I want to share a story with you, a true story. Maybe it will help other people to avoid this kind of tinnitus that I have.
First of all, what is tinnitus? Tinnitus is a sound in one or both of your ears, that just you can hear. Tinnitus can be caused by damage, stress, high sounds etc. or the version I have, caused by eczema and cotton-swabs.
One year ago, it was then when it all started. I always use to clean my ears with cotton-swabs, sometimes just because it felt so good... I started to have fluid coming out of my ears because of all that cleaning with those cotton-swabs, and really dry skin in the outer ear. And of course that dry skin was itching even more. So I itched back.
One month later my ears looked horrible... They were red, swollen, and filled with eczema, all the way in to the middle ear. I tried to moisturize with a really fat cream, of course without any perfume added, and just in the outer ear.
It was hard to sleep during the nights, because fluid went out and it was a really uncomfortable feeling.
In May last year, or 5 months later, my ears was still red and itchy and had a bit of fluid inside. And I hadn't stopped with those cotton-swabs either, but I was a bit more careful when I used them, compared to before.
One day in the end of May, I cleaned my left ear, and it was totally black on the cotton-swab when I took it out.
I googled around and found out that earwax can have that kind of color, but still, I had never seen that color coming out from my ears before. And when I cleaned a bit deeper, trying to remove the rest of that black wax, I felt a sharp pain. The pain from hell. I laid down on the bed, hoping that the pain would go away. It didn't....
Later that evening my ear was hurting so bad, that I could barely sleep. I was laying and crying because of the pain.
And the fluid was now worse than ever. In the coming morning my boyfriend went down to the pharmacy and came home with painkillers and a small bottle of hydrogen peroxide.
That hydrogen peroxide was the most amazing and funniest feeling ever. I put my head on his knees and he put some drops of that liquid in my ear, and it started to bubble. I started to laugh, because it was tickling so much. But that thing also removed the itchiness a bit, so that was good.
After a few minutes he cleaned my ear carefully and a lot of ear wax came out. But the pain was still there.
After almost a week of pain I realized that I had developed otitis. I remember that feeling from my childhood...
I started to eat antibiotics for 10 days. The pain was gone after approximately 5 days.
During my time with otitis I couldn't barely hear anything from my right ear. It was totally clogged. And I also started to hear that sound....if you remember those old tv's, that sound....Bzzzzz....
I got scared, but thought it would go away when my ear-infection was gone.
For 4 weeks my ear was clogged, then slowly it went away. Summer came and also the heat and moist.
I still had eczema in my ears, but they slowly went better. The tinnitus-sound was still there.
I started to feel a bit depressed because of that sound and everyday I was hoping that it would go away...
But it didn't.
Now it's 8 months with tinnitus. Some days its lower, and some days it's higher. When I'm watching a movie my tinnitus become higher, maybe my left ear is sensitive to sounds? When I'm stressing up, it becomes higher or when I'm really tired.
I miss silence, a lot.
But I starting to get used to this now. In evening when I'm trying to fall asleep, I listen to that sound instead of counting sheeps. I'm trying to be friend with the sound. Because what else I can do? If I don't become friend with the sound I will go insane and I don't want that.
In the future I'm going to try some therapy, maybe I can train my brain to forget about the sound?
But a warning to you all, don't clean your ears deep with cotton-swabs. It can end up like it ended up with me.
And if you have tinnitus already because of other reasons or maybe even the same reason, try to live day by day and be happy that you are alive, even if you have a sound in your ear/ears. It's so much more in this life that is worth focusing on than a sound. Don't let the sound destroy you! And try not to focus so much on it.
This was a story how I got my tinnitus. If you have tinnitus, please comment below and tell me how you got it and how you deal with it daily.
Hugs from me to you! :)
Image source:
Pic nr 1: https://pixabay.com/en/ear-earring-hair-neck-face-girl-191625/
Pic nr 2: https://pixabay.com/en/cotton-swabs-flexible-rods-592148/