ED drugs and tinnitus - HORRIBLE experience!

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I have mild form of that 6800hz whine. Comes and goes. Occassionally it flares up enough to be annoying and I cant imagine living with that level 24/7... let alone what you are going though.

Hoping you have a speedy recovery.

Note: apparently I can hear to 16800hz in my right ear and about 15500 in my left ear.

I know that drops drastically as you age.
 
Maybe you could get hearing aids and turn the volume up until the tinnitus sound is less
 
i am profoundly deaf in one ear and have tinnitus in the other, I have total empathy and personal sadness at your situation as I have experienced the same problem

one solution ironically is a hearing aid, the new digital hearing aids can be tuned to emit the identical tone that your tinnitus frequency is perceived, this works on the same principle as active noise cancellation in a car

lets say your tinnitus is at 1000hz, hearing aid will send back a 1000hz tone into your eardrum to suppress the noise, the hearing aid technician will tailor the decibel threshold to more or less kill off the ringing

and it works (at least for me it does)

http://www.starkeycanada.ca/hearing-aids/technologies/xino-tinnitus

give it a try, I am sure all of us want you to get better
 
Slo, so sorry to hear of your present condition. You are not alone. Hang in there and keep looking for effective treatments to get better soon!
 
Hello All:

Thanks to all of you for your considerations. It's really appreciated!

A few comments:

1) With all the ED drugs, one of the possible side effects is changes in hearing or vision. In my passionate opinion, the consequences of these side effects are woefully understated. IMO, they should say that deafness and blindness is possible if one continues to take these ED drugs with hearing and vision side effects.
2) With respect to my ED, I had no real problem per se. I had a few instances (less than 3 or 4 over a three month period) where my body was not cooperating. That said, I was under a great deal of stress regarding a trust on my wife's side. My wife's family put me in charge of correcting things, which was extremely stressful. Family members and money issues can make for poor behavior, and I was the one who had the fix it and break the news to those trying to take advantage of things. I think stress was my problem, not something physical.
3) My hearing test indicated that I actually have above average hearing for someone my age. Hearing aids are not likely to provide benefit for me because I don't need sound amplification. I can hear just fine in voice type frequencies.
4) I do have high frequency hearing loss, as do most men my age. However, my high frequency hearing is really bad. I have never even noticed this. The human brain is programmed to expect a frequency range. The problem with people who suffer with tinnitus is that their brains recognize this lost frequency. The brains of tinnitus sufferers try to correct things and produce the missing frequency on its own. This is a bad thing. People without tinnitus, but with hearing loss; their brains do not try and correct for this loss of frequency. This is a good thing.
5) There are "noise cancelling" hearing aids that try to program the brain to stop producing my tinnitus sounds. As I said, tinnitus sounds are produced in the brain, not the ear. However, this noise cancelling approach only works with people who have hearing. I am very fortunate in this respect. A person can be stone deaf but still have tinnitus. I have great pity for these people!!!!!!!
6) Stress reduction is essential in controlling/lessening tinnitus. This is a huge challenge because tinnitus causes a great deal of stress!
7) Dietary changes are also essential. Salt, alcohol, sugar, and caffeine consumption must be greatly reduced, or eliminated entirely. All these things are things I like! That said, this will be the easy part.
8) Meditation is a key component as well. I am not a mediation kind of guy. I don't even know how to do it, but I must learn, and start right now. I've bought books on it and am studying them now. I will seek out meditation groups to speed my learning curve. From what I've read, meditation must become a permanent part of my life, for the rest of my life, if I want to beat tinnitus.
9) It takes great discipline to not let tinnitus stop you dead in your tracks. It sucks the initiative and motivation out of your body. For example, I love hardcore road bicycling. It is a life long love of mine. That said, I had to force myself to go out for a short 7.5 mile loop today. I hadn't ridden for several days. I often ride over 200 miles per week. Even though I rode just 7.5 miles today, I did it! I refused to let tinnitus steal one of my favorite things in life. I punched my tinnitus in the face and rode today. And I'm going to ride again tomorrow. I'm proud of myself! I will not be defeated!
10) My wonderful wife is a career professional and started a new job today. That is stressful for anyone. Sadly, I was not able to offer her the support and encouragement that she needed and deserved. I was mired in my own misery. I will NOT let that happen again!

I am fighting as hard as I can. I am genuinely hopeful that my symptoms will fade back to normal because of my short term, low dosage usage. It will take a great deal of work to speed my recovery and to keep myself from wasting a year of my life waiting. I hope I'm up to the task. I think I am. The thought that my condition could be permanent is not something I can fathom right now.

My family and friends have been really great. Both my sons have been fantastic. My wife is her regular remarkable self. They are greatly helping my efforts because they remind me how much they care for me and how much I have to lose.

One of my good friends, Rick Stxxx (you get it), told me yesterday, "Scott, hang in there. You will be a better person on the other side of this." He's right. I believe I've been good and fair to all those I have touched in my life. But I know I could have done better. His comment gives me hope and inspiration to do better.

Thanks to all of you,

Scott
 
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Originally Posted By: 2004tdigls
i am profoundly deaf in one ear and have tinnitus in the other, I have total empathy and personal sadness at your situation as I have experienced the same problem

one solution ironically is a hearing aid, the new digital hearing aids can be tuned to emit the identical tone that your tinnitus frequency is perceived, this works on the same principle as active noise cancellation in a car

lets say your tinnitus is at 1000hz, hearing aid will send back a 1000hz tone into your eardrum to suppress the noise, the hearing aid technician will tailor the decibel threshold to more or less kill off the ringing

and it works (at least for me it does)

http://www.starkeycanada.ca/hearing-aids/technologies/xino-tinnitus

give it a try, I am sure all of us want you to get better


Hey, this is good advice for me- I too have mild tinnitus and my dermatologist has hearing aids and tinnitus : he told me that the hearing aids can help the symptoms of tinnitus but did not provide as much detail as you.
 
Thanks for your post.

I have had tinnitus since 1970. During this past year, I have been fasting for other reasons and noticed a reduction in the volume and frequency shifts of the ear noise. Dr Jason Fung has written a book about fasting which I found very good. My regimen is one 48 hour fast per week, with the occasional 96 hour fast in a week. Dr Fung also has a website that has most of his program in a free blog. Blog post 1 of many: https://intensivedietarymanagement.com/fasting-a-history-part-i/

I meditate 20 minutes each morning for other reasons. I have been doing that since 1974. Perhaps it has kept me from experiencing degradation of my symptoms, but am not sure. It certainly has plenty outcomes that would ameliorate tinnitus. I am basically a one-trick-pony mediator. Sit and focus on my breath passing my nostrils. These days, I have to set an egg timer, or I go way over my 20 minutes.
 
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SLO Town here, I thought I would give you an update regard my rapid onset of tinnitus. It was caused by taking Levitra, an ED prescription med. Read my original post.

------------------------

After 8 1/2 months I am still experiencing severe tinnitus. I have seen a half dozen medical specialists. Each and every one of these doctors has told me that they have seen situations similar to mine - one of the ED drugs causing tinnitus. One when so far as to tell me, "Feel fortunate that your didn't go blind. That happened to a patient I saw." All these doctors show great concern and empathy, but there is nothing they can do. There is no cure for tinnitus. It is considered a "debilitating condition". I emphatically say that it is far worse than that. It's more like ongoing torture.

Because I am still considered a risk to my self, I have been advised (for the second time) to see a psychiatrist. The thought is that I need to be put on anti-depressants so I can better cope with this screeching noise in my head. That noise is there 24/7/365. It is the loudest sound I hear, even while driving my car on coarse pavement or riding my bicycle and descending 40mph down Peach Canyon Road. Imagine how loud it is when you try to sleep! It's nearly impossible. I routinely get just 4 1/2 to 5 hours of fitful sleep a night. And it shows. I look like s h i t.

My message to you BITOG folks, please consider the possible side effects of these ED drugs (Levitra for me). Sex has always been a big part of my truly wonderful 41 year marriage. My wife is a fantastic woman in every sense. But our lives are in a state of limbo right now. I cannot imagine living like this for another 25 to 30 years (I'm 64 now).

I'd gladly give up sex for the rest of my life it I could make this tinnitus go away. And those who know me, know that sex has always been important to my wife and me. It also bothers me alot that my two sons are so concerned about me they fear a phone call from their Mom one morning that I am no longer alive. This saddens me more than you can imagine. It's another form of tinnitus torture.

You have been warned,

Scott
 
I don't have voices in my head, I have screams. Mine has grown increasingly worse in 20 yrs. Along with deafness. Some times it is worse than others. Wife's uncle, had it after a dose of penicillin. Working in comm and data sites with positive pressure A/C keeping the fiber muxxes cool is what I blame for mine.
 
Scott, I'm so sorry that you are having to go through this. Being in any kind of situation where it seems like there is no answer, no solution is terrible and it makes you very weary. I hope the tinnitus passes quickly so that you can have peace of mind and your life back again the way it was before this happened. If you ever want to talk, you can PM me anytime.

Praying for you and your family,

Tony
 
Wow...quite a story. Your world and mine are completely different in many, many ways.

I have experienced tinnutus for several months, decades ago now after landing on the water from an unfortunate water skiing fall. My hearing in that ear fell off, it could feel it was swollen, and it 'rang like a bell' all of the time.

Sleeping was difficult so I turned on a radio one night to give my brain something else to focus on. You could also listen to an endless recording of the surf.

I found meditation useful as well as focusing exercises. Point being to work on being able to move myself away from the sound. Rather than being 100% consumed by it, I could encircle it by mentally backing away from it. It's tough to explain this with words. The process is very gradual, like building a wall from single bricks.

Another exercise I used was to imagine a large valve wheel connected to the sound. Once connected, I could turn it by counting backwards, decreasing the volume. Another way to think about it is to step into an elevator and watch the 'floors' decrease as you go down.

Point is, you'll have to train your brain to focus amidst the noise. This takes deep concentration and the ability to reframe this experience.

Hope this makes sense.
 
Scott,
sounds easy when someone says it, but you aren't defined by the noise. If it's your sole focus, it will destroy you, and I've read of people who it has.

sleddriver's technique are sound.

I've been dealing with it forever it seems like, but have gotten to the point that I forget about it. Just focussed on it, and it's clearly as loud as the TV in the room, just most times I genuinely forget about it.

When it becomes annoying, like lying in bed, I focus on it, then imagine a new sound, exactly the same, but one note higher (give or take), then make that note the loudest thing in my head for a minute or so. Then when I drop that focus, I can sleep.
 
Side note is that the thermostats on the HVAC "upgrade" at work all sit there and buzz 24/7. I've got one in my office, and it just gets tuned out with the other noises.

It must be annoying, as visitors go looking for the noise, and others complain that they cant's work in their workspaces with the ongoing buzz...It's almost like a super power.
 
Cats are a good example of tuning out sounds...but staying tuned to the rustle of a mouse in grass. Sitting here on a quiet day, I can listen to my tinnitus, it's pretty loud if I focus on it...day to day it's not even there. But it doesn't sound like it's anywhere near the OP's level.
 
I'm 23 and have been having some tinnitus. But i'm also now taking Gabapentin for my sciatica. I asked my doctor and she said it's not a real common side effect but could cause it, she says it won't permanently cause tinnitus if it's the cause, I'm not so sure. I quit taking it for a while and it seemed to get better but I'm back on it now and I still have it.

Anyone know if Gabapentin can cause this? Thanks.
 
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