Hi.
I've had tinnitus for 5 years, probably caused by very loud music through headphones. Really really stupid, and I wish every day I could take myself back in time and tell myself how stupid it was. When it first appeared I was in a complete state, read all the horror stories online about how it never goes and there is no cure, which just made me focus on it even more. I had ENT visits (they are on the whole pretty clueless about tinnitus unless there is a physical cause),MRI scan to check for a tumour on the acoustic nerve (very rare), tried hearing aids (made it worse), altered my diet by cutting out various things (no help), gave up caffeine (no help), took every supplement under the sun mentioned on the tinnitus forums (no help) and many other things.
I lost about 2 stone in weight due to stress and not eating. I had very dark thoughts and was put on anti depressants.
I was a member of the Tinnitus Talk forum, but the stories on there actually make it worse and cause you to focus on tinnitus.
What was a game changer for me was getting a sound machine and sleep -phones (like a soft headband with flat speakers in it) that you can wear at night to play soft sounds (crickets/music/whale noise/waterfalls etc) that allow your brain to focus on something other than the tinnitus. This let me sleep again.
I would encourage you to try to never be in a silent room. If you think about tinnitus as a candle flame it helps. When you are in a room during the day, if a candle flame was burning, it would hardly be seen, its just one light among many other lights. But at night, in the darkness with no other distractions, that same candle flame would appear to be the only thing in the room. It's the same with tinnitus. At night there is nothing but you, and the sounds in your head/ears. You need to distract your brain and get it away from the tinnitus noise.
I can't say my tinnitus has faded over the years but I HAVE learned to deal with it better. It gets worse with a cold or allergies. It gets better after a couple of drinks! I often wonder if someone invented a pill that dulled the same part of your brain as alcohol does (without the side effects!) that they would be on to a winner. In reality, I doubt there will ever be a cure because tinnitus has so many causes. If cause by hearing loss, if they ever find a way to regenerate the tiny cilia hairs in the ear which are flattened and damaged, they could theoretically cure tinnitus, but that's probably decade away if ever.
So we need to learn to live with it. And that's so hard, knowing that you will never hear silence again. You need to find small ways to distance yourself from the tinnitus if you can. Try not to focus on it, don't chase up every 'miracle' cure like I did. Don't give it power. And in time you will find that you go longer and longer stretches of time without thinking about it until one day, you realise you have gone the whole day without it being a problem.
Good luck.