Scared - Tinnitus help/handholding - massively struggling to deal with it

[Sleepy21]

To ask for any tips/stories on how to manage/cope with onset of tinnitus, particularly when you have young children? Really down and struggling, sleep especially, so would be grateful with anything anyone could share! 🙏

Thank you so much - yes, please let me know how you get on. Going to speak to my GP next week about ENT referral

Thank you 🙏 I keep re- reading these types of messages when I have a bad day to help get me through! Some days are ok and others bad, hoping the bad will reduce soon!

I’ve had it about 8 years and mostly don’t hear it (can now as thinking about it!)

I went to a hearing clinic and they said I had to teach my brain to ignore it, in that it’s a normal sound that it doesn’t need to warn me of.

they used a helpful (at least to me!) example that every second of every day your brain is checking your feet are safely on the ground.
I’ll bet you can feel your feet now 😉 🤣!!

If you happen to trip the brain recognises this isn’t normal and warns you to put out your hand to stabilise yourself or balance yourself with your other foot. So you need to get to a point where the brain is checking re sounds but doesn’t need to highlight to you the fact that it is there and in essence ignore it, the same as not telling you all the time that your feet are in contact with the floor.

I don’t recall there is a way to train it other than to try and ignore it yourself and not focus on it. I hate background noise and can’t deal with lots of sound inputs at once (eg: music and multiple people talking) and actually quite like silence but think I’m a bit odd in that regard!

I hope you can find a way to try and ignore it and hopefully it will lessen a lot over time x

Thank you so much - that is a great way to think of it, and I will start putting it into practice! These types of messages make me feel more positive about learning to ignore it - I am finding the more I think about it the more I hear it, so trying to keep distracted and busy and focus on other sounds when I hear it

Just in case it's relevant, my tinnitus was cured by a root canal in a cracked tooth. It also cured my chronic sinusitis. I now think I had a low level infection under the tooth festering for 25 years or so....

Hello OP how are you doing now? Im going through the same as you at the moment. I cannot escape from the noise & it's driving me mad. Im really trying hard to accept it but it's easier said than done. Fancy a chat sometime? I could do with talking to someone that is in the same boat as me x

Hi @RealMcCoy1979 so sorry to hear you’re having a tough time - I can’t even begin to explain how much I understand what you are going through! The good news is I am doing a lot better than I was when I started this post, and at that point I couldn’t imagine being where I am now - I honestly thought I would never feel like myself again! I never thought I would be able to accept it, but I have slowly come round. I don’t know if the tinnitus has quietened down or if I have habituated but I try not to overthink it because either way it’s so much better! Please do DM me so we can have a chat - that was one of the hardest parts for me, trying to find someone who was going through the same so I could talk about it - it’s hard to understand unless you’ve experienced it xx

Hi. Hearing aids have helped my mum cope with her tinnitus. Silence makes it worse so she listens to music