They usually have this warning sign at concerts, gun ranges, etc. I have most all the symptoms also. Wear range muffs while grass clipping & yardwork cleanup with this obnoxiously loud Homelite gas blower I have. Ear piercing loud.
I am reasonably consistent about wearing hearing protection when using loud tools. Worked with older guys who never did in their youth and I realized the future benefits.
Does anyone have sudden bouts of the tinnitus suddenly and spontaneously going away for a few seconds at a time? I'll be doing something like sitting at my desk and all of a sudden it gets quiet, like I've gone deaf. It has happened enough times I've started snapping my fingers to see if I'm deaf or can still hear. It never lasts a minute but it is really odd when it happens. I would liken it to how your ears feel when you go up or down too fast and just before your ears pop. Oddly enough, I still hear fairly well except for the range where my tinnitus is. My wife thinks I'm deaf. I keep explaining that I worked in an open environment office for 30+ years. I learned to block out everything. I hear, I simple don't listen unless you get my attention first.
Took me awhile to find this. Just search - mit-develops-drug-for-reversing-hearing-loss-and-tinnitus. The site that Max made available did not work when I clicked on it. Don't know why. I have hearing loss and only getting worse. My wife thinks I'm ignoring her. LoL. However, researchers at MIT, Brigham and Women’s Hospital, and Massachusetts Eye and Ear have now discovered a combination of drugs that expands the population of progenitor cells (also called supporting cells) in the ear and induces them to become hair cells, offering a potential new way to treat hearing loss.
That exact thing happened to me about a week or so ago. In the garage, walked from my car to the bench, about 15 feet, and about halfway there, my hearing went from "volume 8 to about volume 1.5" Felt like my ears were "full" (pressure) similar to descending quickly (yeah, lotta years flying status...) but even the "Valsalva" did nothing at all, even though my ears "popped", it made no change in volume. Lasted about 30-45 seconds, then diminished rapidly. It was only volume. (It was like an audio version of near blackout when you stand up too fast) Never recall it ever happening before, so it got my attention. The only thing ever similar was being in the Anechoic Chamber at Eglin AFB during testing of an F-15E model back in the late 80s, where the sound absorption is tremendous, and almost to the point of uncomfortable sensory overload. Very agitating experience. I was happy to not have to work in that environment for a long time. My tinnitus is pretty much a "white noise" most of the time, and with any ambient sounds, I almost do not notice it. I do have slight "tones" in two different high pitches, and only am aware when I am in near total silence. "White noise", like fans, highway noise and the like bother me, because my brain focuses on it. Random noise, even if it is a lot, is easier to "filter out/ignore" unless it gets to a certain point, then I become agitated and need to get away or put in earplugs/headset type muffs. (And blame autism for part of that)
44 years of flying light planes is what caused mine. Most pilots wear headphones. but I could never find a set that didn't feel like a C-clamp, so I rarely wore them.
Mine came on after my second Covid shot. Partial hearing loss also occurred in both ears shortly after that, and only started coming back before I got the third shot, - then was bad again and has only started to return in the right ear where I can hear a watch ticking on the nightstand again, - if it's a loud watch. Actually have the hearing tests documented through the company clinic, which shows a marked and unexplained improvement from 2 years ago when it had inexplicably changed after being stable for 40 years. The left ear is still a tinnitus nightmare, it started to return to normal after the second shot but has been bad since the third one. Coincidently I got very, very sick with all of the Covid shots, so who knows what's happening there, and I don't want to start a flame war or anything, just reporting my experiences, and I'm not alone, there have been a few people I know reporting the same thing. Only had the hearing completely fail once; - and that was about 6 weeks after the last shot, my boss came in and started droning on, and then I realized I wasn't hearing him anymore, (ok, he was boring and I did zone out, but this was different) and that scared the bejeezus out of me, I thought I was having a stroke. Maybe I did; I have no idea. About 15 minutes later and after some food, it started coming back; - but the tinnitus in the left was still there. I've worn ear protection for 40 years, am diligent about wearing it. The plant I work in has a lot of loud machinery, and is rated at 110 decibels, so it's up there. Same thing at home, anything loud, I was wearing protection. Maybe it's just old age...
Tinnitus is usually a certain frequency that you can’t hear and it’s your brain compensating for it, when it all goes quiet it could be because that frequency is being provided externally? Mine is a higher frequency that fortunately is in the range of a woman’s voice, what luck!
My wife is always accusing me of being deaf, but I suffer from focused task syndrome, FTS, where I can eliminate external stimuli while working on a project. FTS is also known Frack That Stuff. I think she's developing memory problems because I have to keep telling her that I block things out when I'm doing something.
I've been around racing since I was a baby and can remember lying down in bed when I was 3 or 4 listening to ringing, especially after a race. I only started to protect my ears about 10 years ago. Had a hearing test done 2 weeks ago and I have significant high frequency hearing loss. My audiologist tells me ringing signifies heaing loss and a hearing aid will reduce it. I think I hear too much, my neighbors air conditioner wakes me up at night, sometimes I wear ear plugs to sleep. Ringing is ALL deaf people hear, and it loud. It's the number one reason deaf people commit suicide, it drives them crazy! Feel lucky!
Mine sounds like Locusts with no up and down, just a straight line sound. Some days I don’t notice it but once I do it doesn’t stop.
I have it bad....concerts, racing, fireworks......I cringe when I see a baby in a stroller in obvious pain near the burnout area at the track. I used to have my son on shoulder at track when he was like 3 and I would reach up and hold his ears at the expense of mine. Yeah, I know....forgot the ear muffs at home.... I did some searches so now get all kinds of scams/cures coming up on Facebook. My doc said like 80% of people over 65 have it so HUGE market for "cures".
When actual doctors prescribe cures, I'll investigate it. No quack/snake oil supplements that are unregulated and unproven. Most are placebos.
Ya, I agree, all the medical/prescriptions Ads on TV with their medical claims. If that were true, my Doctor would be prescribing them to me. The over the counter Meds are not even regulated by the medical community or FDA. Vet
I went to a FREE Miracle Ear presentation with a $25 Starbucks gift certificate to be awarded after....then a one-on-one hard sell....told them I had to think about it...was like a pit bull wouldn't let go. Told him the harder you try the more I'm going to say no. Finally got outta there....they wanted almost 4 grand..... And no....never got the Starbucks gift cert...they said they were out of them and would mail it to me....yeah, right......
