or anything like it) before. I'm hoping it was just a random thing not related to tinnitus. But does anyone have an info on this?
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