<![CDATA[The Hyperacusis Network Message Board]]>

<![CDATA[The Hyperacusis Network Message Board]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net 60 Sat, 02 Jun 2012 04:23:55 GMT <![CDATA[Headphones for Pink Noise]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5870496
I finally got my hands on a pink noise cd. Realizing that I will need to listen to this sound for up to 8 hours/day, I bought some very nice comfy headphones made by beyerdynamic called the dt880 pro . The are" semi-open" style, meaning that they attenuate the outside sound a bit, but you can still hear ambient noise relatively clearly. When I ordered the headphones, I did not realize that this company also makes a dt990 pro model, which is open ear. Should I exchange them? I don't want to wait another 2 weeks for new headphones to show up. Is the semi-open model "good enough" for our purposes when trying to listen to pink noise?

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5870496 Thu, 31 May 2012 22:23:40 GMT <![CDATA[Decreased sound tolerance (DST): hyperacusis and misophonia by Dr. Pawel Jastreboff]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5870424

From Dan:

Dr. Pawel Jastreboff graciously offered to write an article for the network newsletter. He is a very busy man and I am grateful that he even considered doing this. He finished the article and plans to circulate it but did not want to do so until the June network newsletter came out. However, since then an American TV program (20/20) aired a program on misophonia. Since that program aired Pawel emailed me this memo expressing the urgency to make his article public:

The 20/20 presentation (on misophonia) caused lots of confusion and demands from both patients and audiologists. I am getting a lot of requests for advice and for comments. In this situation the fastest and probably optimal reaction for me would be posting the text I sent you on my web page, but I do not want to do it before you post it on yours. Would it be possible that you post it over the weekend and then I will do the same? I honestly believe that doing this will help many confused and scared patients and help professionals as well.

Pawel

Decreased sound tolerance (DST): hyperacusis and misophonia

Pawel J. Jastreboff, Ph.D., Sc.D., M.B.A. and Margaret M. Jastreboff, Ph.D.

Emory University School of Medicine & Jastreboff Hearing Disorders Foundation, Inc.

(This text contains some information which was presented at the lecture during AAA Annual meeting, Boston 2012)

Sounds of different pitch, loudness, spectral complexity, and duration may be to some people pleasant, but to others neutral, the same sounds can be unpleasant, uncomfortable, annoying or even hurtful to others. There are many studies related to the effects of sound on humans focused on psychological consequences, general health issues, engineering challenges, development of new technologies, environmental problems. Studies with the use of non-verbal digitized sounds showed that when presented on a comfortable level, on the average they induce similar emotional responses in people from different countries and backgrounds. Nevertheless, there is a significant group of people whose lives are significantly affected in the negative manner by the sounds not significant to other people and who suffer due to decreased tolerance to sound. Interestingly, it is not simply the loudness, pitch, and duration of sound which cause a problem, but these factors are most commonly considered when offering advice to patients. In the case of sensitivity to louder sounds the most common advice is to use ear protection and avoiding these sounds, which unfortunately frequently leads to worsening of the problem. Moreover, patients’ complaints are frequently classified as exclusively psychological or behavioral problems and treated accordingly to this diagnosis. It is not unusual that patients’ problems are simply ignored and there is no help offered.

Decreased sound tolerance may have profound impact on patients' lives as it may restrain exposure to louder environment, prevent them from work, reduce social interactions, negatively affect family life and, in extreme cases, it may control the patients' life. Even milder severity DST could affect quality of life by interfering everyday activities, e.g., driving car, shopping, going to restaurants, going to movies, attending sport events, use of noisy tools, hair dryer, vacuum cleaner, lawn mower, listening to music or TV.

Certain triggering factors for DSTare commonly reported by patients such as: chronic exposure to sound, e.g., at work, school, explosion and impulse noise, e.g., guns, fireworks; head injury, surgery of the head (particularly involving ear); stress associated with an event / activity involving sound, e.g., dental procedure, wedding, concert, participating for first time in summer camp, eating in new, stressful surrounding, cafeteria in new school or in college, sound of eating of a new unfriendly person, sounds after moving to a new house or to college. Some medical problems are linked to DST with tinnitus being most common. Lyme disease, withdrawal from benzodiazepines and tensor tympani syndrome, some surgical procedure, genetic disorder (William syndrome) and autism have been linked to DST as well.

There is still lack of agreement regarding definition of decreased sound tolerance. Decreased sound tolerance canbe defined as being present when a subject exhibits negative reactions as a result of exposure to sound that would not evoke the same reaction in an average listener. Reported reactions include discomfort, distress, annoyance, anxiety, variety of emotional reactions, pain, fear and other negative responses. In the past two phenomena, hyperacusis and phonophobia have been linked to DST: 1) Hyperacusis - when subject reacts negatively to all "louder sounds" and 2) Phonophobia - when subjectis "afraid of specific sound or one’s own voice."

In 1990's when TRT was developed and used to help tinnitus patients, it became obvious to us that many tinnitus patients and actually some people without bothersome tinnitus as well, complain about discomfort caused by sound. In our work we always pay big attention to patients’ description of their problems and through this we have been gradually accumulating clinical knowledge on how to help patients in the most effective manner. In 2000 it become evident that while about 60% of our tinnitus patients exhibited DST, only a minority of them reacted to loud sound disregarding their meaning and situation when they were exposed to sound. The majority of patients reacted negatively only to specific patterns of sound frequently (but not always) associated with specific situations /places, e.g., neighbor playing music; sound of eating, chewing, swallowing at home or at school; voices of specific people, clicking sound, e.g., copy machine; running water; crackling sound, e.g., paper, fireplace; high flying airplanes. At the same time these patients could tolerate even high level of other sounds, e.g., loud music or noise of busy street. This category of patients did not fit into a hyperacusis category. A relatively small group of patients expressed fearful reactions to sound while others talk specifically about different emotions, e.g., discomfort, dislike and they were strongly opposed to their condition being described as phonophobia.

With some hesitation regarding introducing a new term it appeared to develop a word describing these complaints. We askedfor help from Guy Lee, Don at St. John’s College of Cambridge University, U.K., an expert in Greek and Latin literature, to provide a list of pre- and postfixes which would convey a negative reaction/attitude to something. He sent us about 20 different words, but none were perfect. Finally we decided on the prefix“miso” meaning “hate” in Greek and we proposed the new term, misophonia, to describe this subtype of DST. To avoid word “hate,” which is very powerful and has very strong negative meaning, we used in writing or lectures a “diluted/milder” wording “strong dislike” or even simply “dislike.” Unfortunately, some professionals and patients took the word literally and started to associate misophonia with dislike of sound in general.

The term was introduced into public domain in 2001 (Jastreboff, M.M., Jastreboff, P.J. Hyperacusis. Audiology On-line, 6-18-2001) and in peer-reviewed journal in 2002 (Jastreboff, M.M. and Jastreboff, P.J. Decreased sound tolerance and Tinnitus Retraining Therapy (TRT). Australian andNew Zealand Journal of Audiology. 24(2):74-81, 2002). DST results from the summation of the effects of hyperacusis and misophonia. The analysis of conditions when hyperacusis and misophonia manifested themselves indicated different physiological mechanisms of hyperacusis and misophonia. Therefore we have proposed two types of definition for component of DST: behavioral and based on presumed mechanisms involved in hyperacusis and misophonia.

From the behavioral point of view hyperacusis (occurring in about 25-30% of tinnitus patients) is characterized by negative reaction to a sound which depends only on its physical characteristics (i.e., spectrum, intensity). Time course (coded in the phase of spectrum) and meaning of the sound are irrelevant as well as the content in which a sound occurs.

Misophonia (occurring in about 60% of tinnitus patients) is characterized by negative reaction to a sound with a specific pattern and meaning. The physical characteristics of a sound (its spectrum, intensity) are secondary. The reactions to sound depend on a patients' past history and depends on non-auditory factors, e.g.,patient's previous evaluation of the sound, the patient's psychological profile, and the context in which the sound is presented. Under this definition phonophobia is a special case of misophonia when fear is a dominant emotion. Misophonia increases awareness of external sounds and somato sounds (e.g., eating) which are normally habituated and misophonia frequently induces tensor tympani syndrome. Note that both hyperacusis and misophonia are evoking the same emotional and autonomic (body) reactions and it is impossible to discriminate between them on the basis of observed reactions.

In mechanism-based definitions hyperacusis reflects abnormally strong reactivity of the auditory pathways to sound (overamplification of sound-evoked activity), which only in turn yields activation of the limbic and autonomic nervous systems (which are responsible for emotional and body reactions). The functional connections between the auditory, the limbic and autonomic nervous systems are normal.

On the other hand misophonia reflects abnormally strong reactions of the autonomic and limbic systems resulting from enhanced functional connections between the auditory, limbic and autonomic systems for specific patterns of sound. In pure misophonia the auditory system will function within the norm. Note that there is a clear analogy between the mechanisms of tinnitus and misophonia - the difference is in the initial signal, but the mechanisms which generate these reactions are the same and involve conditioned reflexes.

Diagnosis of hyperacusis and misophonia is complex. Typically patients combine and confuse hyperacusis and misophonia. Typically audiological evaluation of DST involves measurement of Loudness Discomfort Levels (LDL), i.e., measuring for pure tones of different frequencies and the sound level when the patient reports strong discomfort. For people who do not report problems with DST the average value for all tested frequencies is about 100 dBHL. LDL, however, are not sufficient for the diagnosis of hyperacusis or misophonia. When a patient has hyperacusis the LDL show lower values (average typically in 60-85 dB HL range), but low values alone are not proving the presence of hyperacusis as they may be due to misophonia! In misophonia both normal and low values are possible (range of 20 to 120 dB HL). Therefore, a specific, detailed interview is crucial for diagnosis. Comparison of an audiogram and LDL may, however, provide an assessment of the extent of misophonia for some patients and the method has been described in our 2002 paper.

In practice hyperacusis and misophonia frequently occur together in varying proportion, and in patientswith significant hyperacusis misophonia is automatically created, as normal sounds will evoke discomfort, and therefore create the conditioned reflexes. Once misophonia is established, the reactions are governed by principles of conditioned reflexes,e.g., reaction to the sound will be very fast and will occur without need forthinking about the meaning of the sound, or belief that the sound is bad for them.

Common recommendations for treatment of decreased sound tolerance are not necessary helpful and actually may create the increase of the problem, e.g., “avoid sound” or “use ear protection” because it will increase hyperacusis. Medications have no impact on DST, but may have potential negative side effects. Use of sound therapies based on desensitization may be helpful for hyperacusis, but have no or limited effect on misophonia.

Evaluation and treatments of DST is included as an imperative and obligatory element of Tinnitus Retraining Therapy(TRT). Certain points are particularly important.

First, there is a need to properly diagnose and differentiate hyperacusis and misophonia as while patients' reactions to sounds may be the same, but treatments of hyperacusis and misophonia are distinctively different.

Second, effective treatment for hyperacusis is not helpful for misophonia!

Third, effective treatment for misophonia is not particularly helpful for hyperacusis.

Fourth, when both hyperacusis and misophonia are initially present and hyperacusis is successfully treated, typically misophonia increase and there is no improvement observed at the behavioral level.

Hyperacusis is treated in TRT by desensitization with variety of sounds combined with specific counseling aimed at DST. In the case of normal hearing ear level sound generators are recommended as a part of the sound therapy. When hearing loss is present then combination instruments are optimal and sound generators are not recommended. It is especiallyimportant for hyperacusis patients to have an enriched sound environment day and night, 24/7. This method is very effective and in majority of cases it is possible to achieve the cure.

Treatment of misophonia with TRT is much more complex and takes longer time. Misophonia should be treated simultaneously with hyperacusis /tinnitus. In addition to specific counseling, patients are advised to follow one of 4 categories of protocols which attempt to create an association between variety of sounds with something positive. Protocol (1) has been published in our 2002 paper. These protocols are further modified to fit the needs of individual patients and typically more than one protocol is used. Note, that while misophonic patients frequently benefit from the use of ear level sound generators, they are not necessary for successful outcome of the treatment. Sound generators alone without specific protocols for misophonia have very limited usefulness. Duration of treatment is generally similar to duration of tinnitus treatment, but success rate is very high and in majority of cases it is possible to achieve a cure. Interestingly, successful treatment of misophonia restores habituation of external sounds and somato sounds and typically removes tensor tympani syndrome.

The concept of misophonia is gradually gaining recognition. In recently published prestigious Texbook of Tinnitus misophonia is mentioned numerous times through the book and is discussed in detail in three chapters (Baguley, D.M., McFerran, D.J. Hyperacusis and Disorders of Loudness Perception. Ch 3: 13-23; Moller, A.A., Misophonia, Phonophobia, and"Exploding Head" Syndrome. Ch4: 25-27, 2010; Jastreboff, P.J.Tinnitus Retraining Therapy. Ch 73:575-562. In: Texbook of Tinnitus. A.Moller, T Kleinjung, B. Langguth, D. DeRidder editors, Springer, 2010).

The main points toremember:

· Decreased sound tolerance accompany tinnitus insignificant proportion of cases (~60%)

· Detailed evaluation is necessary to diagnose the presence and extent of hyperacusis and misophonia as while patients' reactions to sounds may be the same, but treatments are distinctively different

· Special protocols for misophonia are necessary

· The use of ear level sound devices is crucial in hyperacusis patients

· Misophonic patients commonly benefits from sound generators as well, but it is possible to treat misophonia without any devices

· Significant improvement is observed in nearly all cases with decreased sound tolerance, but both hyperacusis and misophonia need to be treated concurrently

· In majority of cases it is possible to achieve the cure for both hyperacusis and misophonia

· Treatment of hyperacusis and misophonia increases effectiveness of tinnitus treatment and in some cases is crucial for achieving tinnitus control.

© 2012

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5870424 Thu, 31 May 2012 21:30:22 GMT <![CDATA[SF Bay Area audiologists that treat hyperacusis]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5869441
In San Francisco, I have seen a great audiologist at the aforementioned Hearing Center. My progress has been very slow, but I also have a chronic migraine condition that has been a huge obstacle. My audiologist said all of her H patients have shown improvement when they follow their treatment plans. I am doing modified TRT.

A few months ago, a member named superseve1985 found a doctor to treat H at Kaiser somewhere in the Bay Area, but we have not heard from him in awhile.

If you find any other SF Bay Area audiologists that treat hyperacusis, feel free to add them to this thread.

Snow_World

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5869441 Thu, 31 May 2012 05:28:55 GMT <![CDATA[Is this Hyperacusis?]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5866300 At the beginning of the year I developed tinnitus. The tinnitus was very loud to begin with, and caused me a lot of distress. Because I went from a noisy environment at work, to working at home in silence, I wasn't aware of any real sound sensitivity issues at the time. Because it was the winter months I rarely got out. I do however remember a phone call sounding loud around that time. The tinnitus is a multitude of noises, mainly tonal, and police siren like, but on other days can be a violin sound. It always gets worse after noise exposure.

I went out to a restaurant a couple of months after this began and it was about (80+ db). I would in the past easily manage this environment, but it seemed very loud. Over the top of everyone's voices I could hear another sound, like a Formula 1 car at full revs. I also now notice this sound when boiling the kettle, or running water. No matter how loud the sound, the noise remains i.e. it is unmaskable. But it goes completely I believe when the sound source is stopped. When I play white/pink noise, even at barely audible volume, this sound is present right away.

I find my tinnitus is now virtually gone in the morning I believe because of the quiet environment. I often have a bath and if its silent, there is no tinnitus. However, as I get exposure to any noise, the tinnitus returns. If I go to a silent room, the tinnitus can settle down to virtually nothing again. But as the day wears on and I expose myself to environmental sounds, it gets harder and harder to get this recovery, and the tinnitus becomes persistent.

I have hearing loss, and have recently got hearing aids. I believe I have had this hearing loss since birth, as I had speech development issues. But certainly since teenage years. But no tinnitus or sound sensitivity until the beginning of this year. But I have always worked in an environment with a constant 50-60 db background noise.

Personally, over the last few years, I have yearned for silence. I would get annoyed at some noises, especially any unnecessary noise like someone tapping their feet or tapping a pencil on the table. It wouldn't be loud, just irritating. At the beginning of this year, working from home, I was in complete silence for about 95% of my day. I rarely switch the telly on and stopped listening to music a couple of years ago, so when I say silence for 95% of the day, I mean that for real.

Now I wear hearing aids, naturally the higher frequency sounds seem loud. The hearing aids are currently at 50% of the volume they need to be at to put my hearing back to normal. The audiologist has shown me what 100% sounds like and I can say that that was loud and I wouldn't be able to bare that level of volume at higher frequencies just yet. But he assures me that the brain will gradually make new pathways to lessen the perceived volume of these frequencies, and gradually the hearing aids will be jacked up to 100%. At the moment, traffic isn't a problem, and with my hearing aids in (at 50% amplification), nothing is especially loud although cutlery/crockery can cause me to wince, as can flushing the toilet.

So does this sound like hyperacusis? I believe it is due to not being able to stand that restaurant when I would easily of done in the past. I also had an episode of what I believe was TT symdrone that night as my ears went full, and dull after about an hour in there. By the way, this was without hearing aids in.

But do people suffer with these noises over white/pink noise? The F1 car sound, or any other sound that shouldn't be there? Is this treatable? Or some sort of permanent damage?

I have been trying to listen to sounds as much as possible during the day to try and up my tolerances, and hopefully get rid of this tinnitus, but I'm not seeing a huge amount of success. White/pink noise can be distressing to hear because of these other noises that come in over the top of them.

So what should I do? How is TRT implemented for someone like myself who doesn't have a severe sound intolerance (with current hearing aid settings), but does have tinnitus, and these strange noises over the top of white/pink noise? Shall I just suck up the white/pink noise at barely audible levels for as much as possible each day?

Thanks for any help or reassurance you can give me.

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5866300 Tue, 29 May 2012 11:18:07 GMT <![CDATA[Please help]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5864283 I thought I posted a message, but it hasn't shown up, so I'm trying again...
Two weeks ago I suffered a noise injury (horn) and since then I have come to realize the condition I am left with is hyperacusis. It's very severe. I cannot tolerate any sound, a voice, fan on computer, refrigerator noise, nothing. My ears burn to any noise.
I'm in the grieving stage for sure right now, but I'm trying to get ahold of myself and do something. I found this site last night and received some hope from it that something might be able to be done about this. I plan to call one of the tinnitus trained specialists tomorrow morning. There are two in southern California that I will check out.
In the meantime, I've been wearing earplugs and earmuffs due to an increasing intolerance to any noise. Last night I read on this site that doing so can make sound intolerance worse. So, I'm trying not to wear the earmuffs, except when I anticipate a noise I can't tolerate (coffee maker, sliding glass door opening, etc.)
Any advise, suggestions, recommendations...ANYTHING will be welcome to help me help myself and deal with this.
Thank you.

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5864283 Sun, 27 May 2012 21:01:19 GMT <![CDATA[Sick building syndrome connection?]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5863528 Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5863528 Sun, 27 May 2012 03:10:58 GMT <![CDATA[Misophonia = problems in hot summer months. Recommend a fan?]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5863295
I rely on fans.

The problem is that the fans we get or have always seem to have recurring problems, particularly with weird vibrating/clangy sounds. It might be pieces that are somewhat loose, I don't know. But it's happened with rotating fans *and* box fans.

The second problem is that they tend to vibrate a bit on the floor - not sure if the sound is from the fan vibrating or the floor vibrating from the fan, but either way, I can't ignore it, even with ear plugs.

Does anyone have any recommendations for brands/types of fans I could look into?

Thank you!

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5863295 Sat, 26 May 2012 22:42:42 GMT <![CDATA[How many get disabled?]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5863240 Hi ! I wondered if anyone knows of any statistic about how many % of h-sufferers gets completely disabled ? I have applied for a disability pension because of my h., and I wonder how rare I am ? I am just curious. : )

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5863240 Sat, 26 May 2012 21:21:17 GMT <![CDATA[Like a Fellini film...or Fassbinder]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5861661
I have been walking my dog less and less, and he's not too happy. All I was able to do was walk the dog for months. Yesterday I went to fave little park and when it rained, we sat in car for a minute and I remembered the 'worst' day back in the Winter when I sat there, I had been driving around just to get away from the clacking which was so loud and scary, and did not even want to get out of the car. My heart would race from the noise. It was crippling back then. I need to remind myself of these things, and still have my list of things I can now check off that bother me.

A boisterous man and his huge dog stopped to talk to us, and he talked loud for some time about his dog (grr), but I did not fear it, and have worked on voices, and don't seem to have any bad effect from that. I continue to do better.

Where is everyone? Need advice on the T. The things I did to help H don't seem to work for the T as well. Other than ear gens, and I continue to do music every day, are there specific things to help when T noise is so loud?
I see the H noise and the T noise as 2 different things. For me the H turned the T into an all over my head horrible noise in both ears. All that has mostly gone, but I still have some in both ears. It is this horrible mild roar of the T in just the original ear that is coming back. It feels like I have reversed how this whole thing fell apart in my ears (mild T, then loud T, then hyper T, then both ears with constant clanging/clacking etc.) and now this is in the process of coming full circle, getting back to my original T. I am not there yet, but that is what is going on.

I do almost everything I used to do, and stores are nothing now. It is the T when trying to sleep at night that is getting to me. It's nothing like it was, but enough to keep me from getting any good sleep. Is there anything in the music protocol I can adjust to help? I don't turn things up loud at night to compete with T, but I am so tempted. I still use a fan or fountain at night.

Editing: click edit, than go advanced and fix, then post.

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5861661 Fri, 25 May 2012 16:25:00 GMT <![CDATA[Tinnitus and global noises]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5861296 To have tinnitus is to cope with all kind of noises, since pipes from water, dogs, helicopters, cats, police sirens, ambulance sirens, airplanes, cars, garbage cars, mobile taking loud out in the street, television, radio, and so on.

I have music 24 hours a day for more than 15 years.

Who has the same, tinnitus and how someone copes with it?

Thank you,

Vedor

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5861296 Fri, 25 May 2012 12:08:45 GMT <![CDATA[Voluntary Middle Ear Myoclonus help?]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5860841
My myoclonus is voluntary. What I mean by that is I can make my eardrum thump or move. I can do this by touching a specific spot on my tongue which is about the size of a pea. When i move my tongue, swallow, talk, even breathing will set it off at times. I can stick my tongue out...touch that spot on my tongue and my eardrum twitches/thumps every time. It is hardly bearable at times. Maybe it has something to do with nerve damage? As I said, any help would be appreciated.

Thanks in advance!

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5860841 Fri, 25 May 2012 02:27:02 GMT <![CDATA[Editing]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5860793

I suppose I would be better to use the "spell Check" first, instead of trying to edit that which is posted in a misspelled manner.

sorry. I'm a simple elderly learner.

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5860793 Fri, 25 May 2012 01:39:38 GMT <![CDATA[Question on "Sound system"]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5860770
Today at 02:48 PM #13
Hi! I'm new here. And, so glad that I found this Forum. I'm not sure what kind of sound affliction that is mine. but, I believe that it is associated with electrical currents that run through the house; or with some kind of security system that has been installed in the owner's apartment. I am becoming so very sensitive to this continued vibrational sound in my left ear, that it is driving me crazy. Hopefully, that I won't end up mentally ill concerning this overwhelming, continuous sound that is singing through my head on the left side of the head, more than on the right.

I am a HSP -- highly sensitive person -- involving all the senses, inner and outer -- smells, tastes, sounds, lights, colors, feelings, sensory .......

This sound that I hear, especially when the Landlord is out, and I suppose his system is ON, makes me feel sick, highly stressed out, I want to run away into the most quiet spot on earth! There is not relief, unless I put on a classical music CD, soothing and calm;

Has anyone else encountered this type of adverse reaction To a "SECURITY, call-in system" that works over the phone lines?

Thanks a lot!
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
I had posted the above on NEW HERE. since I am a new member I had not realized that I could start my own athread/question. As of yet, I have not read much of the Forum's input. I look forward to doing just that.

Hoping that I/m not the only one experiencing this adverse reaction to "electricity" and it's constant ZZinging sound. At times it is so loud that I need to get away from what I believe is the source of it!

Will this constant ZZinging sound cause ill effects to the nervous system?

when I am elsewhere I don't hear this ZZinging sound which gets veru loud at times.

Wonder where and how I can get help for this besides moving away from the area, from this particular apartment.

Hope to hear from someone on this Forum!

Thank you all! I am so glad to have found this site.

shestelle
Edit | Delete

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5860770 Fri, 25 May 2012 01:18:42 GMT <![CDATA[Bose noise canceling headset]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5858576 This is my first posting:

The condo building I live in was built in the 60’s. It really does not have much in the way of sound insulation. I am bothered by snoring, even coughing, conversations. My concern is the degree to which it disturbs me and my inability to turn it off. Once I hear the first snore or motor sound (fan/air conditioner) it catches my ear and does not let it go.

There is also a new sound in my left ear like a jazz bass with a definite rhythm, always the same. At first I thought it was my neighbor playing jazz music. It has the quality of sounding far away and inside my head at the same time. I only realized it was inside my head by wearing a Bose noise canceling headset. ( Because outside noise was blocked) This may be temporary because of my sinus drainage or real tinnitus. I only hear it when lying down. I do not think it is "musical ear".

I had an MRI negative. I had a hearing evaluation. The audiologist recommended a hearing aid evaluation based on mild to moderate sensory neural hearing loss both ears. Since I do not experience being hard of hearing, it is difficult to imagine wearing a hearing aid. I am an active and employed 64 yr old interacting all day in person and by phone. I am also an active member of Toastmasters and have no problem hearing from the back of the room except people with strong accents, especially high pitched. Has anyone in this situation found a hearing aid helpful ?

Using the Bose noise Canceling headset helps when I am trying to avoid external sound. The soothing sounds or music mask the tinnitus. If I have it on a CD in the room then I still hear the external sounds from neighbors and does not soothe me but add to the annoyance.

The audiologist strongly advised against using the noise canceling headset. I understand the concept of needing to desensitize but I find the need to use the headset quite often. I have been reading about pink noise tapes and that there are professionals to help with desensitization. I did not see any listings for the SF Bay area. I would appreciate any comments or suggestions.

I

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5858576 Wed, 23 May 2012 15:55:12 GMT <![CDATA[Dental work]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5854380 need your opinions and input :
I have suffered from H & T for 25 years. It is the worst it has ever been as I write this. I need dental surgery and a crown for an abscessed molar....or I can extract a very important tooth and eventually replace it with an implant. My T& H is intolerable now, I can't imagine what I would do if it got any worse. Even moderate noise seems to spike my T ... causing me extra grief for weeks/months. I am also thinking that leaving the abscessed tooth untreated is itself affecting my ears. What do you think I should do. I am at my wit's end with this problem.

Forum: New Messages ]]> http://www.chat-hyperacusis.net/post?id=5854380 Sun, 20 May 2012 22:44:37 GMT