Published on 12, July, 2020
Hi does anyone else suffer from the inability to block out noise? I hear my neighbours, I hear the traffic, car doors slamming, flat doors slamming, barking dogs and I can’t block any of it out. I live with noise cancelling headphones on all the time, it is now affecting my gait so I’ve been advised to not wear them so much but it is the only way I can deal with the world. I find it is much worse when I don’t sleep and I never sleep well. I feel overwhelmed with the noise around me and lost. Does it ever get better? The older I get the worse it gets. I’m having difficulty dealing with every day life. Does it ever get any better? I feel like if I couldn’t hear anymore, it would be a relief. I’m constantly exhausted. Everyone try’s to take your money by promising this supplement will help, or dietary changes will make it better. Has anyone found anything that makes it better?
Same. Always have and it drives me nuts, especially when my mother used to nag my brother over and over to do things. Open-plan offices are my definition of hell. It is overwhelming and exhausting, as you say. On the inside, I feel like I'm going to explode, and all I can do is self-harm to relieve the frustration because, apparently, yelling at people to shut the f*** up is considered 'inappropriate' no matter how much they torment me.
I can categorically say, the more stressed I am, the more sensitive I am (and the constant noise exposure is stressful so it's a bit of a vicious circle). Consequently, I do what I can to minimise my stressors—be that limiting my exposure to people, foods that make me allergic or moody, itchy clothing, overheating, whatever—and try to maximise my stress-relievers, namely getting out for a quiet walk along the beach and some fresh air, or going swimming. Use earplugs the rest of the time. Due to my chronic vestibular migraine, I haven't been able to use headphones in a while as I was finding they made my dizziness worse, so, although I hadn't heard of that side-effect before, I'm not entirely surprised they've affected your gait.
Do you find it's worse when you're stressed?
Yes, everything is amplified when I’m stressed and tired. My clothes bother me, I can’t stand my hair touching my face. Things that I can usually tolerate become intolerable. It’s painful to live sometimes. I find even a car ride is difficult because I feel every bump in the road. I can always tell when I’m doing okay because I don’t think about being in the car at all. Controlling my anger when I can’t get away from the noise is a work in progress. I Always try to reflect later whether it was my inability to cope with it or if it was actually justified. I can totally relate to telling people to shut the f*** up. Our world is too loud.
Yep, I hear ya—stressed or tired. I've also had tinnitus since I was 18, so even when it's silent on the outside, there's still constant noise in my head. Ugh.
As you say, all the sensory stuff becomes incredibly bothersome.