I feel like I am going nuts.

Update:

I got off of Weight Watchers from Aprilish until October.  At which time I joined back up and am actually attending meetings.  I had gained back 15 lbs of what I had lost and I am happy to say I am back down those 15 pounds now.

However, I am going nuts.

Well at least I feel like it, I have been told a lot of people suffer from this condition.  I am praying that the doctor on Monday can give me some help to either learn to cope with it or fix it.  The condition?  Tinnitus, a constant very annoying ringing/buzzing/noise in your ears -- people commonly say it's in their head.  NO ONE else can hear the noise, and for me that is the worst part.  If you could hear it too, I wouldn't feel nearly as insane as I do.

Background:  Due to asthma and multiple ear infections as a child I lost approximately 20% of my hearing in both ears.  YOU would never know that though, because after 30+ years I have either gained that back or learned to cope exceptionally well and it is virtually undetectable now.  The only time I really notice the loss is when someone is walking in front of me and trying to talk to me, when the sound is carrying away from me, I can't hear you.    This buzzing sound -- I equate to cicadas in the summer -- is not new to me.  I have had it most of what I can remember, I thought it was normal.  UNTIL 2 weeks or so ago, when it was so INCREDIBLY loud in the middle of the night I woke up crying.

It has never been so loud that I couldn't function.  Mind you, I thought this was normal, I didn't know there was actually something called complete silence, where you heard NO sound at all.  I never told anyone about the sound in my head because it has always just been there.  But when I couldn't sleep because of it, I knew there was something more wrong.  I did some research, I brought it up to my audiologist cousin, and she assures me I am not crazy (at least not in this way), and now I have a doctor appointment with an ENT on Monday 12/10.  Though I don't know what they can do for me.  All my research says you basically have to learn to live with it, and avoid excessively loud sounds.

This sound is all I can focus on, I don't know how I am going to "learn to live with it" if that is indeed the case.  I want to cry ALL the time.  I even had my mom put her ear to mine to see if she could hear it, because at least then I would have shared it, she of course could not hear it, I didn't really expect her to be able to but was hopeful.

If you are the praying kind, please say one for me that I make it through this, because right now I would rather be deaf than have this noise.  Thanks for listening.  I will try to post more often again, and at least an update on what the doctor had to say.

Becky