Thread: Any Tinnitus Sufferers out there?

Originally Posted by Wullie

I got that for 35 years. My personal opinion of the VA is that they hope we'll die without them having to spend a dime on us. They will provide IF you persevere. I wouldn't have gotten a dime from them if I hadn't taken the advice of a fellow 'Nam vet to get my state veteran's representative involved.

The DVA (Canukistan) is pretty much the same as well.

Deny, in hopes you simply go away...where to doesn't matter, just go away.

Sadly, there are many that are just too broken to fight and do go away...more oft they find themselves at the bottom of a bottle.

I've had tinnitus since '95. I was serving at the time and on two occasions in a two months duration had to shoot a 2" mortar without ear plugs. Or rather, on one occasion I had no time to put them in, the other I DID, only to have the one closer to the mortar fall out as I was turning the firing pin release... I remember the -"oh, $h!t.." BOOM - sequence very clearly. And the ringing after. Taking in mortar and rocket fire on a semi regular basis (and the various artillery elements responding sometimes) for another year sure didn't help, and transferring to an armored corp battalion for a year and a half after that probably didn't, either, even though I was very careful to have plugs or muffs whenever needed.
O.k, and maybe, MAYBE, shooting ipsc matches for 20 years and about 1500 hours of scuba diving weren't the smartest thing to do...

Nights is a constant buzz (who wants to hear crickets, I've got my own!) And having a conversation in a crowd is something better done if I can see the lips of whoever is talking to me, otherwise results may vary ( might be funny). But hi, don't really like crowds anyway.
The notched therapy mentioned here is very interesting, thanks for the tip and here's hoping for a quiet night!

P.s
SWAMBO wanted me to get hearing aids for a while now, and I kinda refused on account of a. I'm not even 40 yet, and b. Didn't think there's something to be done with the ringing.
If I understood people here correctly and hearing aids do help, I might have to reconsider...

Sorry if I lowered the thread age average

Originally Posted by grizli

I've had tinnitus since '95. I was serving at the time and on two occasions in a two months duration had to shoot a 2" mortar without ear plugs. Or rather, on one occasion I had no time to put them in, the other I DID, only to have the one closer to the mortar fall out as I was turning the firing pin release... I remember the -"oh, $h!t.." BOOM - sequence very clearly. And the ringing after. Taking in mortar and rocket fire on a semi regular basis (and the various artillery elements responding sometimes) for another year sure didn't help, and transferring to an armored corp battalion for a year and a half after that probably didn't, either, even though I was very careful to have plugs or muffs whenever needed.
O.k, and maybe, MAYBE, shooting ipsc matches for 20 years and about 1500 hours of scuba diving weren't the smartest thing to do...

Nights is a constant buzz (who wants to hear crickets, I've got my own!) And having a conversation in a crowd is something better done if I can see the lips of whoever is talking to me, otherwise results may vary ( might be funny). But hi, don't really like crowds anyway.
The notched therapy mentioned here is very interesting, thanks for the tip and here's hoping for a quiet night!

P.s
SWAMBO wanted me to get hearing aids for a while now, and I kinda refused on account of a. I'm not even 40 yet, and b. Didn't think there's something to be done with the ringing.
If I understood people here correctly and hearing aids do help, I might have to reconsider...

Sorry if I lowered the thread age average

True Tinnitus actually has nothing to do with your hearing. It's an add on but doesn't affect anything else. if you have hearing loss that's another story. Right now technically speaking there is no cure for the ringing. Also it's in both ears always. if you have it in only one that's something else and it's usually indications of a very serious problem in your head.

I would imagine if they could custom make a white noise generator to your specs it should cancel out the tones you hear. I imagine that would be very expensive. I'm skeptical about this notch thing. Do much research before you spend money.

A few years ago there was this guy advertising if you pay him he'll send you a CD you listen to and it makes your Tinn. go away. It was a total fraud and he advertises similar "sound therapy" to cure everything known to man.

Originally Posted by grizli

I've had tinnitus since '95. I was serving at the time and on two occasions in a two months duration had to shoot a 2" mortar without ear plugs. Or rather, on one occasion I had no time to put them in, the other I DID, only to have the one closer to the mortar fall out as I was turning the firing pin release... I remember the -"oh, $h!t.." BOOM - sequence very clearly. And the ringing after. Taking in mortar and rocket fire on a semi regular basis (and the various artillery elements responding sometimes) for another year sure didn't help, and transferring to an armored corp battalion for a year and a half after that probably didn't, either, even though I was very careful to have plugs or muffs whenever needed.
O.k, and maybe, MAYBE, shooting ipsc matches for 20 years and about 1500 hours of scuba diving weren't the smartest thing to do...

Nights is a constant buzz (who wants to hear crickets, I've got my own!) And having a conversation in a crowd is something better done if I can see the lips of whoever is talking to me, otherwise results may vary ( might be funny). But hi, don't really like crowds anyway.
The notched therapy mentioned here is very interesting, thanks for the tip and here's hoping for a quiet night!

P.s
SWAMBO wanted me to get hearing aids for a while now, and I kinda refused on account of a. I'm not even 40 yet, and b. Didn't think there's something to be done with the ringing.
If I understood people here correctly and hearing aids do help, I might have to reconsider...

Sorry if I lowered the thread age average

NO apologies necessary. You served your time in Hell and now it's time for you to get some relief.

Listen to your wife. My messed up hearing was causing problems between my wife and I. She thought I was ignoring her. Truth was, I couldn't hear her. My wife was sitting beside the audiologist that gave me my preliminary exam. The lady told my wife "that man NEEDS hearing aids!" and then told my wife what she was doing and how she was acting without my wife ever mentioning what had been going on.

Do both of yourselves a favor and get your hearing tested. Most of the "box store" hearing aid places will do hearing evaluations for free. Go to a couple of them. See how close the results are or do like I had to do and pay for an exam, then take that information to VA and they'll confirm it with their tests.

Good luck with it.

Update on this notch sound therapy stuff:

I don't listen to it every night and not always for the hour per day they suggest, but it looks promising for me as it seems to provide me some relief.

It will NOT "cure" tinnitus. The ringing remains. However, the relief/benefit I feel so far is threefold:

1) While I'm listening to the sounds through headphones, the ringing is completely gone. It provides a respite.
2) The sounds are relaxing to me which helps me in general.
3) For whatever reason, I'm aware of my ringing less now during the day. It used to be that I was always aware of it to varied degrees. Maybe it's my imagination, but I seem to have occasions where I forget it's there.

My ringing is not a single pure frequency, it's a mixture of high frequency and lower frequency. The high seems to be around 7500 Hertz. This notched thing is interesting because the instant the sound therapy ends and I'm in silence, my ringing is different. It's as though the high spectrum of my ringing is not there.

The site I found this on has a bunch of different sound mp3 files to download. Some sounds are waterfall, waves, street sweeper, kitchen sink, mountain stream, white noise, pink noise, etc. I made a playlist and downloaded it on my phone. The cost was $100 which is worlds better than the little ipod looking thing the audiologist wanted to sell me for $4,100. For me the $100 is totally worth the money for reason number 1 alone.

I'm not calling out a directive to anyone else recommending that you jump on board; I'm just a guy with lifelong tinnitus giving my 2 cents on something I recently stumbled upon.

ChrisL

Maybe it was running a tattoo machine for years, but the ringing doesn't really bother me. I only "hear" it when I'm reminded of it, like in a thread like this, or when I turn out the light to go to sleep. Even then it isn't long before I tune it out. Of course my tinnitus and yours are probably two different kangaroos.

Originally Posted by JimmyHAD

Maybe it was running a tattoo machine for years, but the ringing doesn't really bother me. I only "hear" it when I'm reminded of it, like in a thread like this, or when I turn out the light to go to sleep. Even then it isn't long before I tune it out. Of course my tinnitus and yours are probably two different kangaroos.

My ears have rang since I was a kid.
I don't hear/think about it until someone starts talking about it....

I have learned to live with mine as well (what's the alternative??), but if there was something that would stop the ringing I would assume most would jump at the chance. I would. It's usually in times of stress when I'm more aware of the ringing to the point it just about successfully bugs me. I have a sensitivity to loud sounds along with it. Part of that I think is wanting to avoid loud noises since when I'm exposed to them, my tinnitus amps up big time for days afterward. With all of this though, there's a heckuva lot more serious things out there so I keep it in perspective.

ChrisL

Originally Posted by ChrisL

I have learned to live with mine as well (what's the alternative??), but if there was something that would stop the ringing I would assume most would jump at the chance. I would. It's usually in times of stress when I'm more aware of the ringing to the point it just about successfully bugs me. I have a sensitivity to loud sounds along with it. Part of that I think is wanting to avoid loud noises since when I'm exposed to them, my tinnitus amps up big time for days afterward. With all of this though, there's a heckuva lot more serious things out there so I keep it in perspective.

ChrisL

I'm ultra sensitive to high frequency noise.
I feel like I have dog or bat dna sometimes...lol

Originally Posted by ChrisL

I have learned to live with mine as well (what's the alternative??), but if there was something that would stop the ringing I would assume most would jump at the chance. I would. It's usually in times of stress when I'm more aware of the ringing to the point it just about successfully bugs me. I have a sensitivity to loud sounds along with it. Part of that I think is wanting to avoid loud noises since when I'm exposed to them, my tinnitus amps up big time for days afterward. With all of this though, there's a heckuva lot more serious things out there so I keep it in perspective.

ChrisL

Have you been to an M.D? True Tinnitus does not change. it's always the same. Your perception of it may change but the noise itself is steady and constant in volume though the frequency can change. If yours actually does change in volume you have something else going on.