24F long story but cured in ~6 months

Hi everyone!

I'm writing this from a much, much better place than I was in when I first found this subreddit in July 2024.

My tinnitus started as an odd intermittent whistling beeping semi-loud sound in one ear. It came at a time I was already suffering from health anxiety and it drove me crazy to the point where I wasn't able to sleep. Soon more tones started piling on, including a constant shhhhh noise.

I figured it was because I loved listening to music, and playing FPS games such as Valorant where there are loud shooting noises involved. Although the irony is I was always quite mindful about volume as I didn't want to be deaf when I was 60.

I also developed an odd ear thump in one ear whenever there was a sound that broke silence. Later, a very kind ENT in Melbourne, Australia diagnosed me with TTTS (which I already knew from reddit, haha). He assured me that he had other patients with the same condition and that it's very very rarely doom and gloom (after advising him what I saw in these forums), and that he has never heard of it ever progressing to serious hyperacusis/pain hyperacusis. Apparently its anxiety induced and is just a small thing about me i'll have to deal with, similar to having a mole, or a lisp. Especially because I had a perfect hearing test.

Back to the tinnitus, it kept getting worse as my sleep deprivation got worse. The cycle of insomnia and sleep deprivation was a cruel joke. I received some valium from a hospital visit, it was the only thing that could get me a wink of sleep. More tones, more reactive, water running sounded like crickets etc.. My family was getting sick of having to deal with my insane depressive/anxious episode, I wasn't eating or speaking to friends, took medical leave from work. This was rock bottom, and the turning point.

My GP told me that I had anxiety, likely for a while, and it was fully showing during my encounter with tinnitus. So, I was put on fluoxetine, a SSRI medication. Three or so weeks later, I was showing so much improvement in my sleep and mood. With the SSRI and melatonin (prescription required in Australia), my sleep slowly changed back to normal until I was sleeping a full 8 hours a night again (from multiple days in a row with no sleep). My mood was improving so much, I started eating again, hanging out with friends, caring about work, doing hobbies. I was slowly habituating to the noise - it was bothering me less every day.

Oh, and bonus, the tinnitus went away! This was around 4 months after onset. No more loud beeping/whistling noises. It just stopped. The TTTS is still there but is triggered a lot less often than it was before. I still have a bit of white noise tinnitus, maybe like a 0.5/10 that I completely habituated to. of course I know the tinnitus can come back, and it probably will. Now, I'm much better equipped to deal with it. I'm still on SSRI's 6 months later, but I'm going to start weaning off them next month.

I still listen to music with headphones, but I limit it to always 40% maximum volume (I use noise cancelling to make this realistic), although I rarely ever exceed 30% as the noise cancelling is really good on Sony XM4s. I still play video games a lot, although I limit my time on FPS games like Valorant to only a couple of games once or twice a week. I also attended the Coldplay concert (loud!) and various parties with music, ALWAYS with loop earplugs on. It didn't affect my tinnitus at all, although I'm sure it could've if I didn't take precautions.

Also, it turns out tinnitus runs in my family. My cousin has had it since he was 6 years old, my auntie since 21, and my brother noticed he had mild tinnitus after I had brought it up. So it could just be a family thing.

If you're a new sufferer, my number 1 advice is to get off this forum and seek professional help immediately and invest in some earplugs for loud situations. I understand I got very lucky with the doctors available to me, and this isn't possible everywhere across the world. In that case, I'd at least check in with a doctor about your mental health. It's not the tinnitus that hurts (unless very severe, of course), its your mental health. Tinnitus isn't treatable, but anxiety and depression are.

Good luck everyone. Happy to answer any questions