Tenacious Tinnitus Club – Ear Pressure, Noise and Hyperacusis

[[an...]]

Wow somehow I totally missed this thread! Ear problems when I took Zopiclone is the cause of all my suffering and darkness.

 

I had tinnitus and hypercusis on and off for the first week when I stopped Zopiclone. But I got something else with it - sound distortion

Sounds such as heavy rain, engines, fan, all create a weird soundtrack. The result I hear is either tapping, kettle boiling or just whooshing on top of the original sound. I especially notice it outside, where there is a lot of noise. All I hear is a huge mess with distortion and it freaks me. I'm glad I can hear voices fine though... still listening to music is not the same with this symptom.

 

Has anyone experienced any kind of noise distortion?

[[an...]]

Hi everyone I found a you tube video. It is a rain video but to me it sounds like it could also be the sound you hear when taking a shower. I just loop this all night and it helps to block out my Tinnitus

 

Rob

 

This is exactly what I am talking about in my previous post haha I tried to put the same noise when I had Tinnitus but it turns into a weird distortion, which sounds like crackling and whooshing.

Is my brain not able to translate the sound waves correctly?

[[pe...]]

Believe it or not, this simple technique really does help!

 

· Finger drumming technique

 

The following method may reduce the ringing in your ears, suggests Dr. Jan Strydom, of A2Z of Health, Beauty and Fintess.org. Place the palms of your hands over your ears with fingers resting gently on the back of your head. Your middle fingers should point toward one another just above the base of your skull. Place your index fingers on top of you middle fingers and snap them (the index fingers) onto the skull making a loud, drumming noise. Repeat 40-50 times. Some people experience immediate relief with this method. Repeat several times a day for as long as necessary to reduce tinnitus.

 

Learn more: http://www.naturalnews.com/039625_home_remedies_holistic_treatments_tinnitus.html#ixzz2qaW1vat2

 

[[sn...]]

Ya mean like this? :idiot: That's what this guy is doing. :idiot: :idiot:

 

Just kidding. PD. You could be one of those naturopathic doctors...Smart lady.

 

Snoball

[[Bi...]]

Ya mean like this? :idiot: That's what this guy is doing. :idiot: :idiot:

 

Just kidding. PD. You could be one of those naturopathic doctors...Smart lady.

 

Snoball

 

Snoball,,,    :idiot: :idiot:

 

Only you could do this with smileys 

 

Still love ya 

[[sn...]]

;) I'm winking back at ya Little Mermaid. ;)

You are so pretty. I wish I was a fish too.

 

Love ya too Birdie.

[[Bi...]]

;) I'm winking back at ya Little Mermaid. ;)

You are so pretty. I wish I was a fish too.

 

Love ya too Birdie.

 

You will never guess how I got this nick name   I prefer to watch TV in the swim spa we have in the living room.  I stay in there every night watching TV until I get wrinkled

 

It really helps the stress being in the warm water!  Little mermaid is a name that just stuck in our house hold. I think I am getting webs on my hands

[[sn...]]

;) I'm winking back at ya Little Mermaid. ;)

You are so pretty. I wish I was a fish too.

 

Love ya too Birdie.

 

You will never guess how I got this nick name   I prefer to watch TV in the swim spa we have in the living room.  I stay in there every night watching TV until I get wrinkled

 

It really helps the stress being in the warm water!  Little mermaid is a name that just stuck in our house hold. I think I am getting webs on my hands

Swim spa in your living room?  Very cool.

[[Bi...]]

;) I'm winking back at ya Little Mermaid. ;)

You are so pretty. I wish I was a fish too.

 

Love ya too Birdie.

 

You will never guess how I got this nick name   I prefer to watch TV in the swim spa we have in the living room.  I stay in there every night watching TV until I get wrinkled

 

It really helps the stress being in the warm water!  Little mermaid is a name that just stuck in our house hold. I think I am getting webs on my hands

Swim spa in your living room?  Very cool.

 

Typical Vegas home 

[[pe...]]

It's getting a little mushy around here.    Only a movie star like the Little Mermaid would have a spa in her living room! 

 

PD

[[sn...]]

It's getting a little mushy around here.    Only a movie star like the Little Mermaid would have a spa in her living room! 

 

PD

 

Ya, No kidding. I want one of those Vegas homes too.

[[xe...]]

I have read that Tinnitus is a progressive degenerative disease for which there is no cure. My Psych has warned me that the Tinnitus can result in suicide, in that the noise is non stop, and drives you insane.

 

I need to type up a long thread on this subject with sources and citations, but I don't have time to do that now so I'm going to respond to this as quickly as I can.

 

I believe that the information you've been provided is misguided at best. I don't believe tinnitus in general is 'progressive', I've seen multiple studies that show essentially a 1/3rd 1/3rd 1/3rd breakdown of "gets worse over time", "gets better over time", "stays the same". So overall the odds are that it will get better or stay the same.

 

Let's talk quickly about how this works. This isn't incredibly well understood, but in the past couple decades, the medical understanding has improved drastically. When sensory nerves are cut off from input (as in hearing loss, or if you chop your hand off), they tend to fire erratically. This can give rise to tinnitus (or phantom limb pain), but the reality is much more complex and nuanced than that. The majority of people with hearing loss do not have significant tinnitus (and the majority of people who lose a hand do not have severe phantom limb pain). There's evidence that this is because those sensory inputs are pushed through the thalamus prior to interacting with consciousness/emotion (via the limbic system). The thalamus has "gates" that remove these erratic signals before they are perceived. In tinnitus (and phantom limb pain), the 'gates' are not functioning correctly.

 

I do not believe this is necessarily a progressive or irreversible process. There's heavy interplay between GABA/serotonin and thalamic function, and so it's reasonable to imagine that things which affect those transmitters also affect the phantom sound (or phantom pain). In fact, there's at least one peer reviewed study which concluded that the simple act of meditation, over time, may impact these thalamic/limbic gating mechanisms. As long as you're alive, your brain is plastic and capable of changing.

 

There's evidence that rats exposed to severely traumatic noise, and then given NDMA antagonist drugs shortly afterwards, do not go on to develop tinnitus. This suggests that tinnitus isn't the result of the damage, but is the result of a nasty set of feedback loops that gets set up between the sensory neurons in the ear and the limbic system (and that certain drugs given very quickly can prevent these loops from being created). As of yet, no one has a drug which can chemically erase the loops once they exist, but I'm totally convinced that there are many other avenues to attack this from.

 

Because tinnitus appears to largely be a result of interactions between sensory neurons and the limbic system, I think it's logical to imagine that things which alter limbic function can alter tinnitus. Essentially all people, put into total silence, will perceive some amount of ringing/buzzing/high pitched noise, because the mind is adept at cranking up the signal strength when normal input is disrupted. I'm fairly convinced that if you put someone in total silence for a length of time sufficient for them to become completely fixated on these noises (and perhaps suggested them to external anxiety, with drugs or torture -- a nasty hypothetical, for sure), they could go on to develop tinnitus that persists after the silence is removed.

 

The bottom line is that the more I look into this, the more convinced I've become that the way we consciously respond to tinnitus may literally impact the progression of the condition. I'm done chasing these things with drugs, so meditation has become a logical next path of exploration for me, and even though I'm fairly early in that process I've already had some pretty interesting experiences I can relate a little later. I also think that fear/adrenaline is an important deciding factor in whether or not tinnitus is 'bothersome', as I know multiple people who have what they describe as "a high pitched ring in one or both ears which can be perceived over background noises in many cases" who literally are not bothered by it. They are not anxious people by nature, and so they never developed a fear response to the ringing, and so even though it's "there", they don't notice it. If an ear rings in the forest but no one is paying attention to it, does it make a sound?

 

I've got to go for now, but I think a lot of the information in this link is agreeable and fascinating:

http://www.cst.eu.com/tinnitus.html

[[Dr...]]

Hello Birdman,

 

It is good for me to read that other people are having this problem too. I wish nobody had this tinnitus thing. I'm just writing that I thought I was the only one with this. Mine started in March of 2013. I made no connection to the clonazepam. At the time I was not trying to stop anything. It was completely by accident. My idiot doctor gave me this horrible drug to help me sleep. It did do that. The problem was that in December of the previous year I was taking twice to three times as much to get sleepy and stay asleep. When I got back home I went back to my usual dose of 1mg at night only. It took two and a half months for my brain to scream out at me with this tinnitus. It was only when I got into this forum and found your letter that I realized the cause was the clonazepam. I have been doing a slow taper now since August of last year. Some days it is very loud, like today, some days it is soft enough to not truly bother me in a way that keeps me from being able to concentrate. "They" say there is no cure for tinnitus but I am hoping this only applies to the loud noise induced tinnitus and not the drug induced. For the sake of all of us who are suffering with this screaming in our brains I do hope it will go away once the brain gets accustomed to not having this drug around.

 

Dreamovie

[[Bi...]]

xerxes,  Great post. I think your right about tinnitus being worse if your anxiety level is elevated.  I had done some drug experiments and certain drugs make you not care at ALL about the Tinnitus even though it is still there.  I will not mention those drugs since I do not want people to play with them, it's not a cure just a test (no not benzo's).  I am pretty sure once our CNS calms down it will not be an issue.  It may take years but I am sure we will all be whole again.

The best answer is SOUND.  I noticed my T always went down after a shower. Did you know a Shower is as high as 130DB?  Theoretically a shower should make you deaf at 130db for 30 years.  Sound therapy seems to work for me and I am always plugged into some kind of noise generator these days.  It helps much.

[[Ma...]]

Hey, I'm joining!!!

 

Mine started as soon as my dose got low -- 4 mg or so. I've had it for 9 mos.

 

It is like a bunch of cicadas in my ears. Yeah, Birdman, like a high-pitched buzz. It does get lower and louder and sometimes stops momentarily in one ear (that scares me) only to start up again.

 

I don't have it 24/7 though. When I take my valium at night, I notice once the damned drug works, that it stops. That's a grotesque thought. That I need valium to stop this!

 

Anyhow if I'm working or engaged in doing something that keeps my attention, I don't notice it so much.

 

So that's me.

 

How is it for the rest of you?

 

Okatz

 

Cicadas describes mine very well.  First I said "crickets" but it's more constant, not a chirping.  But it sounds exactly like a quiet night when you can hear cicadas loud and clear.

 

I've had tinnitus for a long time.  I thought it was the antidepressant I was on (while taling Xanax) because when the doc increased the a/d dose, the tinnitus became unbearable, so I lowered the dose again.

 

But, niw off the Xanax, the tinnitus is loud and unrelenting.  My ears feel plugged, as if the cicadas are trapoed in there.  It makes me feel very dizzy and headachy, and it feels like it is related to nausea as well.  It's hard to function with this tinnitus.  There are things I do which require sitting quiety and conversing with people and it's hard to hear above this noise in my head. 

 

Tex67 said something about taking lipoflavinoids and that they helped so I'm looking into that.

[[pe...]]

xerxes: Awesome post!!  I definitely agree. 

[[pr...]]

As long as you're alive, your brain is plastic and capable of changing.

 

i like this idea!

[[Ma...]]

xerxes: Awesome post!!  I definitely agree. 

 

Hi Perfect Daughter!

 

nice to cross paths again!  glad we're both still around, even with the ringing ears...

 

:o :o

[[pe...]]

Hey Mama!  So nice to see you again.    How are you doing? 

[[Ma...]]

Hey Mama!  So nice to see you again.    How are you doing? 

 

Month 5= thumbs down

 

For example, today I forced myself to go for a walk, came home and went onto my bed to figure out how to delete all my old emails.  After doing it for a while and feeling discouraged, I looked around my room at all the papers I still have yet to sort through and clean out.  Weighed myself after two weeks of eating very carefully and no sweets....hadn't lost a pound (weight gain is one of my symptoms).

 

Physically feeling exhausted, congested, headachy, broken out in a rash, tinnitus raging like a field of cicadas, having hot flashes, body feels heavy and void of life.  I just had the thought "I should just give up.". I didn't mean suicide and I didn't mean go back on benzos.  I think I meant, close my door and tell everyone to pretend I don't exist for a while.  I think I meant to have absolutely 0 expectations of myself even though my whole church is doing a program where we're setting goals.  I don't want to set any goals, I don't want to do anything, I'm so depressed today I just want to "give up".

 

How are YOU???

[[pe...]]

So sorry Mama    Let's get that thumbs down changed to a thumbs up!    Don't give up.  No matter how bad it seems, things will get better.  I'm living proof of that. 

 

Well, as far as benzo withdrawal goes I think I'm doing very well.  My ears are even getting better.    But unfortunately it seems it's just one thing after another.  I was just diagnosed with hyperthyroidism.    The doctor is in the process of doing more blood work to try to determine the cause.  I'm just praying it is something that can be resolved easily.

   

 

 

[[am...]]

Mamasho,

 

This made me laugh !

 

"tinnitus raging like a field of cicadas"

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

 

Thanks !

[[Ma...]]

Mamasho,

 

This made me laugh !

 

"tinnitus raging like a field of cicadas"

:laugh: :laugh: :laugh: :laugh:

 

Thanks !

 

Laughter is SO healthy for the brain, body & spirit.  Sometimes I listen to comedians so I can just laugh.

Can't praise laughter enough!

[[...]]

  Hello BB,

 

 

  Trying out a new product that is support to help with our Tinnitus. Well it is new to me any way. So far I have been taking it for 4 days, but no results as of yet. But I'm very hopefully for the future. The Manufacture says to take it for 60 days and you will get results from it. So down the hatch and away we go.

 

  I will keep everyone informed of my results every week on my crazy little Blog.

 

 

The Xanax Club

 

 

  I'm hoping for some good results so I can inspire everyone to maybe try it. There has been good comments written about it, so let it ride.

 

 

 

Godspeed to you all, keep the faith.     

 

 

 

Rocket 

[[or...]]

Oi what is it?

 

Okatz