A Carlisle woman features in a national charity video to raise awareness of her own experiences with tinnitus, released for the condition’s awareness week.
Charity RNID brought together three people from across the UK who live with tinnitus and each experience it in their own unique ways to mark Tinnitus Week, which starts today.
They took to a splatter-paint art space in London and explored their tinnitus through creativity, translating the sounds they live with every day into expressive pieces of art.
Tinnitus is the name for hearing noises that are not caused by an outside source, and despite it affecting millions of people, it remains widely misunderstood. Tinnitus is an invisible experience that can impact every aspect of your life and often, there’s no easy way to explain what it truly feels like.
Charlotte Young featured in the short film, talking openly about what her tinnitus sounds like, how it affects her daily life and what helps her to manage it through art.
Charlotte has a cochlear implant to help with her hearing loss which has changed her life for the better in many ways, but has also made her tinnitus feel louder.
Charlotte said: “I would compare my tinnitus to those old toilet blocks – the ones with toilets that have cisterns high up on the wall, and long chain flushes.
“My tinnitus is like that overbearing sound you get if all the old toilets are flushed at the same time. You almost feel it in your body, because the sound is echoing across the whole room.
“At night, when I take my processor and my hearing aid off, that’s when I hear my tinnitus. It’s a horrible, screaming, hissing, fizzling kind of noise.
“My tinnitus has got worse this year, and I remember saying to my audiologist ‘I feel like there’s a lightsaber in my ear’.”
Charlotte tries to keep busy to distract her from her tinnitus, such as through her weekly yoga sessions to help her relax or by reading a book at nighttime.
Although there is no cure yet, there are a variety of ways that tinnitus can be managed. RNID is undertaking research into it.
To support people experiencing tinnitus, RNID has developed a free guide providing advice, available at rnid.org.uk/tinnitus
Tinnitus facts
- Tinnitus is more common than many people realise. Around 1 in 7 adults have tinnitus, which is over 7 million adults in the UK.
- Tinnitus is different for each person. Many people describe their tinnitus as a ringing sound, but other sounds can include buzzing, whooshing, clicking, hissing, or sometimes a combination of sounds.
- Tinnitus is known to be more common in people who have hearing loss. However, people without hearing loss can also have tinnitus.
- Tinnitus can be caused by loud noise exposure such as loud music or in the workplace, but this is not the only cause. Tinnitus can be caused by certain ear conditions and other medical conditions. Other times, there is no clear cause.
- If you’ve suddenly lost hearing in one or both ears, contact NHS 111 or your GP urgently. You could also visit your nearest urgent treatment centre.
