whistling in the ears

Helpful thread, thanks.
I just developed severe tinnitus and coincidently just took 14 days of Prilosec from a gastro doc.
Also, I too am 52.5 and also just finally got my dream system put together.
I am new to this hobby and have been listening lots and developing an appreciation for audiophile sound. In the NY Times article posted by Bdgregory it could be inferred that audiophiles have a greater propensity for Tinnitus.
"researchers in the United States and Europe have independently discovered that the brain areas responsible for interpreting sound and producing fearful emotions are exceptionally active in people who complain of tinnitus."
Sucks, damn ringing doesn't take a break.
I will try some of the advice here, cut back on the caffine, sugar, iboprofen and aspirin, see an ENT.
Incedently, I work with a gent who was the pres of the www.ata.org and sat on the board for years. He has suffered from tinnitus and accutitas (sp)since the 80s from playing in a rock band for many years. His is so severe he must wear earmuffs when traveling in the car. It apparently can keep getting worse if caution is not heeded.

don't be discouraged. If cared for properly,it will subside... It may be a long time though

hi,

I have both tinnitus and eharing loss from years of playing live shows and recording at ear splitting volumes. It is a lot better now that I don't tour. My only encouragementto you is that it can get better and cutting out caffeine, nicotine tec., will help. Also try taking ginko to improve the blodflow and sometimes going to an oesteopath can help if you get your neck worked on.

The brain compensates well for these things, surprisingly enough. I have my job making records in spite of these issues and Ido not think it clouds my audio judgement.

In terms of it being annoying, i can only suggest trying these things. All osrts of things affect hearing. TMJ is a big cause too.

I get this from time to time. Maybe a few times a year. It usually is in one ear or the other and only lasts for 10 or 15 seconds. Most likely for me it was caused when I used to spend a lot of time around race cars. One of the ways we could tell the motor was tuned properly was by the ear tingles we'd get when the rpms would hit about 9K.

If you actually do have tinnitus it is a chronic condition, usually the result of acoustic trauma - time around artillery or on a flight line without hearing protection. It is permanent damage and does not go away. It may get worse but it won't get better. However, if you have a whistling or ringing every now and then, you don't have what is generally referred to as tinnitus. Most people experience this from time to time - can result from any number of causes - head cold, too much caffiene etc. Good news is - whether you have the chronic condition or not, you don't have to do anything about it. Of interest, I noticed recently that Peter Townsend of the Who runs an add for a tinnitus/hearing protection organization (sounded like a nonprofit) - saw this in the back of sound on sound I beleive it was - a mag for audio engineers etc. He attributes it to the slightly high volumes experienced during his musical career - but hey it beats having what Keith Moon had.