Whistles and Tinnitus

[McRick]

Tinnitus is one of the reasons why I prefer quiet whistles and, well, quiet everything. I use plugs for mowing the grass and the like. For anything really loud I use muffs AND plugs.

I seldom notice my tinnitus except when I'm trying to sleep. I have to have white noise in my bedroom to drown out the ringing. For that I use a rainstorm CD. It works very well.

The research I've read said that the affect on the patient has little to do with the volume of the ringing or anything else. It's mostly a matter of the patient's attitude toward it. It's almost literally true that if you ignore it the sound goes away. I hadn't noticed my own tinnitus for several days until I read this thread and now it's ringing like crazy. In my experience, anxiety about it really seems to boost the volume.

Just wondering, how does labyrinthitis differ from Meniere's disease?

[Mick Down Under]

Yep, I got it too. The ringing in my ears began when I was 21, and foolishly fired some rounds out of a .22 magnum revolver without ear protection...

You got off lightly mate, I foolishly forgot to replace my earplugs just before I stepped up to the shooting mound with five other blokes. We all fired off fifty rounds each with M60 GPMG's. Needless to say I was deaf for a couple of days and no friend of my section commander for this little bit of forgetful stupidity.


Mick

[Ceili_whistle_man]

Labyrinthitis is an infection of the ear, anyone can get it (like a cold), it is just a lot more annoying/painful for people with tinnitus because of the underlying noise they are having to manage day to day, so having the added dizziness and nausea that comes with labyrinthitis makes it altogether unpleasant.
If you have Meniere’s disease, bad luck, it’s there to stay, there is no cure and the best help is careful management of the condition.
I am not a medical practitioner and am not offering advice/diagnosis, I have had tinnitus for as long as I can remember and have learned to self manage the condition.
I have a permanent high pitched hissing/whistling sound in my ears/head. The benefit of this permanent drone is that I can tune my guitar without a tuner because I hear a constant drone of a mid/low A, and I also have a mid range G and a high E.
What I have noticed in the last couple of months is that I am now hearing a fluctuating low tone which hovers around B and drops to D for a ¼ beat and back up for one or two beats then down again, and up again, and down again and so forth. There is no pattern to the duration of the B and D, only that they fluctuate, I am finding it really hard to block this drone out and I am starting to lose sleep over it.
I have found that I am playing my whistles less, I prefer my flute, the second octave B and A are really hard to listen to on any of my whistles so I try to stay away from them.
If you would like to find out more about what tinnitus is and it's related conditions, have a read of this
http://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/bhcv ... enDocument
Once again, I have no connection with the site, I just found it was helpful in understanding my condition.

[dfernandez77]

clicky

I have a pair of Etymotic ER•4 MicroPro™ earphones and a dedicated earphone USB DAC and amp. I use them on airplanes, and for high isolation when monitoring live recordings. Etymotic makes good stuff.

I also have Tinnitus, for which the audiologist can't find a source. It's a very specific tone high pitched squeal in the background always in my left ear. Luckily it's not at too high a volume, and it's way over the pitch of any note played on a whistle. So except for a tiny range - like judging reverb wetness for high percussion, and sibilance in high dynamics - it causes little interference.

[McRick]

If you would like to find out more about what tinnitus is and it's related conditions, have a read of this
http://www.betterhealth.vic.gov.au/bhcv ... enDocument

Very good site. Thanks!

[Ceili_whistle_man]

Has anyone else tested the frequency/tone of their tinnitus?
I used an electronic keyboard with a pitch variance paddle fitted. I found that the tones I hear are all on pitch, there may be undertones there that I am able to block out to stop any dissonance from happening, but I have tried bending the pitch of several notes to see if I get a matching tone and was unsuccessful (thank jayzus!)
Clashing tones would send me over the edge I think .
Mine started out (about 30 years ago) as a single pitch close to Fnat, it has since developed into a multi-toned ringing/hissing combined with a couple of very low rumbling tones. The low tones are a recent addition to the cacophany.
I always assumed (I don't know why) that tinnitus affected everyone in both ears, like it does me, so I find it interesting that some of you have it in only one ear. Am I reading the posts correctly, do some of you mean that it is only in one ear, or is it in both ears but with an over balance to one side making it seem like it is only affecting one ear?
I don't know what would be worse; having 'surround sound' tinnitus like me, or having an annoying little leprechaun sitting one one shoulder whistling into only one ear.

[AngeloMeola]

Some time ago, I measured the sound level of my whistles in my living room and most of the generation type were about 95 db. Susato went up to 100 at the peak. I can often be drowned out at a session when we have several fiddlers going. I don't use ear plugs, but I limit the time I spend in noisy environments. The typical session I go to lasts about 2 hours. Not all of that time is spent actually playing. For a 2 hour exposure, the maximum sound level industrial standards allow is 100 db. The rest of the day should be 80 db or lower.

I think I will look into those hifi plugs. Maybe I won't have to leave early.

[westwind]

As I suffer from unilateral deafness I've no idea whether or not I have uni or bilateral tinnitus, intersetingly when I first developed my tiniitus some years ago the only reason I was referred to a consultant was because of this fact, apparently unilateral tinnitus can be indicative of something more serious whereas bilateral is taken as routine and doesn't warrant a referral to ENT.

[McRick]

Am I reading the posts correctly, do some of you mean that it is only in one ear, or is it in both ears but with an over balance to one side making it seem like it is only affecting one ear?

Mine is in the right ear constantly and only occasionally in the left.

When trying to sleep, if I put my right ear against the pillow (thus shutting out the white noise rainstorm CD) the ringing can be too distracting. But if I roll onto my left side and have the left ear against the pillow all is well.

No big deal really. Just one of the many conditions that can accompany growing older. Sure beats the alternative.

[dlovrien]

Excellent thread - lots of helpful info. Thanks everyone!

I've had tinnitus since I was a child, and after reading some of the other accounts here and I am grateful that mine is balanced between both ears and has only very high frequencies (10Khz+). I think that has made it easier to ignore over the years.

I do recording and live sound mixing fairly often and I wonder sometimes whether I overcompensate on the high frequencies due to the T. I ask others to listen for the specifically and rarely get complaints, so I guess I'm coping well. Playing whistles never aggravates it - even a Susato in the 2nd octave doesn't reach the dB level of the average PA system, even when it's only acoustic music.

[Raggle Taggle]

I brought my Dixon Trad to my Audiologist to have the Dbs checked.

The high notes measured at 94db to about 80db. The audiologist suggested that a single whistle played an hour a day with these intermittent peaks should not cause damage. She did suggest that if a number of instruments were being played and the times were longer, one should consider earplugs.

It did surpise me though, how loud the whistle measured. 85 db being the benchmark for concern over a period of time. The louder you go the less time you have before hearing damage.

It seems I will be OK for practice but sessions will be different. In other words, I am safe for a loong time.... honk!

[Whitmores75087]

I have T. Good earplugs don't interfere with the tone too much. My hearing is worth more than missing a little tone.

[fearfeasog]

I'm going to revive this thread if only briefly because I think it's a good idea to reintroduce the topic every few years at least!

Part of my coping strategy for T is hearing others' stories and knowing that I am less alone. I find that comforting, somehow--many of you probably get that. Thanks alot for sharing your stories.

I've had T for about 14 years--forgot my plugs, went to the loudest club concert of my life, in a place with the worst acoustics in town, drank VERY heavily and stood by the speakers up front. Jeebus what a moron. The T is in both ears, the left a little louder, but both ears are pretty damn loud. I rarely don't hear it anymore.

When I play without plugs (which is occasionally, alone, and not for long--couple of tunes maybe 30 minutes tops) I find that my fear of the T getting worse plus the contrast between the loudness of the tunes vs. the silence afterwards actually makes the T seem louder, Probably it isn't, really, though. In the last year It does seem to have gotten louder for whatever reason--it's difficult to be truly and perfectly fastidious about wearing plugs for every situation--and that prompted me to look into musician's plugs, which attenuate evenly across the frequency spectrum. I got Westones, here in the States they seem pretty common. I like them quite a bit. Highly recommended.

so yeah, everyone hang in there. I'm trying to get over the "slight embarrassment" factor that I personally feel when I go to put my plugs on at a session. I know, it's really stupid. But for some reason I just don't want to be noticed doing it, don't want anyone to ask, don't want it to be an issue. I do realize though that it's an opportunity to tell people how important hearing protection is. So I'm sure I'll get over the hump and just do it. Besides, my plugs are acid green! It looks like I have caterpillars crawling out of my ears when I wear them. Not gonna hide that.

Has anyone else tested the frequency/tone of their tinnitus?

Yep, I *have* tried to find my T's freq. It's not as easy as it seems like it should be. It's waaay up there in the 15kHz range, though. I used some recording software I have. Reaper, It's called. has a tone generating plugin.

PS--I just tested the loudness of my Low Tech whistle (which I made) and the higher notes--high G, A, B--are all around 90-100 decibels. ouch. I'm making one with a narrower windway to see how much that actually affects the sound output. should be interesting. it'll be a 6mm tapered in from 8mm, vs. the original 8mm, no taper.

[Raggle Taggle]

I thought I might throw in an update since I started this thread back in 2009. My T is a part of my life and i have learned how to live with it. I switched octaves by learning the low whistle and flute. These are plenty loud, but the perception of the high D whistle shrillnesss scared me initially. Now, I can push a high D whistle and it doesn't bother me nearly as much.

I have been using Tinnutis Retraining Therapy (TRT) over the past two years which involves wearing hearing aids (which I needed anyway) that generate a consistant tone just under the frequency of my T. The idea is that over time your brain focuses on the tone of your aids and less on your T. This takes a long time but it has worked for me in the sense that I no longer think about my T all day. Tinnutis aside, the recovered audio frequencies from my hearing aids have really re-opened the world for me.

There are good days and bad days probably just like people with bad backs. Obviously, I don't go to sporting events without earplugs and I am careful about prolonged loud noise exposure. The important thing is that I no longer associate my T with my intimate form of music creation.

[Tor]

My left ear tinnitus is around 8KHz, which is also the exact frequency where there's a great big "dip" in any hearing test diagram. I got that tinnitus on new year's eve in 1979 or 1980. I was deaf in my left ear for two days, and when the hearing came back I had tinnitus. These days I have some tinnitus in my right ear as well, that's probably from more long-term noise.

Fortunately the tinnitus doesn't bother me much, even though I always hear it in non-noisy environments (for example now, when sitting alone in the living room typing on this keyboard).

Some years ago I started to wear noise-cancelling headphones during flights. I noticed that after intercontinental flights I could have increased tinnitus for up to a month afterwards, and shorter flights maybe two or three days. Using noise-cancelling headphones helps.

About earplugs - there shouldn't be any reason to be embarrassed by using earplugs, if anything that should make you look more professional! - every musician I know are using them these days. And some of them deeply regret that they didn't start using them the day they first stood on a stage! I just wish I had used them earlier myself.. all those loud concerts.. well, later tonight I'll head out to watch the fireworks, and as always the last 30+ years (after that incident back in '79 or '80) I'll wear earplugs, _plus_ a big heavy-duty hat with earflaps. That'll look perfectly fine here, it's cold outside. (Around here everybody have their own personal fireworks show, with firecrackers and whatnot. They can explode _really_ close.. and how I hate exploding fireworks, I would be perfectly fine with just the lights.)

-Tor