'It's all gone so loud' - what can we do?

[MrsMot]

Don't know if anyone has any ideas - we're going to get a gp appt when they eventually reopen. We're just at a loss as to what's causing this

Ds1 (12) has awful episodes where as he describes, 'the volume in my head just goes wrong'.

Tonight he's come down in floods of tears and v distressed - the 'noise volume level' in his head has gone incredibly high, despite the house being quiet. He was shaking, flushed and scared.

This has happened several times now, there's no real pattern although it seems to happen more in the evening. It has happened in school a couple of times.

His usual way to cope is to put on some headphones and low music but even that didn't help tonight. I had to hold him v close and sing low and quiet. Dh has taken him to bed and will sleep with him until he's settled.

We wondered if it was an attention seeking thing but he is so distressed and it's so out of character we're flummoxed . Does anyone had any ideas about what this could be??

Is it the outside noises or noises from inside his head? I would be thinking tinnitus but that needs to get checked out as could have a neurological cayuse.

Wondering about tinnitus. My grandmother had it quite badly.

She always said the tinnitus noise level would vary quite a lot and at times would be unbearably loud.

She also found introducing other noise tv, radio, classical music would help distract or sort of drown it out

She also described it as if she was hearing the tinnitus noise in her head.

She did have surgery at one point which didn't cure it but lowered the level of noise and made it more bearable.

This was 30 years ago so things medical will have come a long way since then.

I would suggest seeing GP with your son or if he has a really bad episode over Christmas, go to out of hours to get checked out.

Just in case it's something else.

It sounds like tinnitus to me too. I have it, have done for 15 years, and it tends to get worse in the evening when I'm tired and/or it's quiet.

I have a speaker pillow that I listen to audio books with at night. That helps distract me from the noise. If it is tinnitus the hospital might be able to get him a white noise generator, which does much the same thing.

Wish I had more constructive advice as it's just horrible.

Thanks, I wondered about tinnitus. It's just so horrible to see him so upset. It is 'inside' his head which is what I think causes him the most distress.

Yes, it's the brain over compensating for the hearing loss apparently. It scared me too at first, and I was in my mid-twenties when it happened. I've been in bed for an hour and now that it's going to be one of those nights for me too.

Just to update this, saw gp this morning. He's doing an urgent referral to paeds so hopefully we'll have a better idea of what's going on.

Glad you got a swift referral.

I hope you'll get answers soon. I also hope your DS isn't too distressed.