A World Without Tinnitus
My Journey
As a yoga instructor I thought I had my finger on the pulse of what it meant to possess mental and physical well being. After all, this is what I was teaching on a daily basis. I was living a normal life—working hard, building two businesses, paying off debts, and trying to keep a social life and a relationship afloat at the same time. I thought I had everything under control; that was until tinnitus walked into my life and changed everything.
The noise was subtle at first, a slight ringing in my left ear accompanied by a slight pressure. The ringing was almost like I’d spent a night at a loud concert, except I hadn’t. At first I didn’t think too much of it and went about my hectic daily schedule. After a few days, this slightly annoying ringing became more and more noticeable, and a pressure built. As the noise became more prominent it slowly began to grate on my nerves. “This must be an infection or some kind of impaction? A simple visit to my doctor will fix this” I thought naively.
To my amazement, my doctor could not figure out what was wrong but after multiple visits and a round of Prednisone, I was diagnosed with tinnitus, which I was informed has no cure.
This marked the beginning of an endless, demoralizing and ultimately fruitless chase for an answer. I spent almost eight months visiting ENT’s for a second, third and fourth opinion. I had MRI’s, C-Spine, dental examinations and x-rays all of which came up with nothing that would trigger such aggressive tinnitus and ear pressure.
The conventional route turned out to be somewhat disheartening and futile and all that could be offered for my tinnitus was powerful and potentially addictive sleeping medication and anti anxiety medications. Although these were much needed at the time, as I was exhausted and stressed, they were not something I wanted to entertain as a long term solution.
So I subsequently embarked on a journey to explore an abundance of alternative healing methods, all of which again unfortunately proved ineffectual in the face of my raging tinnitus.
This marked the true beginning of my despair—the sleepless nights, the exhaustion, the anxiety and the subsequent depression that followed.
The Endless Road of Tinnitus Despair
Many months later synchronicity or fate played a roll in an impromptu meeting with a very unique and exceptional, retired Ear Nose and Throat specialist who had himself suffered from tinnitus due to an accident many years prior. This man had suffered from tinnitus for many years, but now considered himself tinnitus free (meaning he no longer suffered from the affliction.) With one simple question he changed my life with tinnitus for good.
“Why do you think the majority of people with tinnitus are oblivious and not troubled by the noise in their ears? “And before you say, because mine is louder than theirs, think again!”
He went on to say that It has nothing to do with the volume, pitch, tone or type of their tinnitus, but everything to do with their nervous response to the stimuli, learn to override that response and you’ll bypass your condition!
He told me that I can either spend all of my money chasing the next latest and greatest secret remedy, or I can accept and in doing so learn to nullify my Tinnitus. It was at this moment that an interesting shift in my attitude and perception took place and with his help I chose to take a new direction.
Viewing tinnitus as a subjective condition allowed me to radically alter the way I perceived it. And over time, with testing, researching and combining the most tried and true cognitive behavioral techniques, mind body exercises, holistic nutritional therapies and practical habituation methods and lifestyle modifications, I finally cracked the code to override my own tinnitus.
This process I coined“Learning to listen beyond tinnitus” Many can do this naturally, while others have to educate themselves on the true causes of their tinnitus troubles.
This unique formula eventually evolved into the Tinnitus Retrain System.
It worked for me, and I know it will work for you!