Prayers for my tinnitus

[pael]

Could you pray for my tinnitus (noise in ears)? I fear it is hindrance for meditation. It's disturbing. I fear I can't have good rebirth if I can't meditate properly. Can you get good meditation with hindrances and disturbances? I have been too careless in protecting my ears.
Everyone says in those situation there were not too much noise. They say they didn't get any bad effects in there. Is this karma? Why no one else get punished from their carelessness?
Doctor have done everything he thinks helpful.
P.S. Sorry if this is wrong section.

[emaho]

Could you pray for my tinnitus (noise in ears)?

Hmmm... would you mind if I prayed for you instead?

[Jeff H]

Just a suggestion, but I don’t think the tinnitus is the problem. Samsara is distraction; the tinnitus is an opportunity for you to work on not being distracted by one particular thing. Realized beings are not necessarily without the things that cause suffering in others, but they are without the attachment and aversion that bring about suffering.

It is my understanding that a favorable rebirth is not guaranteed. The graduated path is not necessarily a steady ascension across all future lives. Even seemingly advanced practitioners have many distractions and latent karma that could generate an unfavorable rebirth. I think your anxiety may be a much bigger problem than the tinnitus.

You have had an infinity of negative and positive rebirths in the path. Take heart that you are now on a path that will eventually end your uncontrolled rebirths. That is refuge.

[Simon E.]

I do empathise.
Following surgery, I was left with deafness and tinnitus in my right ear probably as a result of antibiotics.
You can actually learn to 'befriend' it. You can learn to regard it as just part of the background, rather then resisting it..this really helps.

[emaho]

I have tinnitus sometimes too. Funnily I find the easiest way to ignore it is to relax, close my eyes, and for some minutes focus completely on the tinnitus. Then, after a while, open your eyes again and focus on whatever you're doing.

[Simon E.]

[Johnny Dangerous]

Sorry man, tinnitus can be rough, people who don't have it chronically: no offense, but you don't quite get it.

I burst my eardrum (twice) a few years back from fluid buildup, now I have both a deep rumbling, and the typical high sound all the time. One thing no one told me is that for many people after a year or so, your brain starts to automatically tune it out. I had a hellish year after it happened, I remember having nightmares where people only talked in my tinnitus tones lol.

Luckily for me, I have no hearing loss, which AFAIK is unusual with my level of tinnitus. But yeah, really nothing doctors can do, there's no cure.

Of course I will definitely do some practice for you, but here's my advice:

1) In meditation, use absence of sound as an object, that way, it will become obvious quickly that tinnitus is just another sound-type event, with no more meaning than any other. Using it as an object as suggested above has also helped me. You can definitely meditate with tinnitus, focus on silence helps tremendously, silence is a constant.

2) Buy a "sleep sheep" or similar device for babies, they usually have three or four settings of white noise that are fantastic if your tinnitus is preventing you from sleeping, etc. When mine was so bad I couldn't sleep I would put the sleep sheep noise box under my pillow. THere are more expensive white noise generators too, but I found the sleep sheep did the trick.

3) The above is especially good if you live in a quiet place, when I used to live the forest my tinnitus was x10 more noticeable than now, even though the ambient noise around us isn't even perceptible, it drastically mutes the tinnitus.

It does suck, but it's one of those things, you more you give it power and reality of it's own the worse it is.

AS far as Karma though, dude, annoying as it is, it seems like pretty mild Karma in comparison to many things we could be dealing with.

[Kim O'Hara]

Luckily for me, I have no hearing loss, which AFAIK is unusual with my level of tinnitus.

The association of the two things is that hearing loss is often accompanied by tinnitus. The short-term version is the "ringing in your ears" you get for a while after a really loud concert. Experience that level of exposure too often and you get permanent hearing loss and long-term tinnitus.
If your tinnitus doesn't come from over-exposure, there's no reason (AFAIK) that it should be accompanied by hearing loss.


Kim

[Johnny Dangerous]

Luckily for me, I have no hearing loss, which AFAIK is unusual with my level of tinnitus.

The association of the two things is that hearing loss is often accompanied by tinnitus. The short-term version is the "ringing in your ears" you get for a while after a really loud concert. Experience that level of exposure too often and you get permanent hearing loss and long-term tinnitus.
If your tinnitus doesn't come from over-exposure, there's no reason (AFAIK) that it should be accompanied by hearing loss.


Kim

I guess that makes sense. I have had over exposure anyway I'd say though, I just never really had noticeable tinnitus until the eardrums filling with fluid and perforating. Probably a lot of factors for me, as before this even happened I had bad scarring on my eardrums from ear infections as a kid.

Additionally, for a year or so after the perforations the pressure in my Eustachian tubes was never right, still isn't completely normal. IME doctors know jack and squat about tinnitus, even the ENT's..who you'd expect to be some help.

[Sprouticus]

I do empathise.
Following surgery, I was left with deafness and tinnitus in my right ear probably as a result of antibiotics.
You can actually learn to 'befriend' it. You can learn to regard it as just part of the background, rather then resisting it..this really helps.

Someone, I don't remember who, once suggested using tinnitus as a focus during meditation. Like following the breath.

[boda]

If your tinnitus doesn't come from over-exposure, there's no reason (AFAIK) that it should be accompanied by hearing loss.

There are theories that it can be caused by hearing loss, similar to phantom limb syndrome, and I suppose there are a variety of ways to loose hearing.

Anyway, pael, if your tinnitus is anything like mine it can be lessened, if not eliminated, by a controlled diet. A diet absent of refined sugar, caffeine, and alchohol. Sugar is the worst culprit. I've gone for a year without those things a couple of times in my life and the tinnitus has gone away each time. It takes months to go away though. By that time you may become habituated to it and not care so much.

It's funny, I don't remember the last time that I was aware of the tinnitus, but now that I'm thinking about it, I hear a ringing.