Hacker News new | past | comments | ask | show | jobs | submit
I've got tinnitus, 38 male.

Got it randomly one day this summer.

It's impossible to describe how depressing it is to hear a sound non stop in your ears, night and day, wherever I go or whatever I do, it just never stops.

The brain started filtering it out a bit after months, but it's always there and you're often reminded of it when you're in a slightly more silent environment.

There are days where it becomes especially loud and falling asleep you'd just like to cry or something.

Don't wish it on anybody.

I've had tinnitus for as long as I can remember, so I've never had any negative feelings associated with it. As a kid I just thought it was natural that everyone's ears would ring all the time and would get louder when it was quiet. My ears are ringing right now as I write this.

Then I developed pulsatile tinnitus in my early 30s, which means I can hear my heartbeat in my (right) ear at all hours of the day as well. When I tell people about it, I like to describe it like the heartbeat from Poe's The Tell-Tale Heart.

Developing pulsatile tinnitus really affected my mental health for a while, despite living my whole life with a constant buzzing and ringing in my ears. I couldn't get over the fact that there was now this loud whooshing sound in my right ear, 60+ times per second, and my doctors couldn't even tell me why after several MRIs. I thought I was going crazy, or that I'd developed some kind of brain tumor invisible to scans.

I don't have any great advice except to say that eventually (maybe six months to a year) my brain just adapted to the sound and I hardly ever think of it anymore. It's as much a part of my life as the buzzing and ringing I've had since I was a kid. It can be annoying when I'm trying to listen intently for something (my wife is a birder and it's hard to hear things she points out), but it thankfully doesn't affect my mental health anymore.

I always had problems with sinuses. I've had a few surgeries and while it's better, it's not good either. I literally had a drill up my nose, in my forehead. They still hurt and pop on their own, many times a day.

One day my kid brought a nasty flu from the kindergarten. My otolaryngologist recommended the strongest irrigation stream I can find to clean my sinuses.

Not only did it not help, but it also pushed some goo to the end of my sinuses, which resulted in pulsatile tinnitus.

After about 6 months my kid got sick again, so we all got sick, and I got rid of this tinnitus where I was hearing my heartbeat, by casually blowing my nose. The trick was having a stiff blockage, I guess, so the pressure builds up.

It sounds stupid and probably won't help you, but I wanted to share my story. I had no support from the people close to me and the heartbeat was driving me insane.

I'm sorry you have to go through this. Even though it's not a life-treating condition, it might be a life changing condition (QoL).

You sound like me! I have had sinus issues all my life before 17. I even had a surgery at 16 but I honestly don’t think it helped. Now I have the sinus problem a bit under control, aka I still have occasional infections during allergy and cold season. I use NielMed to wash my sinus and I think it helps a lot. Besides that I really don’t know what it would take to fix it permanently. I constantly can feel the mucus dripping down my throat everyday.
loading story #47289412
loading story #47288496
loading story #47288475
loading story #47289327
loading story #47289272
loading story #47288399
loading story #47288579
loading story #47288403
loading story #47288369
loading story #47289404
loading story #47288408
A lot of people hear a slight hiss. Is that tinnitus? Faint enough that it's not noticable 90% of the time.
loading story #47288482
loading story #47288371
loading story #47289259
loading story #47288333
loading story #47289336
loading story #47288323
loading story #47288413
loading story #47288507
loading story #47288357
loading story #47288396
loading story #47289209
loading story #47289148
loading story #47288346
loading story #47288197
loading story #47288559
loading story #47291666
loading story #47288132
As somebody with tinnitus, forgive me, this seemed instinctively obvious. A very bad night of sleep raises the volume of the tinnitus substantially. Stress does the same.
loading story #47289456
loading story #47289329
loading story #47289831
loading story #47288878
loading story #47290944
loading story #47290329
loading story #47290897
loading story #47290441
loading story #47291201
loading story #47290969
loading story #47288196
loading story #47290360
loading story #47289093
loading story #47291291
loading story #47288800
loading story #47289671
loading story #47290430
loading story #47290102
loading story #47289766
loading story #47288489
loading story #47289196
loading story #47290163
loading story #47289716
loading story #47289237
loading story #47290133
loading story #47290726
loading story #47290076
loading story #47288583
loading story #47288845
loading story #47289131
loading story #47288465
loading story #47288263
loading story #47289996
loading story #47288092