ringing in my ears?????

[joyce1980]

I have always had ringing in my ears but now it starting to worry me!!

I mostly hear it when it's quiet.



Thanks

[belle]

Hi..
I am experiencing this at the moment. I've had it for a month now and its driving me potty. I can hear it all the time and the other night it got louder than the TV. Apparently these sounds differ...all i can describe the noise in my "head" as either like when the TV goes on/off you sometimes hear the electricity, that sound OR when its really quite and they say 'silence is deafening' that sound. I can hear it right now going on in my head....
I don't think it means you are going deaf, have you seen the doctor about it? I am waiting to see a neurologist.

x

[Blaise]

Hey Joyce,

Dont worry about this ringing in your ears its an anxiety symptom. I get it sometimes but my dad, who is a sufferer gets it constantly - its like tinitus but wont make you go deaf if its anxiety related. Hope you get it sorted tho as its bery annoying

Blaise xx

[scooby28]

I'm 28 and i'v had this most days for about the last 5 years i think mine is gradually getting louder too

[milly jones]

hi

i was diagnosed with tinitus by my gp and he says its totally unrelated to my anxiety?

i get it particularly badly at night, like a fridge humming, or a radio not on station. he suggested having the radio on low to help blot out the noise.

i also cannot tolerate loud noises at the moment and find my son particularly irritating

i just seem to want peace and quiet

im not convinced that the tinitus and anxiety / depression are not all linked in some way

best wishes

milly xx

[BKF1515]

I've had ringing in my ears too and have been told by a technician giving hearing tests that it is a sign of stress. BKF1515

[AtmoLav]

I've had tinnitus for years (I'm 25 too) but like you it's only started bugging me over the last couple of days.

For anyone who's been told it has nothing to do with anxiety, I suggest you read this link: http://www.tinnitus.org.uk/index.php?q=node/71

This is from the British Tinnitus Association, and is written by leading tinnitus experts. Allow me to quote a bit of it:

Tinnitus is a real sensation, but of oto-neurological origin. While it is not a psychological disorder, the problems it causes are in the psychological domain. These include anxiety concerning its cause, prognosis and feared influence on lifestyle and work. Tinnitus can also cause or exacerbate tension, frustration, loss of concentration, sleep disturbance and depression. These, often together with over-attention to the tinnitus, set up vicious circles of increasing tinnitus, which in turn cause greater anxiety, thereby increasing the tinnitus and so on, as illustrated in the diagram.....

.....In addition, pre-existing or coincident psychological and emotional problems may lead to an increased perception of the tinnitus and anxiety about it, as also can external stresses. Patients may need assistance for these circles to be reversed, by appropriate information, counselling and support. Some degrees of habituation usually occur spontaneously but the traditional approach of telling patients that nothing can be done about tinnitus, and that it inevitably continues and has to be “put up with”, can have a devastating effect on this possibility. Clinicians, among them audiologists, have thus sometimes been responsible for worsening the effects of tinnitus.

Having tinnitus absolutely does NOT mean you're going deaf. 7 million people in the UK have it, and the vast, vast majority of them have no hearing problems and no underlying, serious cause. Another reliable link (from the RNID) here....http://www.tuneouttinnitus.org.uk/home/whatistinnitus/myths/intro.htm

So there you have it - nothing to worry about and it CAN and DOES get better :-)

[Cathy V]

Yes I get this too, and the noise that i have is very like Milly's noise...sort of a low-pitched 'humming' like a fridge motor. It started about a year ago when i was still living in UK, and got worse when i came here last year. Its always in my right ear, and this ear has always been sensitive to noise.

When i also started getting headaches on the right side of my head last august the doc sent me to a neurologist, who said results of tests were nothing bad as far as she could tell, but that the right side of my brain seemed a bit slower than the left side, and she wanted me to go for an MRI scan to be be sure. I declined because i have very bad claustrophobia and nearly pass out at the thought of going inside that small space.

Anyway, she diagnosed severe migraine and it was she who started me on propranolol....which eventually caused more problems but thats another story:wacko:
Recently my doc has said he doesn't think it was migraine as the pain doesn't come on, or stay in the classic migraine way. When it comes on it can then disappear after only half an hour, then come back for another 15mins and go again. It responds to Ibuprofen which isn't a strong painkiller particularly, and can disappear without meds sometimes just by me turning my head in a different way.

Ive always been convinced its connected to the prob with my ear...but who are we to argue with the docs :whistles:

Cathy xxx :)

[AtmoLav]

Some more interesting stuff from the BTA:

When we first become aware of tinnitus, it is a change in the ‘status quo’ and the grey matter of the brain becomes involved, ie our thought process. As previously mentioned, many people think that the presence of tinnitus is related to deterioration in hearing or even more sinister causes, ie brain tumours or other diseases of the brain. These thoughts increase the arousal further and thus give an increased central auditory gain and, in some cases, also trigger off a survival reflex. It is important to note that most tinnitus patients are met with little understanding when they first come into contact with the medical profession. Many may further increase their suffering or emotional reactions due to the misinformation first given, such as there is nothing that can be done, and they have to learn to live with it. One can imagine what effect this has on a patient who is in distress and unable to cope.

In this situation the survival reflex kicks in and the brain automatically becomes the surveyor of the tinnitus signal, thereby using the pathway of identification over and over again. There is also an increase in the sensitivity within the auditory pathway, which can lead to less tolerance of other sounds. If this develops further, it can result in over-sensitivity to sound or hyperacusis. As a consequence some of these patients will start avoiding noisy environments and, by doing so, actually make things worse for themselves as they will seek silence which further increases their sensitivity/reaction to sound. In extreme cases, the sufferer develops phobia to sound.

The good news

The good news is that the whole process has been learnt and can, therefore, be reversed through re-training. The first step in this treatment is to de-dramatise the presence of tinnitus. If the patient is taken seriously by the medical profession and provided with a thorough medical examination to rule out or confirm any medical condition that would need treatment, the doctor can, in most cases, give the patient reassuring information and thereby take away the reason for the survival reflex. Tinnitus is a non-specific symptom and is a very poor indicator of any specific disease and should be looked upon as a nonsensical sound. The identification of the sound has, in most cases, happened when the brain was in a state of heightened arousal. It does not necessarily reflect the level of hearing and this can be explained by the fact that we cannot predict which ear has tinnitus by examining the audiogram.

If the reason for the survival reflex is taken away, the brain will start a process of habituation, like it does to any sound or sensory stimulation after the initial identification has taken place (eg the sound of a cooling fan to the PC, raindrops on the window or the outside traffic noise). Most patients are trying desperately to do things or to find cures for the tinnitus suffering. This obviously leads to what we call tinnitus related activity, ie it underlines the presence of the tinnitus and the use of the pathways of identification. When the survival reflex is taken away, the pathways are less used and the sensitivity in the auditory pathways reduced, as the central auditory gain is turned down and through a learned process, although the tinnitus is still audible, less attention is paid to the tinnitus signal.

We can speed up this process by avoiding quietness and by using other sounds to reduce the contrast between silence and tinnitus. Whether we use hearing aids, white noise generators or environmental sound is not important. The most important thing to remember is that these sounds are there to reduce the contrast between silence and the perceived tinnitus, not to be listened to instead of the tinnitus. As less and less attention is paid to the tinnitus and the mechanism explained above is kicking in, tinnitus becomes mixed up with the background noise and the perception of the sound disappears. Most sufferers would, at this stage, realise that they have not thought of the tinnitus for quite some time, in other words, they have not been aware of it. Whether or not the tinnitus signal is completely gone or is still perceived occasionally, is immaterial. The important thing is that it does not affect quality of life and that the patient no longer suffers from its presence.

Conclusion

The crucial information for any tinnitus sufferer is, therefore, to reiterate that it is not the source of the sound that is important, but the interpretation/attitude to the sound. The patient should, therefore, avoid quietness, stop the checking process and let the doctor take care of the medical side of things. In other words, don’t do anything for, or because of, your tinnitus, just avoid silence. By understanding how you use your hearing in everyday life, you will realise that the importance of sound changes with emotional changes and sensations of well-being. By using simple strategies as outlined above, the brain reverts to its ability to filter out unimportant sensory information, amongst which tinnitus is one, thereby teaching the sufferer to live without the perception of tinnitus.

[Trish]

I think i suffer with this sometimes in both ears, it will disappear if i move my head to a different position on the pillow at night. I do think its to do my health anxiety.

Trish.