Anyone dealing with tinnitus ?

[TommyS]

While we're on the subject of physical ailments, any thoughts on avoiding or coping with it.

[DulceLabs.com]

Hey I got that too. Sometimes is loud, sometimes quiet - sometimes not there at all. You notice is most when it's real quiet - I always keep a fan going or something to mask it. I also use the Sleepmaker app to generate rain noise from my iPhone as I fall asleep so the ringing isn't as noticeable. Yoga or relaxation exercises may help.

[OB Dave]

I think I see what the problem is.

 

http://www.oceanbeach.com/temp/tinnitus.png

[opdigits]

I have it to varying degrees (though ever present) and the way I cope with it is by not paying attention to it. I know that sounds counter intuitive, but it's what works for me. IOW, if I'm not paying attention to it I seem to cease noticing it is there.

[Joe Muscara]

How about not talking about it and reminding me???

 

http://blue-funk.com/NonBandPictures/smileys/wall.gif

[Joe Muscara]

In all seriousness, this has been discussed here before. Link for your reference.

[wmp]

I think I see what the problem is.

 

http://www.oceanbeach.com/temp/tinnitus.png

 

 

Nope. The rest of me is pretty beat up but the ears are still in good shape.

[TommyS]

Thanks for the link Joe.

[Brettymike]

I have found a ton of people have got it (muso or not) to varying degrees.

I happen to know it's not from loud noise.

Mine is subtle and changes in "loudness" from day to day.

 

Brett.

[DulceLabs.com]

I have found a ton of people have got it (muso or not) to varying degrees.

I happen to know it's not from loud noise.

 

Mine started after a slip and fall where I hit my head (would also explain a lot of other anomalous behavior, but let's not go there )

 

Anywho, loud noise CAN cause tinnitus, but there are many other causes. It is a very common affliction: Even Uncle Leo has it.

[video:youtube]

[JimboK]

Doesn't everyone have it?!? Proximity to drummers alone dictates it right?

 

[Daniel Heslop]

Ten years ago this coming September 10th, I lost 90% of the hearing in my left ear, and I have constant tinnitus, and somewhat random bouts of vertigo ever since.

 

It seems to have been a virus that did it.

 

I did have a few periods of about three days of bad tinnitus and hearing loss over a period of around six months, and then it would clear up. I went to my doctor but he seemed to think it was nothing.

On Sept 10th, 2003 I was teaching in my home as usual. I warned my first couple students my hearing was a bit messed today. By 4:30 I had a student having her first drum lesson, and I couldn't complete the lesson because my hearing was pretty much gone and I started getting dizzy. By the next morning I couldn't walk and keeping food down was a challenge. I would sit looking at the TV not wanting to move my head or things would spin for the next 5 minutes.

That lasted for about 2 weeks.

 

My doctor sent me to a specialist right away who put me on Prednisone for 6 weeks and told me that in most cases it clears up, but in a significant number of cases it does not, and in some cases it goes to both ears.

 

By far the worst part was the vertigo. I'm not thrilled with hearing loss or tinnitus, but my world spinning constantly was absolutely the worst experience of my life.

The worse thing about the hearing loss itself at first was the loss of direction in sound, and the inability to separate sounds, so learning songs for students was a night mare at first. I had to wear headphones to learn guitar parts.

 

I also had pitch trouble, because what I could hear in my left ear had altered pitch. I will never ever forget my audiologist putting me in the booth, and speaking to me only in my left ear. She sounded very much like Darth Vader. It was absolutely surreal!!

It took about a year to settle down. Now what I hear in that ear is ok pitch wise, but it sounds like everything is underwater.

 

I do wear a hearing aid when I go out and for teaching, and I think it helps a bit with the tinnitus simply because other sounds are louder and sort of drown the hissing out. I gotta be honest though...I hate my hearing aid.

The closest analogy of how it works I could give is this:

Suppose you have really bad eyesight, and you are in a dark room.

Suddenly the lights are turned on, but you still have bad vision.

With the hearing aid I get a bit of a sense of direction in my hearing, but I still cannot make out any details with that ear.

 

Back to the tinnitus, for me it usually sounds like white noise though there is a high pitch in there as well. I have a feeling that because I am basically deaf in that ear, and it also sends bad information about balance, my brain pays very little attention to it. So for the most part I don't think about the tinnitus, but it is constant.

I noticed last year I also have it in my right ear now, but much much quieter, and I'm not sure it is constant. I think many people develop it as they age, and that is likely what is going on.

 

Over all I'm pretty used to it now though, and I only think about it when it is especially bad.

I do know certain things make it worse though:

Stress, being over tired, alcohol, some pain meds, physical activity, loud or high pitched sound.

 

[Throbert]

I remember when I was a kid and asking my parents, when ever your in a very quiet place can you hear a very faint and really high pitched squeal. They would ask, what's wrong with you, so I ignored it since it was pretty much silent. These days it's quite a bit louder but still doesn't bother me all that much.

[Bosendorphen]

Ten years ago this coming September 10th, I lost 90% of the hearing in my left ear, and I have constant tinnitus, and somewhat random bouts of vertigo ever since.

Oh my! My sympathies, Shutoku! The vertigo would be indeed terrible (I only had it once when water was trapped inside my ear canal for a little while - awful). I can't imagine having it for long.

 

I've heard about a virus causing hearing loss; I believe that happened to Phil Collins. That too is scary; I've lost my sense of smell/taste for a good year or two because of a virus but not hearing, knock on wood.

 

Hope things continue to improve for you!

[David Loving]

between firearms and loud PAs, my ears are ringing right now. I just accept it

[Michael W]

I have a constant very, very high pitched sound in both ears. It is many octaves above the highest piano notes, so high that I cannot identify it as a particular pitch. It is way up there, near the border of human hearing, I'd guess. But it is there, and it is constant, and it is noticeable. But it is not something I would describe as "ringing," so I've never been certain that it is typical tinnitus.

 

[MushMusic]

It's that waterfall sound. If you find yourself needing to have the fan running all night when it's 40 degrees, in order to not go mad from the sounds in your head, I got news for you.

 

Could be from my voicing high pressure tuba magnas, harmonic trumpets and full length 16 foot bombards all those years. But I loved every minute of that.

 

Ok, getting burn ins from loser wannabe guitar gods, that wasn't worth it.

 

Being around jet cars and top fuelers, I always did that and it never really was a problem.

 

But it does go away, it takes a long time, like decades.

[Daniel Heslop]

Ten years ago this coming September 10th, I lost 90% of the hearing in my left ear, and I have constant tinnitus, and somewhat random bouts of vertigo ever since.

Oh my! My sympathies, Shutoku! The vertigo would be indeed terrible (I only had it once when water was trapped inside my ear canal for a little while - awful). I can't imagine having it for long.

 

I've heard about a virus causing hearing loss; I believe that happened to Phil Collins. That too is scary; I've lost my sense of smell/taste for a good year or two because of a virus but not hearing, knock on wood.

 

Hope things continue to improve for you!

 

Thanks for the kind words.

After about a year my hearing settled in to where it has remained. the 90% loss is mostly in the mid to high frequencies and will never return. It is what it is.

 

Musically the worst part is I just cannot deal with really loud volumes. I have my rock band classes and several performances a year with them, but the drummers have to use bundle sticks, and I run everything straight to the board so I control volume. I haven't gigged regularly since. I did a couple Blues brother tributes in large venues. The first one with headphones and actually the sound was fantastic, but I did feel pretty isolated. The second one I just went with monitors and the sound was awful for me, so if I ever were to gig again with a loud band, I will have to use headphones.

 

Speaking of headphones...Beatles in headphones suck when you are deaf in one ear! Tomita too. Damned them and their creative use of stereo!!

I recently found some mono mixes of my favorite Beatles albums so that is really nice. I may see if I can create some mono mixes of Tomita's Snowflakes and Burmuda Triangle, because I love both albums.

 

I actually feel pretty lucky that it only affected one ear. I honestly don't know what I could have done if I went totally deaf. Every penny I've earned in my life is through music, and honestly I suck at pretty much everything else.

 

The vertigo mostly only happens if I tilt my head back, or for a few seconds when I lie on my left side. Very rarely though I will get an attack out of the blue, where I feel like I am quite drunk except with no euphoria or desire to be way too honest. I am not allowed to drive though, because if it hit while driving, there would definitely be an accident, and there is just not enough warning.

 

Tinnitus...non stop all day everyday, but I am lucky because I seem to be able to ignore it. My wife has tinnitus too and she complains about it all the time. So really I'm pretty lucky all things considered.

[cashews]

i have tinnitus as well; a high pitched ringing in both ears, about the same pitch as a 'tree toad'!!!!

had it all my life from sickness as a kid; now i'm in my 60's.

 

i found this site about Tone Therapy and some people get relief for a short time by listening to the tones.

http://lets-beat-tinnitus.co.uk/blog/free-tinnitus-pulse-therapy/

[rien]

Being a drummer, i had a very bad tinnitus for a long time, which regularly prevented me from sleeping.

 

Due to a personal choice in my life, i had to stop making any kind of music for quite a long time. I stopped playing drums (played only on pads and cushions), did not go to concert, and even stopped listening to my ipod (which was not called an ipod by then).

 

The tinnitus almost completely disappeared after 1 or 2 year.

 

Unfortunately, it came back quickly as soon as I started playing drums again, but now, it's level is manageable... I do avoid loud sources of music, and play drums at a very reasonable level now (should I mention that I don't play in metal bands anymore ?).

[uncledunc]

Mine started 40 years ago. Chain saws, motorcycles, and industrial machinery all contributed. Then along came OSHA and made us all wear earplugs at work. If it wasn't for OSHA, I'd probably be totally deaf by now.

 

For the last thirty years I've been using ear plugs all the time on the band stand, starting with cotton balls in the early days and progressing to the 31db orange squishy ones I use today. I even use plugs at the movies, or for anything that's going to be over 80db. In the studio, I mix at low volumes (as do many big time pro mix engineers) and if a client wants me to turn up the big speakers, I tell them to either put on headphones or go find another studio to work in.

 

It's all about priorities. I want to keep what I have left. No one calls me for loud gigs anymore because they know I won't do them. I don't work as much as I used to, but... I can still hear well enough to produce decent mixes. Funny thing is, if someone in the studio does a single hand clap while I'm in the same room, or if we're setting up the drums and the drummer whacks the snare before I've put on my isolation headphones, my right ear is toast for the rest of the day.

 

Tinnitus caused be volume is a sign that you're doing permanent damage to your hearing - damage that can't be undone. If music is your passion, you have a choice: learn to ration what's left of your hearing, or don't worry about it and go through the "shoulda coulda woulda" routine a few years from now when your tinnitus is so bad you can barely function.

 

(Eliminating coffee can help, or so they say.)

[dama]

I have it occasionaly it various degrees (ringing and noise). I know for me it's cause by playing music too loud. My hearing has gotten a bit worse also.

 

I narrowed it down, that the worse thing I can do is play my keyboard with headphones on and forget about how my volume level creeps up. I get seduced by the sound and it's power. The high frequency of the upper register of my organ sounds are the main culprit.

 

When I lay off using headphones, my ears ring less. I also have to monitor using my Ipod with headphones.

 

[Joe Muscara]

Interestingly, I have more hearing loss in my right ear, but the ringing is more noticeable in my left. It may be because I can "hear" it on the left while the right side is shot and cannot.

 

As long as I can remember, I've had a low level of it that I could hear when it was very quiet. Some unprotected incidents with bands (and usually while I wasn't feeling 100%) put me over to where it became a problem.

[HammondDave]

It comes and goes.... had it real bad for a while. Now when it comes I just take a Xanax... (as prescribed by my physician)....

 

I asked him if this made the ringing go away, he answered no... it will just keep me from killing myself.

[J. Dan]

Never had tinnitus outside of the temporary ringing after loud concerts in my younger years. I can relate to the vertigo issues, though. Late 90s/early 00's I went through it for a while. I'd turn my head and all of a sudden everything woud start spinning uncontollably and I'd get sick. First time it hit me, I was driving a rental car in New Jersey on a business trip, looking back to change lanes. Luckily a co-worker was with me. I quickly pulled over and he took the wheel. We had dinner scheduled with others. I stayed in the car and ended up getting sick in the parking lot. It came almost randomly for a while. At first the doctor thought it was an inner ear virus. But after a while he said it was a condition where the balls at the ends of the little hairs in your inner ear break off and when they strike the eardrum, they throw off your equilibrium. He said, eventually your brain get's conditioned to it. He said when it hit me to fall backwards on a bed and lay still for a couple minutes. It started helping and eventually went away. For I while, I carried Dramamine everywhere I went.

[HammondDave]

Yikes! That's why your hair is on fire....

[J. Dan]

Yikes! That's why your hair is on fire....

 

made me lol!

[t9cstudio]

I have tinnitus in my left ear, mostly. Sometimes it drives me nuts-louder, and then like right now it's not too bad.

 

There's the American Tinnitus Association that's been around awhile. They seem to be leading in research for causes, cures and funding. Most ENT's aren't interested in what they can't explain or cure.

[Phred]

Dan - It's called Benign paroxysmal positional vertigo

 

http://www.mayoclinic.com/health/vertigo/DS00534

 

People who have it (my mom and my sister) can usually fix it themselves (once they know how) by 'shaking' the balls (crystals) out of the ear canal. How do you learn how? Well, there's an app for that: https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/dizzyfix/id368171014?mt=8

 

 

[J. Dan]

Lol, I guess there's an app for everything. I haven't had problems with it for at least 10 years now.