Sleeping With Tinnitus Sounds

An article by Adrian Featherstone.

We all feel somewhat jaded when we fail to get a good night’s sleep. It seems that while we sleep our bodies recharge themselves and our minds are refreshed. When we are deprived of that resting period our energy levels and ability to get the most out of the day becomes diluted. If because of tinnitus sounds that sleep interruption continues over a few nights our ability to cope with the problems and challenges we meet in daily life can be seriously depleted.

During a night’s sleep we go through varying levels of consciousness. Even those who consistently have a good night’s sleep will at times approach wakefulness through the night. It is at these times that those people who suffer from any form of insomnia will come awake.

People coping with anxiety or those with particularly active minds usually find that once they wake in the night it is very difficult and sometimes all but impossible to drift back into sleep. This too is the time when the tinnitus sufferer has his nightmare. Once awake and in the quiet of the night they find themselves listening to the one sound that is always there with them, those tinnitus sounds. In the dark and with little else to concentrate on the tinnitus sound becomes more and more invasive.

There are few options open to the tinnitus sufferer in the dead of night. Possibly getting up and going out of the bedroom and into another room to watch the television or to listen to some music for a while, if you can do it without disturbing the rest of the household, is an option. The downside of getting up is that it may wake you even more because to the body it can be like starting another day. It can also too easily become a habit.

A better option for the tinnitus sufferer is to listen to some quiet music or natural sound such as that of waves breaking on the shore line, a babbling brook or of rainfall. These natural sounds are of a comparable sound type to the tinnitus sound heard by most sufferers and have the effect of masking that tinnitus. Additionally the very soothing and therapeutic effect of them helps to induce sleep once more. Of course to avoid disturbing anyone else they are best listened to through earphones or better still a pillow speaker.

Tinnitus masking CDs are ideal for reducing the contrast between tinnitus and silence. They help the auditory system to become less tuned in to the tinnitus sound and act as a calming aid to relaxation. There are also sound therapy systems available which take this a stage further by delivering computer generated tinnitus masking noise in addition to a selection of soothing sounds. These come as standalone units some of which incorporate mood lighting and alarm clock functions. These are ideal to have at the bedside.

Although none of this will overcome sleep problems overnight, it can certainly reduce the impact of sleeping with tinnitus in the longer term. The fact that you are taking a positive step towards dealing with your tinnitus will in itself give you sense of achievement and reduce the stress that having tinnitus causes you.
 

More articles by Adrian Featherstone:

• What Causes Ringing in the Ears.  What causes the ringing in the ears that we universally call tinnitus?
• Much Needed Tinnitus Relief.  Living a normal life with the sounds of tinnitus constantly ringing in your ears would seem an impossibility to most tinnitus sufferers.
• Tinnitus Cures That Might Work For You. With the realisation that the noises you are hearing in your ears or in your head are not going to go away comes the journey to either eliminate them or to learn to live with them.
• Alternative Tinnitus Treatment.  Most people who have found that they are living with the ringing in the ears which characterises the sounds of tinnitus will have been told by their medical practitioner that there is no known tinnitus cure.
• Subjective and Objective Tinnitus.  The sounds of tinnitus that will be so well known to those living with this condition are variously described as ringing in the ears, hissing,whistling or buzzing.
• Symptoms of Tinnitus.  Millions of people around the globe experience the symptoms of tinnitus. The ringing in the ears which characterises this complaint is especially common in the towns and cities of the industrialised western world.
• Symptoms For Tinnitus.  Ringing in the ear is one of the primary symptoms of tinnitus. Tinnitus being a condition which commonly affects about a fifth of the population aged 55 or over.
• What Causes Tinnitus.  There will be few people who have gone to a discotheque or to a live band concert who will not have experienced the sounds of tinnitus.
• Finding Your Own Tinnitus Relief.  Only those of us who have lived with the sounds of tinnitus singing away in our consciousness and who have suffered the constant ringing in the ears that goes with it truly understand the trauma tinnitus creates.
• The Early Days of Your Tinnitus. Whether they realise it or not most people have heard the sounds of tinnitus. After exposure to any very loud noise we all have a ringing in the ear to some degree. 
• Tinnitus Hypnosis.The use of Tinnitus Hypnosis and Tinnitus Hypnotherapy in the battle to clear tinnitus symptoms has long been recognised...
• The Effects of Tinnitus. Tinnitus is widely described as a condition
  in which a person hears noises where no corresponding external noise exists.
• Beginning the Search for a Tinnitus Cure. If you were able to ask a large group of sufferers who were looking for a tinnitus cure to describe the arrival of a tinnitus sound in their lives, a great many of them would tell you a remarkably similar story.
• Do Any Tinnitus Remedies Actually work?  Anybody who has had the misfortune to find themselves living with tinnitus will be only too well aware of the frustration that this debilitating condition can cause the sufferer.
• In Puruit Of A Tinnitus Cure. Realising that the noise in your ears just isn’t going away can initiate a sense of panic and stress into even the most stoic of us. The diagnosis of tinnitus that so often follows this realisation only serves  to compound the problem still further. 
•   Tinnitus Masking. Those of us that suffer with the intrusion of tinnitus sound in our ears will know that the condition is at its worst when there is no other external noise to dilute that sound. It is at these times that tinnitus masking can be extremely effective. 
• Turn Down Those Tinnitus Sounds. The volume of your Tinnitus Sounds will almost certainly relate closely to your state of mind. When we are feeling down and out of sorts, when we feel depressed and moody we become very inward looking. Of course for the tinnitus sufferer, waiting for them inside their head there are always those tinnitus sounds.
• Tinnitus Sound and Stress. Stress has long been recognised as being a major player in both the cause and subsequent intensity of tinnitus sound.