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My recent cold has given me some (I hope temporary) tinnitus, so Google thought this might be a good article for me as I recover and age.

scitechdaily.com

Johns Hopkins Discovers New Path to Treating Age-Related Hearing Loss – “There’s More to Hearing Than the Ear”

Study of hearing in old and young mice suggests the brain might be trained to filter out background sound. Looking for answers about how the brain works amid age-related hearing loss, Johns Hopkins Medicine researchers discovered that old mice were less capable than young mice of “turning off” cert
scitechdaily.com
Click to read more...
 
I also experienced tinnitus after the flu. To be honest, I was frightened it wouldn't go away. Fortunately, now everything is fine. But now understand what it is like to live with ear ringing, I'm sorry so many people suffer from it.
 
I have tinnitus, and yeah, it sucks, but it isn't as bad as I imagined it would be before I had it. It's funny - I was told that the brain fills in frequencies that you have trouble hearing, and that produces the constant ringing. But that same brain also learns to ignore the ringing most of the time, which makes it tolerable.
 
I've had tinnitus and slight hearing loss in my left ear since college. That was 35 years ago and it hasn't gone away or gotten any worse. I think age and hearing loss is a myth. My dad is nearly 90 now and he's been claiming hearing loss since I was a teenager. His hearing hasn't gotten any worse in nearly 40 years. So I started to suspect that he claimed "hearing loss" when he would get sick of our BS as kids.
 
I hear ya Jose! My grandfather would drive us crazy when he was like 75 until he passed away 87? He would keep saying to us “Huh”, huh?…?” Finally my dad had enough and decided to test him. Turned out it he heard us the first time I guess he got some sort of chuckle out of us repeating ourselves constantly!
 
Hearing decreases w/ age, I have substantial drops starting at 1200 Hz and going higher. I wouldn't know it if I didn't get it tested because I can hear normal conversation fine.
I use Widex hearing aids, which are tuned to amplify only the high frequencies that I'm missing. Hearing aids are as high tech as the gear with which we record (and why wouldn't they be?), they're not just volume knobs any more and they make a huge difference for me
 
I hear birds etc, the clock, the fridge running... Can hear people talking if they aren't right next to me, but I have to strain to hear and still don't understand except the odd words here and there and have to ask what, or try to guess what they're saying. I have to have the TV etc on really loud, and family have told me I need a hearing test after me always asking what? What? Etc ..Finally have my hearing test on Monday with the https://audiologyisland.com/ the waiting list was ages. Can't wait, and I hope they can see what's wrong and help me xxx
 
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Just an opinion, but like anything else if you "exercise" it you tend to maintain it. I think the brain plays a large role in hearing. So if you lose some of the mechanical aspects of it, but are a good critical listener I think keeping the brain aspect sharp has got to help.

I just know from watching the difference from my mother and father. My father had some hearing loss due to working around heavy machinery with no ear protection. My mother never had such exposure. However, my father as he's aged has had much less hearing loss with time. His mind is as sharp as can be as well. My mother, who has dementia, began to have noticeable degradation in hearing when that condition started to take hold. Just an anecdotal account, but it seems to me that the mind plays a pretty large role in hearing and we can keep that sharp by making music.
 
Anyone else notice an increase in physical pain from loud noises as they get older?

This started happening to me when I turned 40 and while I appreciate the visceral feedback that tells me to turn down the volume or put in ear plugs, I also kind of hate it.
 
HCMarkus said:
Sounds to me like a YMMV (Your Mileage May Vary) situation, with age being an important factor.
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And how many times you saw Van Halen live in the 80s! Hehehe... seriously I wish I had worn earplugs earlier attending concerts. I think my hearing is still pretty good, as before I got some proper ear plugs that cut all frequencies, I'd stuff a piece of a cocktail napkin in each ear when I'd go out to clubs. Of course, I played for a couple years in a cover band every weekend and stood on stage with my left year about 4 feet from our (hard hitting) drummer's crash cymbal... that didn't help.

Either way, we all get a certain amount of high frequency roll-off as we age... even IF we are careful. As a funny aside, high school kids were taking advantage of this fact. They weren't allowed to mess with cell phones in the class room. Apparently, many of these kids started using a text alert tone and ring tone that was I guess a sine wave at a very high frequency that their young ears could hear, but the teachers usually couldn't.
 
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I first experienced tinnitus at the conclusion of a "sound healing" session years ago in which the "practitioner" was making all sorts of clashy noises that set off an oceanic inner wind. Healing indeed!

(Of course, playing in a rock band for several years might also have something to do with it.)

It really freaked me at first. But I hardly notice it anymore. I took the attitude to declare it actually quite boring since it was always the same. If I seek it, I can hear it. But most of the time, I'm putting attention elsewhere.
 
noodln said:
I was told that the brain fills in frequencies that you have trouble hearing, and that produces the constant ringing.
Click to expand...
Yeah, that's a bunch of bunk. At least in my case it is. I can duplicate the frequencies of my tinnitus in cans and it massively increases the volume of said frequency when I listen as if it's a constructive interference of waves. So I can still hear those frequencies just fine even with the ringing at those frequencies.

My wife and her friends started screaming during a ball game and they hit my tinnitus frequency with their screams and I was in absolute agony...I swear it was so loud to me that my entire brain was distorting lol. Or maybe hemorrhaging, not sure which. But I can turn up my guitar amp way louder and not a problem since different frequencies...
 
Trash Panda said:
Anyone else notice an increase in physical pain from loud noises as they get older?

This started happening to me when I turned 40 and while I appreciate the visceral feedback that tells me to turn down the volume or put in ear plugs, I also kind of hate it.
Click to expand...
Sensitivity in many people increases with age, not just sound, but taste, smell, heat, cold…. it’s your body telling you to slow down, it’s had enough. It’s too bad we ignore these signs when we are young.
 
noodln said:
I have tinnitus, and yeah, it sucks, but it isn't as bad as I imagined it would be before I had it. It's funny - I was told that the brain fills in frequencies that you have trouble hearing, and that produces the constant ringing. But that same brain also learns to ignore the ringing most of the time, which makes it tolerable.
Click to expand...
Tinnitus is ringing from the hairs in the cochlea of the ear (inner ear) vibrating on their own from being damaged by loud sounds or physical issues. This vibration is perceved as a tone, or many tones (many hairs) Thankfully the brain can ingore these sounds over time, often compensating for hearing issues in the ears, up to a point. But Tinnitus is in the ear and is a physical vibration.

www.nidcd.nih.gov

How Do We Hear?

Hearing depends on a series of complex steps that change sound waves in the air into electrical signals. Our auditory nerve then carries these signals to the brain. Also available: Journey of Sound to the Brain, an animated video.
www.nidcd.nih.gov www.nidcd.nih.gov
 
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I turn the "hearing loss" option on when my kids start to speak too much :emoji_grin:

jokes aside though, I'm no doctor but I do believe the hearing sense is served by nerves and muscles just like any organ. And as such, it makes perfect sense if it gets worn out by age (depeding on how much it's been abused in the past; ex:long hours, loud headphones). Yet, every rule has its exception and maybe some people have better genes/longevity to not suffer these aftereffects like others do.
 
X-Bassist said:
Tinnitus is ringing from the hairs in the cochlea of the ear (inner ear) vibrating on their own from being damaged by loud sounds or physical issues. This vibration is perceved as a tone, or many tones (many hairs) Thankfully the brain can ingore these sounds over time, often compensating for hearing issues in the ears, up to a point. But Tinnitus is in the ear and is a physical vibration.

www.nidcd.nih.gov

How Do We Hear?

Hearing depends on a series of complex steps that change sound waves in the air into electrical signals. Our auditory nerve then carries these signals to the brain. Also available: Journey of Sound to the Brain, an animated video.
www.nidcd.nih.gov www.nidcd.nih.gov
Click to expand...
It seems to be complicated. Hair cell damage is associated with a source of tinnitus, no doubt. But it is not necessarily the sole identified source. In fact, even within the cohort of researchers that view hair cell damage as causal, you will find some that postulate a version of what was said in post #3 above, i.e. that such damage leaves holes in the perceptual frequency spectrum for the auditory cortex to fill in with ongoing background neural noise. Plus there are lots of other things that are considered to cause it, or increase it. If interested in this, there's a short general introductory discussion worth reading in wikipedia which I'll link below. Severe cases can be accompanied by hyperacusis, an increased sensitivity to sound which can become quite painful.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tinnitus
 
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