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I don’t know if this is a clue, but I can do muscle movements in my head/face/jaw to make the tinnitus worse (only as I make the movements, immediately revertin

I don’t know if this is a clue, but I can do muscle movements in my head/face/jaw to make the tinnitus worse (only as I make the movements, immediately reverting back to “normal” tinnitus as soon as I relax). Some examples: - jutting my jaw forwards - moving my ears back with my face muscles - pushing downward on the top of my head with my hands Another possible clue: this has been true since I can remember — even as a child, well before I developed tinnitus. I always thought this was normal, until mentioning it to others, and it seems no one I know shares this experience. This, to me, suggests that (my flavor of tinnitus, at least) may be due to physical/muscle related causes, and not necessarily associated with hearing damage or neurological. Or that I was “destined” to get tinnitus at some point, as if I was born with some defect that others weren’t. Or, it could just be that there is something else unrelated with how my muscles are connected to my hearing that cause the same tinnitus (e.g. same frequency), and that the persistent tinnitus actually is hearing damage. I’ve not looked into it much, and have really only mentioned this to my doctor (who mostly blew it off as irrelevant), and others in my family. But thought I’d share here in case anybody experienced something similar, and may have insight into what causes this “muscle-related tinnitus”, and if it’s somehow connected or unrelated to the persistent tinnitus.

nsxwolf 3y ago
Interesting. I can “play my eardrums”, which I describe as the ability to consciously control something in my ears that causes a loud fluttering, ringing sound that is something like wind entering my ear canals combined with a bell. After some research I’ve found some people can control something called the “tensor tympani” and generate sounds described as a “roar” but being a subjective experience I am not certain this is exactly what I am doing.
- anonymousiam 3y ago
  I've always been able to do this, and I've always assumed that it's not unusual. It does not seem to be at all related to my tinnitus.
- huytersd 3y ago
  That is interesting. I assumed everyone could hear that. I can hear the sound (roar, ocean, wind) when I move my jaw forward but I can also just directly control it without moving anything else. It’s a muscle I can feel myself controlling and contracting in my inner ear.
  - hackernewds 3y ago
    I think that is the experience of _everyone_
    - xigoi 3y ago
      It’s not. I have no idea what you all are talking about.
- smegger001 3y ago
  yeah i think i do the same thing as you with my ears. a flutter is probably the best description of it i had thought of it as clapping or clicking my ears but that is to sharp a sound to really describe it
  - idonotknowwhy 3y ago
    I can do this too. It also does the same thing as yawning when your ears get blocked on a plane or driving up a steep hill. It unblocks them.
    - nsxwolf 3y ago
      I’m wondering if this is something different, or if it’s a more intense level of the other thing. I’m able to pop my ears without any apparent tensioning of my jaw or a yawn reflex. But I can do it while also making the rushing sound or not.
      - idonotknowwhy 3y ago
        Yeah okay, that must be something different (that I can't do) then.
      - matsemann 3y ago
        Yeah, it's two different muscles for the rumbling vs clicking. Tensor veli palatini opens the eustachian tube and makes a click. The rumbling is from the tympani.
    - ce4 3y ago
      Stapedius reflex? Some can control this muscle volintarily (me as well), it dampens incoming noise by a few dB to protect the ears. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_reflex https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_reflex
- sedatk 3y ago
  I can do that too.
- luplex 3y ago
  I'm pretty sure that's the tensor tympani. I also think your description sounds closer to what I do. For me it sounds like wind, but only lower frequencies.
- cjsme 3y ago
  Ditto! Very useful for relieving ear pressure at altitude.
  - bartvk 3y ago
    Yeah, I also use it for that. I've asked people the question, "can you click your ears"? Of course, they don't understand me, because it's such a vague question. I started asking, "can you relieve your ear pressure without moving anything else", and most people answer no. One person who dived, answered "yes, of course!" like it's something all people can.
    - jaeckel 3y ago
      If someone doesn't know how to do it, they could still learn it https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valsalva_maneuver https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valsalva_maneuver
      - metafunctor 3y ago
        That’s not the same thing, I believe.
        jaeckel 3y ago
        It's not the same thing, but it would allow them to > "[...] relieve your ear pressure without moving anything else"
        jaeckel 3y ago
        And I just realized that I meant the Frenzel Maneuver, which I always forget the name of. OK you need a nose clip, but besides that it's hands free. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frenzel_maneuver https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frenzel_maneuver
        matsemann 3y ago
- tudorw 3y ago
  Oh Internet, so maybe I can do that, thought we all could! Sounds like roaring wind...
- carrozo 3y ago
  There’s a whole subreddit dedicated to this, which they call “ear rumbling”: https://www.reddit.com/r/earrumblersassemble/ https://www.reddit.com/r/earrumblersassemble/
  - lotsofpulp 3y ago
    Ear rumbling is not the same as tinnitus. I can make my ear rumble, and I also have tinnitus (constant ringing or high pitched frequency sound). At least I assume, I have never bothered getting it diagnosed by a doctor because I can easily ignore it and have for many years, I only notice it when not focusing on anything else and I happen to pay attention to it. I assumed tinnitus was mostly caused by damaging the little hairs that sense sound becoming damaged from loud sounds and not working anymore, which I would have done with headphone use in my teens/early 20s.
  - hackernewds 3y ago
    wow there's a word for my useless ability!
    - echelon 3y ago
      Not everyone can do this? That's wild.
      - hollerith 3y ago
        I can't.
  - downrightmike 3y ago
    I can do that and have tinnitus and they aren't remotely the same. I usually use the ear rumble as a real world mute option. Someone talking tome and IDK? ear rumble. The tinnitus is always there.
- mofeien 3y ago
  To add another personal experience to that: I can do that as well, and for me it will make my tinnitus louder. It is very low pitched but more or less stable around 340Hz, and thus actually musically relevant to me as it gives me some kind of active, makeshift absolute pitch.
- CapsAdmin 3y ago
  I'm not sure if it's the same, but if I listen to pure noise (to sleep or something) I can somewhat adjust my hearing to focus on certain frequency bands in the uniform noise making me to hear a ringing sound in the noise. I can adjust the pitch and it will stay at the pitch until I change it. So with this I can play a melody with the ringing noise. Sometimes I do this until I fall asleep. :-)
  - LtWorf 3y ago
    Not the same thing at all. Try squeezing your eyelids really tight, you might hear a noise. That's what he's talking about.
- riccardomc 3y ago
  I am genuinely shocked I can do it...
- jakderrida 3y ago
  I went from, "What's this guy even talking about?" straight to inducing roaring after vaguely recall doing it as a child over 30 years ago.
- razodactyl 3y ago
  Right. I can do it too - I can make them click/crunch and roar - which I'm sure is due to the sound muscles make when tensed. Squeeze your fist and hold it up to your ear. It's audible.
  - almostnormal 3y ago
    Click is from pressure gradient when opening/tightening the eustachian tube. If I switch to open I can hear myself breathing. Partially covering the outer ear makes the flow of blood audible. That's not tinnitus-related.
    - w4ffl35 3y ago
      I've been able to do it my whole life, chatgpt tells me it's this: Hearing a crackling sound when you flex your ears is quite common. This noise typically results from the movement of small muscles around your ear, particularly the tensor tympani muscle in your middle ear. These muscles contract to dampen certain sounds, like chewing, but can also be voluntarily or involuntarily activated when you move your ears. This action can cause a vibration or movement of the eardrum, leading to the crackling sound. It's usually harmless, but if you experience pain, discomfort, or any other symptoms, it's advisable to consult a healthcare professional.
      - meindnoch 3y ago
        Another example why you shouldn't take ChatGPT at face value. The clicking sound is the opening of the Eustachian tube. Flexing the tensor tympani sounds like a deep rumbling.
    - im3w1l 3y ago
      A long time ago I would sometimes amuse myself by opening the tubes and humming some melody - would sound really loud.
      - rcstank 3y ago
        This actually relieves my tinnitus for a short period of time. Humming as loud as I can with my Eustachian tubes open would cause my tinnitus to either disappear or be imperceptible for about 3-5 seconds. It's such a relief that when my tinnitus gets really bad, I'll find I need to do it several times.
- itsboring 3y ago
  I always just assumed this was a normal thing that everyone had and never bothered to look it up. Sounds exactly like the roar of a high wind to me.
- ddingus 3y ago
  I can do that. It is like a roar at the loudest point I can manage. A light effort sounds a lot like the ship thruster sound in Asteroids. I find I can clench the muscle, but can only and occasionally relax the thing. When I do clench, my ear response curve in the midrange, say 800Hz to a few KHz, is improved. Have a fan handy? Try it and listen. You may hear a lot more from that fan.
  - LegitShady 3y ago
    I have had the same thing my whole life that I can remember but no tinnitus. If I clench my jaw enough I get that roaring rumble. I assumed it was normal.
- cortesoft 3y ago
  Wait, not everyone can do that?
tuzemec 3y ago
It sounds like mine is the same flavor. And it's getting worse in the last couple of years. I even did MRI scan at some point, but it didn't reveal anything. Recently a neurologist recommend transcranial electrical stimulation. Seems that it helps in some cases. Have to look around if someone is performing that here.
pdntspa 3y ago
I have this too, and in fact I can recall that tinnitus first came to me after it felt like something in my ear physically shifted, in a period of my life where I was not listening to loud music or going to loud concerts or otherwise being around loud noise. I should note I've had numerous ear problems in the past (including multiple colestiatomas), and I used to be able to manipulate it with a q-tip or popping my ears. (Don't do that! I regret it) The head massage technique I've had some friends send me to temporarily alleviate symptoms never worked.
makk 3y ago
Some examples: - jutting my jaw forwards - moving my ears back with my face muscles - pushing downward on the top of my head with my hands That's wild. Never tried that before but just did and I can 100% repro.
- thfuran 3y ago
  Only the first and third do anything for me, but both seem to add the same high pitch tone to the mix.
  - idonotknowwhy 3y ago
    Same here, what the hell? Luckily it goes away as soon as I stop doing it.
  - acomjean 3y ago
    I get more buzzing with the first and third as well. I like the go biting doesn’t seem to change it for me.
- 3rd3 3y ago
  To this list I'd add pulling the jaw backward/inward. Moving the jaw forward and then to the right has the biggest effect for me, causing the ringing on the left ear to increase. It's asymmetric in that moving the jaw to the front left has only a very small effect on the right ear. Moving the ears backwards has no effect for me.
ornornor 3y ago
> - jutting my jaw forward Works for me too. Never noticed it would do it before though. I’ve had very mild tinnitus for as long as I can remember. But I mostly only hear it when it’s quiet around so I’m lucky in that sense I guess.
chrsmth 3y ago
I've seen this called Somatosensory Tinnitus [0], and it's what I have as well. Stretching my neck & clearing my ears of wax pretty much resolves it every time, or at least helps a lot. I only have it on the left side, and my TMJ lines up marginally worse on that side, so it's probably related. [0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1807593222007761?via%3Dihub https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S180759322...
Lorin 3y ago
Tinnitus was one of the reasons I stopped cracking my neck - would trigger it shortly after.
painted-now 3y ago
It took me a long while to figure out that I can make my tinnitus better by pushing by jaw backwards (using my hands). As I understood it, the ear and the jaw muscle are delicately close. "Pressure" on the ear can somehow cause the nerves to send such signals. I got prescribed some special training to relax the muscles in the neck and jaw area; still need to start it. I read that being able to modulate the tinnitus to also be quieter somehow is a good indicator of being able to improve it with therapy.
- nobrains 3y ago
  My symptoms started along with my jaw crackling. So it seems they are related. Putting my symptoms here: - Constant noise in ear - Also seems like noise / tingling sensation in the brain - Is higher just when I wake up - Started along with an infection that went to the ear. Infection cleared up. Tinnitus didn't. - Been on for a year and a half. - Its terribly unbearable. Not suicidal level but very close to it.
  - KomoD 3y ago
    > - Its terribly unbearable. Not suicidal level but very close to it. I feel that, it sucks. For me it started with like a "blocked" feeling, now I'm at the point where it's constant static which makes it impossible to sleep on my side, sometimes my left ear goes "deaf" momentarily and a sharp ring starts and it makes me "zone out" but ends after 15-30s It's living hell.
    - kitsune_ 3y ago
      I have the same shit, it sucks.
  - Solvency 3y ago
    I bet you have a tongue tie. Go get a frenectomy. Do tongue stretches. Get some facial massages.
    - hackernewds 3y ago
lutorm 3y ago
Yes, there are reports of trigger points in the jaw muscles being at least partially responsible for tinnitus (see e.g. https://www.amazon.com/Trigger-Point-Therapy-Workbook-Self-Treatment/dp/1572243759 https://www.amazon.com/Trigger-Point-Therapy-Workbook-Self-T... which, if you have any muscle related pains, will likely blow your mind.) I have exactly the same experience as you. I also get jaw induced headaches from biting my nails etc and my impression is that it is associated with an increase in my tinnitus. Probably a related mechanism, but I can also sometimes hear my eye muscles working. It only happens if I'm sick or otherwise feeling under the weather, but moving my eyes rapidly is then associated with a swoosh-like auditory impression. I haven't heard anyone else experiencing this so far.
- thfuran 3y ago
  That's a peculiarly specific sort of autophony.
JumpCrisscross 3y ago
> moving my ears back with my face muscles Uh, this has always made me hear a high-pitched whirr. Like a tiny buzzer with a dirty power supply. Huh.
kstenerud 3y ago
Interesting.. moving muscles does nothing for me. But then again I was born with tinnitus. I actually didn't know until much later in life that a constant multi-tone ringing in your ears is NOT normal - that was simply my reality so I assumed it was the same for everyone.
KomoD 3y ago
> I don’t know if this is a clue, but I can do muscle movements in my head/face/jaw to make the tinnitus worse (only as I make the movements, immediately reverting back to “normal” tinnitus as soon as I relax). I can do that as well.
BreadPants 3y ago
Lemme guess, somewhat narrow palate, slightly recessed jaw. Unable to breathe exclusively through the nose during high intensity workout. Possible indications of sleep apnea. If they're detecting nerve damage, it's happening from nerve compression. Tinnitus being a manifestation of the compressed nerve. I would bet money rapid palatal expansion with a proper midpalatal suture split would cure you.
- MyFirstSass 3y ago
  Had braces for years, they removed 4 molars, was horrible, now my smile is too narrow, breathing bad, got TMJ, tongue too big for mouth, recessed chin look worse etc. Why is it that orthodontics used this method? I can see locally it's still only some dentists that seem to use palate expansion when it's seemingly easier, prettier, quicker, healthier etc. than teeth removal + braces? Thinking about removing my retainers and having a palate expansion done instead as you recommend as i seriously feel like i'm never really getting enough air during sports, sleep etc. EDIT: This whole reddit thread is quite crazy, full of people having all sorts of issues cured by various methods that classic ortho wont approve: https://www.reddit.com/r/orthotropics/comments/11ow1yb/expanded_my_palate_in_less_than_a_year_by/ https://www.reddit.com/r/orthotropics/comments/11ow1yb/expan...
  - BreadPants 3y ago
    You're on the right track
  - fud101 3y ago
    That's some internet
- hackernewds 3y ago
  how does nerve damage relate to sleep apnea? doctors have recommended tonsil removal to expand my palate space. also have tinnitus bte
  - BreadPants 3y ago
beingfit 3y ago
For me, with tinnitus in one ear (buzzing), what helps is moving (and stretching) the jaw downwards and sideways away from that ear. The jaw bone on the side with tinnitus also makes a low cracking noise every time I make this move. Keeping my jaw in that weird position (downwards and sideways) turns off the buzzing many a times. But it’s temporary. It’s also not easy to keep the jaw in that tensed position for a long time. On the other hand, keeping my jaws relaxed does not make it better or worse. I’d love to know if there are any videos of exercises that could help reduce or cure this form of tinnitus.
- hackernewds 3y ago
  have you tried this https://youtu.be/2yDCox-qKbk?si=eEjtlP97v8UiubX4 https://youtu.be/2yDCox-qKbk?si=eEjtlP97v8UiubX4
radicalbyte 3y ago
Same here! Mine is in one ear, mild, started with a sinus infection and changes depending on whether I have a cold or not. I initially assumed it was caused by babies / children - we have three and they are loud. Plus my kids have screamed directly into my ears on occasion (and been punished for it).
COGlory 3y ago
Do you have TMJ?
kitsune_ 3y ago
As a child my teeth were corrected by pulling my lower jaw back with elastic bands. Not only do I have a weak chin because of this, but in hindsight I think my tinnitus might be related to this as well.
- cedws 3y ago
  I have major distrust of orthodontics as a practice. I see it as chiropractic for teeth. I have permanent damage to one side of my jaw (TMJ) as a result of braces. They not only put unlevel bite blocks in, they did an extraction before putting my braces on. There is literature pointing to this as a common cause of TMJ issues. I was told that the clicking sounds are just due to gas in the joint by a TMJ specialist, but I can literally feel my jaw jut to one side, so I'm convinced the bone is damaged.
  - MyFirstSass 3y ago
    Same! I had braces as a kid and something always seemed off intuitively about how they "fixed" my teeth. Also got TMJ, recessed chin, and i've never felt my breathing has been very good afterwards, like my whole face became too narrow after removing 4 molars making me just a bit less attractive. And after deep diving orthodontics i'm pretty fucking mad. It seems there are way better methods that keep both aesthetics and a more natural breathing - ie. a little palate expansion to make space for your teeth instead of removing teeth and having braces for years. It's even quicker, like what the actual! I still have retainers on, and i'm considering having them removed and having rapid palate expansion done as others in this thread recommends. As they also point out, i also have a hard time breathing correctly during sports, and have been worrying over sleep apnea.
    - kitsune_ 3y ago
      My breathing is impaired as well, there is simply not enough space in my mouth as a result of the fix.
      - MyFirstSass 3y ago
CapsAdmin 3y ago
I have the exact same experience. I believe it's called "somatic tinnitus" and I've had it for as long as I can remember. Every now and then I get ringing in my ears that fade out quickly, which is normal. I always thought that was the sort of constant ringing people had when they talk about tinnitus, and the one you describe is a different class of tinnitus.
- y-c-o-m-b 3y ago
  Yes it's somatic tinnitus. I can make mine go away for a few hours, sometimes a whole day by loosening up my SCM muscles and popping my neck. Other times it backfires and gets worse. Very annoying, but the ability to have SOME control over it makes things less depressing at least.
peebeebee 3y ago
Yup. Pushing jaw forward is the most prominent one. Goes up a lot.
j45 3y ago
This is interesting in terms of tinnitus that can be brought on after a car accident, or a concussion. And maybe as a derivative of the former, TMJ. A muscle related tinnitus seems entirely plausible to me in addition to any potential nerve related tinnitus tied to, for example, listening to loud music.
stndef 3y ago
Very relatable. Have always been able to do this. I have quite significant hearing loss these days, which has been tied back to having Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, relating to connective tissue development, which in part could impact areas that result in certain types of tinnitus developing. Worse thing about tinnitus and hearing loss is that the more your hearing goes, the louder the tinnitus gets. Haven't heard proper silence in over a decade. Bit of a nightmare sometimes!
adamddev1 3y ago
Yes, me too. An ENT also told me that my tinnitus was muslce-related and I got huge relief (low tones totally disappeared) from some good physiotherapy and osteopathy. (See my other comment)
baerrie 3y ago
I have found that if I meditate and “focus” on the area where my inner ear/behind my ear is eventually I can quiet the tinnitus some or even completely. I’ve been able to reproduce it three or four different times. I imagine the nerve endings shrinking, receding, or calming down, and it causes some relief. Could be psychosomatic but it is repeatable and the effect lasts
- wmertens 3y ago
  I can only make it louder, not quieter :(
Jhsto 3y ago
> suggests that (my flavor of tinnitus, at least) may be due to physical/muscle related causes I have explosion-related tinnitus/hearing damage and it also reacts to muscle movements. So, it seems like they are the same.
maushu 3y ago
Interesting. I don't have tinnitus but when I jut my jaw forward I hear really low white noise.
- 123pie123 3y ago
  interesting, I've just tried it and I get the same
arbuge 3y ago
Could it be that those movements are pinching a nerve somewhere and causing the tinnitus?
palla89 3y ago
I’ve an issue similar to yours, playing with my jaws especially yawning seems to increase the whistle while I’m doing it, then it come back to normal. I can hear it almost onyl at night and only in the right ear. Sometimes when I yawn a lot I can dismiss it totally (at least for that night) What the hell is this? I also did a hearing test and I’ve no problem.
adamhp 3y ago
Same here. Mine is basically directly correlated with bite pressure. When I'm chewing sometimes I can literally hear the ringing going "wah, wah, wah" in time with my chewing. And if I grit my teeth I can make it get much louder than its baseline. Same if I open my jaw quite wide (sometimes this helps?). I've ground my teeth my whole life. And I can definitely point at one or two concerts that probably did some significant damage.
itsboring 3y ago
Very interesting. Jutting my jaw forward makes a very obvious loud squeal at what sounds like a lower frequency than my normal background tinnitus. I never noticed that before. I do clench my teeth a lot from anxiety and get muscle pain in the sides of my face on occasion. I wonder if that’s related.
- riedel 3y ago
  Exactly the same for me.
loceng 3y ago
I've had the unfortunate "superpower" of living with central sensitization and hyperalgesia - a hypersensitivity to pain - for the last ~10 years. Not everyone's nervous system works this way but for a significant portion of the population there is the capacity of the nerves to refer pain to other parts of the body, whether in the nerves themselves or signalling in the brain region itself cascading or both. There also seems to be a lack of understanding or consideration that merely normal pressures on nerves, with subtle levels of additional pressure, will actually cause a pain signal or sensitization of that nerve line (either or both directions) to occur. What you state could be a clue to pain somewhere in your body. It could be tooth pain, it could be jaw pain, it could be bite-alignment pain, e.g. where your jaw position and bite with teeth is causing pressure on nerves that it doesn't expect or want. It could also instead be a hypersensitivity to sound you have, and so those nerve line(s) are amped up - so then anything connected or in close proximity to it will then From my experience with pain, 99.999% of doctors have no real understanding of pain, and there's a whole body of work waiting to be written and to start being taught closer to properly; and the rest of them still only have a fairly niche but not holistic understanding. There is a book called "Hearing Equals Behaviour: Updated and Expanded" that dives into a sound therapy developed 70+ years ago in France, called Berard AIT [Auditory Integration Training], for where you can do a non-standard audiogram to check for imbalances in the hearing - for which at certain frequencies you can with accuracy predict a set of behaviours that person will likely have. If such imbalances show up in these special audiograms then it's either a sign of damage or a sign of how the brain is processing audio-sensory signals, and which may been interfered with - proper development disrupted - if say you had painful ear infections as a child who's brain is rapidly developing, and now where your brain is abnormally associating sound as pain. Berard AIT can get rid of tinnitus, depending on its cause, essentially giving the brain an opportunity to recalibrate. Did you ever have ear infections as a child, and do you remember if they were painful at all?
Sosh101 3y ago
I have exactly the same thing. Most tinnitus is caused damage to the hair cells in the cochlea from loud noises for extended periods of time (as is mine). My theory is that the brain basically turns up the gain to compensate for the poor performance of the sensor. I think tinnitus is basically interference, or cross-talk from other nervous processes that normally are low level background. Last time I went for a hearing test the doctor asked me if I had been in an explosion (not to my knowledge).
matja 3y ago
> pushing downward on the top of my head with my hands I've never tried or noticed this before until you mentioned it, but this makes my tinitus noticeably worse. It's not really louder, but seems to add "harmonics".
- hackernewds 3y ago
  same. wow this really lends to the "it's physical" theory
berniedurfee 3y ago
Mine is due to hearing damage from being stupid. I can modulate it as well using my jaw muscles. What I’ve always found interesting is that I can’t describe the sound. It’s high pitched, but I’ve never found a frequency of tone that matches or even comes close to the tinnitus. I would imagine the signals my brain receives from the damaged nerves is very complex. Not white noise, but probably the equivalent of a tone with lots of specific harmonics. As for my experience, it’s been an issue for so long it doesn’t generally affect me. It’s always there and I can’t ignore it, but it doesn’t disrupt my life, other than having generally not great hearing.
longstation 3y ago
This is exactly the same as mine. I never found any with this situation. Even if someone claims to have tinnitus, it's a different variation. My feeling is, for a lack of better word, grateful, (definitely not a good thing for your or me) that I finally found someone the same as mine. Next time I ever want to see a doctor again for this (not helpful btw, they don't really have cure or seem to understand my situation), I will just show your comment!
- hackernewds 3y ago
  if it helps you or your doctor, my experience is exactly the same. I can amplify the tinnitus with jaw movements
iJohnDoe 3y ago
Same here. Head and neck movement can make my tinnitus worse. If I sleep poorly on my neck then I can wake up with my tinnitus being much louder.
dahart 3y ago
> pushing downward on the top of my head with my hands Have you tried pulling up to make it less noticeable? I’ve long suspected my neck muscles had something to do with making tinnitus worse. Or, like you said, maybe there is a correlation or interaction with head & neck muscles that isn’t causal but nonetheless seems to affect the symptoms. Cervical traction, i.e. a device that pulls up on your head, sometimes seems to help me, as does neck stretching & relaxation. Make sure to consult a doctor or physical therapist about cervical traction, it’s easy to overdo it without guidance.
- jader201 3y ago
  Interesting, that may help but if so only slightly. I wonder if an inversion table would help identify whether this helps/is a factor.
  - dahart 3y ago
    I think an inversion table might help my tinnitus slightly maybe but not much… it mostly helps and puts tension on the lower back, and a lot less on the neck. Inversion, or lumbar traction, seem to help with sciatica. (And yeah, that’s another one where it seems like there’s an interaction between muscles and nerves.)
darksim905 3y ago
Where are you based, and would you want to troubleshoot with a friend who notices similar things? :)
financltravsty 3y ago
Try putting your fingers in your ears and massaging around. I've found it gives me complete relief for about 10 seconds. I think mine might be related to stress, hypertension, and an all-around lack of relaxation.
- klardotsh 3y ago
  I have had tinnitus for about 7 or 8 years now in varying intensities and somehow have never thought to do this as an extended exercise (a good 30 seconds of massaging just now). I'm not gonna say I heard silence for the first time in years or anything, but I just heard something relatively close, for just a short little while. The audiologist I saw when this all first started also assumed it was stress and/or blood pressure and/or modern way of life issues, as she couldn't find anything physically wrong with my ears. You're onto something here.
polishdude20 3y ago
My ears ring when I yawn. Does anyone else get that?
- jmckib 3y ago
  Yep same here, and I don’t have tinnitus. Sometimes I seem to get it temporarily though, for unclear reasons.
  - eyemissyew 3y ago
    It can have to do with allergies. However, it might be something else if it has recently worsened or become more noticeable. Has it always been the same?
jaxr 3y ago
Exact same experience here! particularly, if I move my jaw backwards with my jaw muscles, the tinnitus would get worse. Never better, though. I do feel the same sometimes, that doctors are not listening hard enough to what we are saying. I've been suffering tinnitus for 20 years now, and it seems to be getting even worse. I really hope a viable treatment is found in my lifetime. It would improve my quality of life so much!
dghughes 3y ago
I have tinnitus I mean my ears ring constantly but I've never been diagnosed officially. It seems to be a middle C tone. For years I clenched my jaw and grind my teeth mostly at night to the point of damaging my teeth. I wore a guard and then didn't now again back at it due to jaw pain. The guard helps a bit mainly from damage when asleep and seems to protect my jaw joints. My point being even if my jaw is totally relaxed there is a hum from the muscles in my jaw. It's like a 60Hz hum musicians hear from AC interference in speakers. I have to wonder if it's part of the constant noise I hear in my ears. I also get BPPV too it's severe sudden vertigo it may be related to my clench and tinnitus. It's just random no clue what causes it. I can't even walk and have to lay down and not even close my eyes just pick a spot and stare. I had to do that for 12 hours one time my worst time.
- dathos 3y ago
  Interesting, I have issues with jaw clenching and a damaged TMJ. I seem to always notice the (incorrect) position of my jaw, and when this is in a worse position the clenching increases and with that my tinnitus. I always assumed the softer bones around my ears get deformed because of this which in turn causes me to be affected by tinnitus. Honestly the thing that helped best was meditation. I tried guards, even a specialized one to realign my jaw slowly, but I feel those are just symptom relievers.
  - dghughes 3y ago
    I also should have added as a child I had constant ear aches. This was before the time of tubes being inserted for drainage. But also my Dad smoked so it may have been partly due to that. Once the bars here banned smoking and overall smoking in public was more controlled I noticed a big drop in any sinus and ear issues, finally! I never smoked but it was the 1970s and 1980s I got more than enough just second hand. Many factors I think can cause ear and hearing problems smoke, sinus, jaw clench, stress.
ajkjk 3y ago
It's fascinating how many people have various versions of these problems and a bunch of their own theories about it. And how many of them are frustrated by orthodontistry for not helping or causing it or making it worse.
deng 3y ago
Yes, this is called somatic tinnitus and is actually quite common. Like you, I had this since I was a little child and thought this was normal. Only when I first heard of tinnitus as a juvenile, I realized that this is what I had. There have been small studies regarding somatic tinnitus, see for instance https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2633109/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2633109/ For modifying tinnitus loudness, the most common is that it increases when clenching the jaw. In the above paper, the cerebral blood flow was measured with PET, and for people with somatic tinnitus, when clenching their jaw, in addition to the sensory-motor areas, the auditory cortex became activated as well. However, the underlying reason is unknown. In my case, I had pretty severe hearing loss as a little child because of liquid in my middle ear. Due to that, I continuously had my mouth open so that I could hear at least a little bit through the eustachian tubes, and I guess this might have influenced the interactions between these brain regions. But who knows. In the end, my parents realized what's going on and I got tympanostomy tubes, and I'm hearing fine now. Of course I don't know if the tinnitus really comes from that, because I cannot remember (I must have been around 3 years old).
- Natsu 3y ago
  It seems like some cases of tinnitus may be due to tight muscles, too. I don't usually suffer it, but when I do, I've noticed that sometimes massaging the back of the head or jaw can make it just go away. I doubt this works for everyone or for every cause, but it's simple enough to be worth trying to see if it does anything helpful.
  - codethief 3y ago
    Can confirm, I once had an annoying episode of tinnitus for a couple days in a row and it went away once my physiotherapist addressed my neck pain.
  - sokka_h2otribe 3y ago
    This sounds like the tmj type. Probably most common type I've heard for muscular related, and even some ENTs will know about it Grinding teeth at night is a common influencing factor, many other causes for tight tmj muscle Scm area and neck-shoulder is a slightly lesser known but common category I've heard of where muscle s can influence tinnitus. I've heard forward neck posture and less developed core / & core breathing can be common influence for this kind, but similarly there many are other causes/influences. It also iirc stretches more than one muscle in the neck to shoulder that's common. When learning more about these things, I liked a lot 1) "A multidisciplinary European guideline for tinnitus: diagnostics, assessment, and treatment" 2) Tufts eye and ear tinnitus seminar (video series from several years back) Probably a few other resources, but those seem like the best to advertise on HN. There is extensive information elsewhere but more filtering required. E.g, some of the forums have great posts, but also a lot of other posts less great for general topic intro. Sympathy and love, though, if anyone reading is having a hard time right now w/tinnitus. It can be difficult at times and in some circumstances. Id also like to note if you do have tinnitus and don't want to read more, that's ok too! For some people reading is the last thing they really need, and that's ok
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ricardobeat 3y ago
I was curious and tried 'jutting my jaw forwards' and got a very loud whine in my ears. I've had ringing in my ears before but never diagnosed with tinnitus, now I'm worried...
nullserver 3y ago
Could be TMJ. Look up TMJ massage by Bob and Brad. Could also be high cranial pressure. Look up IIH for that.
sdiupIGPWEfh 3y ago
I've just discovered, thanks to this, that my tinnitus stops for a brief moment if I move my jaw forward. Thanks for the moment of relief.
bradknowles 3y ago
Jutting my jaw forwards has the same effect on me. But not the other two. Makes me curious!

nsxwolf 3y ago

Interesting. I can “play my eardrums”, which I describe as the ability to consciously control something in my ears that causes a loud fluttering, ringing sound that is something like wind entering my ear canals combined with a bell. After some research I’ve found some people can control something called the “tensor tympani” and generate sounds described as a “roar” but being a subjective experience I am not certain this is exactly what I am doing.

anonymousiam 3y ago
I've always been able to do this, and I've always assumed that it's not unusual. It does not seem to be at all related to my tinnitus.
huytersd 3y ago
That is interesting. I assumed everyone could hear that. I can hear the sound (roar, ocean, wind) when I move my jaw forward but I can also just directly control it without moving anything else. It’s a muscle I can feel myself controlling and contracting in my inner ear.
- hackernewds 3y ago
  I think that is the experience of _everyone_
  - xigoi 3y ago
    It’s not. I have no idea what you all are talking about.
smegger001 3y ago
yeah i think i do the same thing as you with my ears. a flutter is probably the best description of it i had thought of it as clapping or clicking my ears but that is to sharp a sound to really describe it
- idonotknowwhy 3y ago
  I can do this too. It also does the same thing as yawning when your ears get blocked on a plane or driving up a steep hill. It unblocks them.
  - nsxwolf 3y ago
    I’m wondering if this is something different, or if it’s a more intense level of the other thing. I’m able to pop my ears without any apparent tensioning of my jaw or a yawn reflex. But I can do it while also making the rushing sound or not.
    - idonotknowwhy 3y ago
      Yeah okay, that must be something different (that I can't do) then.
    - matsemann 3y ago
      Yeah, it's two different muscles for the rumbling vs clicking. Tensor veli palatini opens the eustachian tube and makes a click. The rumbling is from the tympani.
  - ce4 3y ago
    Stapedius reflex? Some can control this muscle volintarily (me as well), it dampens incoming noise by a few dB to protect the ears. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_reflex https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic_reflex
sedatk 3y ago
I can do that too.
luplex 3y ago
I'm pretty sure that's the tensor tympani. I also think your description sounds closer to what I do. For me it sounds like wind, but only lower frequencies.
cjsme 3y ago
Ditto! Very useful for relieving ear pressure at altitude.
- bartvk 3y ago
  Yeah, I also use it for that. I've asked people the question, "can you click your ears"? Of course, they don't understand me, because it's such a vague question. I started asking, "can you relieve your ear pressure without moving anything else", and most people answer no. One person who dived, answered "yes, of course!" like it's something all people can.
  - jaeckel 3y ago
    If someone doesn't know how to do it, they could still learn it https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valsalva_maneuver https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Valsalva_maneuver
    - metafunctor 3y ago
      That’s not the same thing, I believe.
      - jaeckel 3y ago
        It's not the same thing, but it would allow them to > "[...] relieve your ear pressure without moving anything else"
        jaeckel 3y ago
        And I just realized that I meant the Frenzel Maneuver, which I always forget the name of. OK you need a nose clip, but besides that it's hands free. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frenzel_maneuver https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Frenzel_maneuver
        matsemann 3y ago
tudorw 3y ago
Oh Internet, so maybe I can do that, thought we all could! Sounds like roaring wind...
carrozo 3y ago
There’s a whole subreddit dedicated to this, which they call “ear rumbling”: https://www.reddit.com/r/earrumblersassemble/ https://www.reddit.com/r/earrumblersassemble/
- lotsofpulp 3y ago
  Ear rumbling is not the same as tinnitus. I can make my ear rumble, and I also have tinnitus (constant ringing or high pitched frequency sound). At least I assume, I have never bothered getting it diagnosed by a doctor because I can easily ignore it and have for many years, I only notice it when not focusing on anything else and I happen to pay attention to it. I assumed tinnitus was mostly caused by damaging the little hairs that sense sound becoming damaged from loud sounds and not working anymore, which I would have done with headphone use in my teens/early 20s.
- hackernewds 3y ago
  wow there's a word for my useless ability!
  - echelon 3y ago
    Not everyone can do this? That's wild.
    - hollerith 3y ago
      I can't.
- downrightmike 3y ago
  I can do that and have tinnitus and they aren't remotely the same. I usually use the ear rumble as a real world mute option. Someone talking tome and IDK? ear rumble. The tinnitus is always there.
mofeien 3y ago
To add another personal experience to that: I can do that as well, and for me it will make my tinnitus louder. It is very low pitched but more or less stable around 340Hz, and thus actually musically relevant to me as it gives me some kind of active, makeshift absolute pitch.
CapsAdmin 3y ago
I'm not sure if it's the same, but if I listen to pure noise (to sleep or something) I can somewhat adjust my hearing to focus on certain frequency bands in the uniform noise making me to hear a ringing sound in the noise. I can adjust the pitch and it will stay at the pitch until I change it. So with this I can play a melody with the ringing noise. Sometimes I do this until I fall asleep. :-)
- LtWorf 3y ago
  Not the same thing at all. Try squeezing your eyelids really tight, you might hear a noise. That's what he's talking about.
riccardomc 3y ago
I am genuinely shocked I can do it...
jakderrida 3y ago
I went from, "What's this guy even talking about?" straight to inducing roaring after vaguely recall doing it as a child over 30 years ago.
razodactyl 3y ago
Right. I can do it too - I can make them click/crunch and roar - which I'm sure is due to the sound muscles make when tensed. Squeeze your fist and hold it up to your ear. It's audible.
- almostnormal 3y ago
  Click is from pressure gradient when opening/tightening the eustachian tube. If I switch to open I can hear myself breathing. Partially covering the outer ear makes the flow of blood audible. That's not tinnitus-related.
  - w4ffl35 3y ago
    I've been able to do it my whole life, chatgpt tells me it's this: Hearing a crackling sound when you flex your ears is quite common. This noise typically results from the movement of small muscles around your ear, particularly the tensor tympani muscle in your middle ear. These muscles contract to dampen certain sounds, like chewing, but can also be voluntarily or involuntarily activated when you move your ears. This action can cause a vibration or movement of the eardrum, leading to the crackling sound. It's usually harmless, but if you experience pain, discomfort, or any other symptoms, it's advisable to consult a healthcare professional.
    - meindnoch 3y ago
      Another example why you shouldn't take ChatGPT at face value. The clicking sound is the opening of the Eustachian tube. Flexing the tensor tympani sounds like a deep rumbling.
  - im3w1l 3y ago
    A long time ago I would sometimes amuse myself by opening the tubes and humming some melody - would sound really loud.
    - rcstank 3y ago
      This actually relieves my tinnitus for a short period of time. Humming as loud as I can with my Eustachian tubes open would cause my tinnitus to either disappear or be imperceptible for about 3-5 seconds. It's such a relief that when my tinnitus gets really bad, I'll find I need to do it several times.
itsboring 3y ago
I always just assumed this was a normal thing that everyone had and never bothered to look it up. Sounds exactly like the roar of a high wind to me.
ddingus 3y ago
I can do that. It is like a roar at the loudest point I can manage. A light effort sounds a lot like the ship thruster sound in Asteroids. I find I can clench the muscle, but can only and occasionally relax the thing. When I do clench, my ear response curve in the midrange, say 800Hz to a few KHz, is improved. Have a fan handy? Try it and listen. You may hear a lot more from that fan.
- LegitShady 3y ago
  I have had the same thing my whole life that I can remember but no tinnitus. If I clench my jaw enough I get that roaring rumble. I assumed it was normal.
cortesoft 3y ago
Wait, not everyone can do that?

tuzemec 3y ago

It sounds like mine is the same flavor. And it's getting worse in the last couple of years. I even did MRI scan at some point, but it didn't reveal anything. Recently a neurologist recommend transcranial electrical stimulation. Seems that it helps in some cases. Have to look around if someone is performing that here.

pdntspa 3y ago

I have this too, and in fact I can recall that tinnitus first came to me after it felt like something in my ear physically shifted, in a period of my life where I was not listening to loud music or going to loud concerts or otherwise being around loud noise. I should note I've had numerous ear problems in the past (including multiple colestiatomas), and I used to be able to manipulate it with a q-tip or popping my ears. (Don't do that! I regret it) The head massage technique I've had some friends send me to temporarily alleviate symptoms never worked.

makk 3y ago

Some examples: - jutting my jaw forwards - moving my ears back with my face muscles - pushing downward on the top of my head with my hands That's wild. Never tried that before but just did and I can 100% repro.

thfuran 3y ago
Only the first and third do anything for me, but both seem to add the same high pitch tone to the mix.
- idonotknowwhy 3y ago
  Same here, what the hell? Luckily it goes away as soon as I stop doing it.
- acomjean 3y ago
  I get more buzzing with the first and third as well. I like the go biting doesn’t seem to change it for me.
3rd3 3y ago
To this list I'd add pulling the jaw backward/inward. Moving the jaw forward and then to the right has the biggest effect for me, causing the ringing on the left ear to increase. It's asymmetric in that moving the jaw to the front left has only a very small effect on the right ear. Moving the ears backwards has no effect for me.

ornornor 3y ago

> - jutting my jaw forward Works for me too. Never noticed it would do it before though. I’ve had very mild tinnitus for as long as I can remember. But I mostly only hear it when it’s quiet around so I’m lucky in that sense I guess.

chrsmth 3y ago

I've seen this called Somatosensory Tinnitus [0], and it's what I have as well. Stretching my neck & clearing my ears of wax pretty much resolves it every time, or at least helps a lot. I only have it on the left side, and my TMJ lines up marginally worse on that side, so it's probably related. [0] https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1807593222007761?via%3Dihub https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S180759322...

Lorin 3y ago

Tinnitus was one of the reasons I stopped cracking my neck - would trigger it shortly after.

painted-now 3y ago

It took me a long while to figure out that I can make my tinnitus better by pushing by jaw backwards (using my hands). As I understood it, the ear and the jaw muscle are delicately close. "Pressure" on the ear can somehow cause the nerves to send such signals. I got prescribed some special training to relax the muscles in the neck and jaw area; still need to start it. I read that being able to modulate the tinnitus to also be quieter somehow is a good indicator of being able to improve it with therapy.

nobrains 3y ago
My symptoms started along with my jaw crackling. So it seems they are related. Putting my symptoms here: - Constant noise in ear - Also seems like noise / tingling sensation in the brain - Is higher just when I wake up - Started along with an infection that went to the ear. Infection cleared up. Tinnitus didn't. - Been on for a year and a half. - Its terribly unbearable. Not suicidal level but very close to it.
- KomoD 3y ago
  > - Its terribly unbearable. Not suicidal level but very close to it. I feel that, it sucks. For me it started with like a "blocked" feeling, now I'm at the point where it's constant static which makes it impossible to sleep on my side, sometimes my left ear goes "deaf" momentarily and a sharp ring starts and it makes me "zone out" but ends after 15-30s It's living hell.
  - kitsune_ 3y ago
    I have the same shit, it sucks.
- Solvency 3y ago
  I bet you have a tongue tie. Go get a frenectomy. Do tongue stretches. Get some facial massages.
  - hackernewds 3y ago

lutorm 3y ago

Yes, there are reports of trigger points in the jaw muscles being at least partially responsible for tinnitus (see e.g. https://www.amazon.com/Trigger-Point-Therapy-Workbook-Self-Treatment/dp/1572243759 https://www.amazon.com/Trigger-Point-Therapy-Workbook-Self-T... which, if you have any muscle related pains, will likely blow your mind.) I have exactly the same experience as you. I also get jaw induced headaches from biting my nails etc and my impression is that it is associated with an increase in my tinnitus. Probably a related mechanism, but I can also sometimes hear my eye muscles working. It only happens if I'm sick or otherwise feeling under the weather, but moving my eyes rapidly is then associated with a swoosh-like auditory impression. I haven't heard anyone else experiencing this so far.

thfuran 3y ago
That's a peculiarly specific sort of autophony.

JumpCrisscross 3y ago

> moving my ears back with my face muscles Uh, this has always made me hear a high-pitched whirr. Like a tiny buzzer with a dirty power supply. Huh.

kstenerud 3y ago

Interesting.. moving muscles does nothing for me. But then again I was born with tinnitus. I actually didn't know until much later in life that a constant multi-tone ringing in your ears is NOT normal - that was simply my reality so I assumed it was the same for everyone.

KomoD 3y ago

> I don’t know if this is a clue, but I can do muscle movements in my head/face/jaw to make the tinnitus worse (only as I make the movements, immediately reverting back to “normal” tinnitus as soon as I relax). I can do that as well.

BreadPants 3y ago

Lemme guess, somewhat narrow palate, slightly recessed jaw. Unable to breathe exclusively through the nose during high intensity workout. Possible indications of sleep apnea. If they're detecting nerve damage, it's happening from nerve compression. Tinnitus being a manifestation of the compressed nerve. I would bet money rapid palatal expansion with a proper midpalatal suture split would cure you.

MyFirstSass 3y ago
Had braces for years, they removed 4 molars, was horrible, now my smile is too narrow, breathing bad, got TMJ, tongue too big for mouth, recessed chin look worse etc. Why is it that orthodontics used this method? I can see locally it's still only some dentists that seem to use palate expansion when it's seemingly easier, prettier, quicker, healthier etc. than teeth removal + braces? Thinking about removing my retainers and having a palate expansion done instead as you recommend as i seriously feel like i'm never really getting enough air during sports, sleep etc. EDIT: This whole reddit thread is quite crazy, full of people having all sorts of issues cured by various methods that classic ortho wont approve: https://www.reddit.com/r/orthotropics/comments/11ow1yb/expanded_my_palate_in_less_than_a_year_by/ https://www.reddit.com/r/orthotropics/comments/11ow1yb/expan...
- BreadPants 3y ago
  You're on the right track
- fud101 3y ago
  That's some internet
hackernewds 3y ago
how does nerve damage relate to sleep apnea? doctors have recommended tonsil removal to expand my palate space. also have tinnitus bte
- BreadPants 3y ago

beingfit 3y ago

For me, with tinnitus in one ear (buzzing), what helps is moving (and stretching) the jaw downwards and sideways away from that ear. The jaw bone on the side with tinnitus also makes a low cracking noise every time I make this move. Keeping my jaw in that weird position (downwards and sideways) turns off the buzzing many a times. But it’s temporary. It’s also not easy to keep the jaw in that tensed position for a long time. On the other hand, keeping my jaws relaxed does not make it better or worse. I’d love to know if there are any videos of exercises that could help reduce or cure this form of tinnitus.

hackernewds 3y ago
have you tried this https://youtu.be/2yDCox-qKbk?si=eEjtlP97v8UiubX4 https://youtu.be/2yDCox-qKbk?si=eEjtlP97v8UiubX4

radicalbyte 3y ago

Same here! Mine is in one ear, mild, started with a sinus infection and changes depending on whether I have a cold or not. I initially assumed it was caused by babies / children - we have three and they are loud. Plus my kids have screamed directly into my ears on occasion (and been punished for it).

COGlory 3y ago

Do you have TMJ?

kitsune_ 3y ago

As a child my teeth were corrected by pulling my lower jaw back with elastic bands. Not only do I have a weak chin because of this, but in hindsight I think my tinnitus might be related to this as well.

cedws 3y ago
I have major distrust of orthodontics as a practice. I see it as chiropractic for teeth. I have permanent damage to one side of my jaw (TMJ) as a result of braces. They not only put unlevel bite blocks in, they did an extraction before putting my braces on. There is literature pointing to this as a common cause of TMJ issues. I was told that the clicking sounds are just due to gas in the joint by a TMJ specialist, but I can literally feel my jaw jut to one side, so I'm convinced the bone is damaged.
- MyFirstSass 3y ago
  Same! I had braces as a kid and something always seemed off intuitively about how they "fixed" my teeth. Also got TMJ, recessed chin, and i've never felt my breathing has been very good afterwards, like my whole face became too narrow after removing 4 molars making me just a bit less attractive. And after deep diving orthodontics i'm pretty fucking mad. It seems there are way better methods that keep both aesthetics and a more natural breathing - ie. a little palate expansion to make space for your teeth instead of removing teeth and having braces for years. It's even quicker, like what the actual! I still have retainers on, and i'm considering having them removed and having rapid palate expansion done as others in this thread recommends. As they also point out, i also have a hard time breathing correctly during sports, and have been worrying over sleep apnea.
  - kitsune_ 3y ago
    My breathing is impaired as well, there is simply not enough space in my mouth as a result of the fix.
    - MyFirstSass 3y ago

CapsAdmin 3y ago

I have the exact same experience. I believe it's called "somatic tinnitus" and I've had it for as long as I can remember. Every now and then I get ringing in my ears that fade out quickly, which is normal. I always thought that was the sort of constant ringing people had when they talk about tinnitus, and the one you describe is a different class of tinnitus.

y-c-o-m-b 3y ago
Yes it's somatic tinnitus. I can make mine go away for a few hours, sometimes a whole day by loosening up my SCM muscles and popping my neck. Other times it backfires and gets worse. Very annoying, but the ability to have SOME control over it makes things less depressing at least.

peebeebee 3y ago

Yup. Pushing jaw forward is the most prominent one. Goes up a lot.

j45 3y ago

This is interesting in terms of tinnitus that can be brought on after a car accident, or a concussion. And maybe as a derivative of the former, TMJ. A muscle related tinnitus seems entirely plausible to me in addition to any potential nerve related tinnitus tied to, for example, listening to loud music.

stndef 3y ago

Very relatable. Have always been able to do this. I have quite significant hearing loss these days, which has been tied back to having Ehlers Danlos Syndrome, relating to connective tissue development, which in part could impact areas that result in certain types of tinnitus developing. Worse thing about tinnitus and hearing loss is that the more your hearing goes, the louder the tinnitus gets. Haven't heard proper silence in over a decade. Bit of a nightmare sometimes!

adamddev1 3y ago

Yes, me too. An ENT also told me that my tinnitus was muslce-related and I got huge relief (low tones totally disappeared) from some good physiotherapy and osteopathy. (See my other comment)

baerrie 3y ago

I have found that if I meditate and “focus” on the area where my inner ear/behind my ear is eventually I can quiet the tinnitus some or even completely. I’ve been able to reproduce it three or four different times. I imagine the nerve endings shrinking, receding, or calming down, and it causes some relief. Could be psychosomatic but it is repeatable and the effect lasts

wmertens 3y ago
I can only make it louder, not quieter :(

Jhsto 3y ago

> suggests that (my flavor of tinnitus, at least) may be due to physical/muscle related causes I have explosion-related tinnitus/hearing damage and it also reacts to muscle movements. So, it seems like they are the same.

maushu 3y ago

Interesting. I don't have tinnitus but when I jut my jaw forward I hear really low white noise.

123pie123 3y ago
interesting, I've just tried it and I get the same

arbuge 3y ago

Could it be that those movements are pinching a nerve somewhere and causing the tinnitus?

palla89 3y ago

I’ve an issue similar to yours, playing with my jaws especially yawning seems to increase the whistle while I’m doing it, then it come back to normal. I can hear it almost onyl at night and only in the right ear. Sometimes when I yawn a lot I can dismiss it totally (at least for that night) What the hell is this? I also did a hearing test and I’ve no problem.

adamhp 3y ago

Same here. Mine is basically directly correlated with bite pressure. When I'm chewing sometimes I can literally hear the ringing going "wah, wah, wah" in time with my chewing. And if I grit my teeth I can make it get much louder than its baseline. Same if I open my jaw quite wide (sometimes this helps?). I've ground my teeth my whole life. And I can definitely point at one or two concerts that probably did some significant damage.

itsboring 3y ago

Very interesting. Jutting my jaw forward makes a very obvious loud squeal at what sounds like a lower frequency than my normal background tinnitus. I never noticed that before. I do clench my teeth a lot from anxiety and get muscle pain in the sides of my face on occasion. I wonder if that’s related.

riedel 3y ago
Exactly the same for me.

loceng 3y ago

I've had the unfortunate "superpower" of living with central sensitization and hyperalgesia - a hypersensitivity to pain - for the last ~10 years. Not everyone's nervous system works this way but for a significant portion of the population there is the capacity of the nerves to refer pain to other parts of the body, whether in the nerves themselves or signalling in the brain region itself cascading or both. There also seems to be a lack of understanding or consideration that merely normal pressures on nerves, with subtle levels of additional pressure, will actually cause a pain signal or sensitization of that nerve line (either or both directions) to occur. What you state could be a clue to pain somewhere in your body. It could be tooth pain, it could be jaw pain, it could be bite-alignment pain, e.g. where your jaw position and bite with teeth is causing pressure on nerves that it doesn't expect or want. It could also instead be a hypersensitivity to sound you have, and so those nerve line(s) are amped up - so then anything connected or in close proximity to it will then From my experience with pain, 99.999% of doctors have no real understanding of pain, and there's a whole body of work waiting to be written and to start being taught closer to properly; and the rest of them still only have a fairly niche but not holistic understanding. There is a book called "Hearing Equals Behaviour: Updated and Expanded" that dives into a sound therapy developed 70+ years ago in France, called Berard AIT [Auditory Integration Training], for where you can do a non-standard audiogram to check for imbalances in the hearing - for which at certain frequencies you can with accuracy predict a set of behaviours that person will likely have. If such imbalances show up in these special audiograms then it's either a sign of damage or a sign of how the brain is processing audio-sensory signals, and which may been interfered with - proper development disrupted - if say you had painful ear infections as a child who's brain is rapidly developing, and now where your brain is abnormally associating sound as pain. Berard AIT can get rid of tinnitus, depending on its cause, essentially giving the brain an opportunity to recalibrate. Did you ever have ear infections as a child, and do you remember if they were painful at all?

Sosh101 3y ago

I have exactly the same thing. Most tinnitus is caused damage to the hair cells in the cochlea from loud noises for extended periods of time (as is mine). My theory is that the brain basically turns up the gain to compensate for the poor performance of the sensor. I think tinnitus is basically interference, or cross-talk from other nervous processes that normally are low level background. Last time I went for a hearing test the doctor asked me if I had been in an explosion (not to my knowledge).

matja 3y ago

> pushing downward on the top of my head with my hands I've never tried or noticed this before until you mentioned it, but this makes my tinitus noticeably worse. It's not really louder, but seems to add "harmonics".

hackernewds 3y ago
same. wow this really lends to the "it's physical" theory

berniedurfee 3y ago

Mine is due to hearing damage from being stupid. I can modulate it as well using my jaw muscles. What I’ve always found interesting is that I can’t describe the sound. It’s high pitched, but I’ve never found a frequency of tone that matches or even comes close to the tinnitus. I would imagine the signals my brain receives from the damaged nerves is very complex. Not white noise, but probably the equivalent of a tone with lots of specific harmonics. As for my experience, it’s been an issue for so long it doesn’t generally affect me. It’s always there and I can’t ignore it, but it doesn’t disrupt my life, other than having generally not great hearing.

longstation 3y ago

This is exactly the same as mine. I never found any with this situation. Even if someone claims to have tinnitus, it's a different variation. My feeling is, for a lack of better word, grateful, (definitely not a good thing for your or me) that I finally found someone the same as mine. Next time I ever want to see a doctor again for this (not helpful btw, they don't really have cure or seem to understand my situation), I will just show your comment!

hackernewds 3y ago
if it helps you or your doctor, my experience is exactly the same. I can amplify the tinnitus with jaw movements

iJohnDoe 3y ago

Same here. Head and neck movement can make my tinnitus worse. If I sleep poorly on my neck then I can wake up with my tinnitus being much louder.

dahart 3y ago

> pushing downward on the top of my head with my hands Have you tried pulling up to make it less noticeable? I’ve long suspected my neck muscles had something to do with making tinnitus worse. Or, like you said, maybe there is a correlation or interaction with head & neck muscles that isn’t causal but nonetheless seems to affect the symptoms. Cervical traction, i.e. a device that pulls up on your head, sometimes seems to help me, as does neck stretching & relaxation. Make sure to consult a doctor or physical therapist about cervical traction, it’s easy to overdo it without guidance.

jader201 3y ago
Interesting, that may help but if so only slightly. I wonder if an inversion table would help identify whether this helps/is a factor.
- dahart 3y ago
  I think an inversion table might help my tinnitus slightly maybe but not much… it mostly helps and puts tension on the lower back, and a lot less on the neck. Inversion, or lumbar traction, seem to help with sciatica. (And yeah, that’s another one where it seems like there’s an interaction between muscles and nerves.)

darksim905 3y ago

Where are you based, and would you want to troubleshoot with a friend who notices similar things? :)

financltravsty 3y ago

Try putting your fingers in your ears and massaging around. I've found it gives me complete relief for about 10 seconds. I think mine might be related to stress, hypertension, and an all-around lack of relaxation.

klardotsh 3y ago
I have had tinnitus for about 7 or 8 years now in varying intensities and somehow have never thought to do this as an extended exercise (a good 30 seconds of massaging just now). I'm not gonna say I heard silence for the first time in years or anything, but I just heard something relatively close, for just a short little while. The audiologist I saw when this all first started also assumed it was stress and/or blood pressure and/or modern way of life issues, as she couldn't find anything physically wrong with my ears. You're onto something here.

polishdude20 3y ago

My ears ring when I yawn. Does anyone else get that?

jmckib 3y ago
Yep same here, and I don’t have tinnitus. Sometimes I seem to get it temporarily though, for unclear reasons.
- eyemissyew 3y ago
  It can have to do with allergies. However, it might be something else if it has recently worsened or become more noticeable. Has it always been the same?

jaxr 3y ago

Exact same experience here! particularly, if I move my jaw backwards with my jaw muscles, the tinnitus would get worse. Never better, though. I do feel the same sometimes, that doctors are not listening hard enough to what we are saying. I've been suffering tinnitus for 20 years now, and it seems to be getting even worse. I really hope a viable treatment is found in my lifetime. It would improve my quality of life so much!

dghughes 3y ago

I have tinnitus I mean my ears ring constantly but I've never been diagnosed officially. It seems to be a middle C tone. For years I clenched my jaw and grind my teeth mostly at night to the point of damaging my teeth. I wore a guard and then didn't now again back at it due to jaw pain. The guard helps a bit mainly from damage when asleep and seems to protect my jaw joints. My point being even if my jaw is totally relaxed there is a hum from the muscles in my jaw. It's like a 60Hz hum musicians hear from AC interference in speakers. I have to wonder if it's part of the constant noise I hear in my ears. I also get BPPV too it's severe sudden vertigo it may be related to my clench and tinnitus. It's just random no clue what causes it. I can't even walk and have to lay down and not even close my eyes just pick a spot and stare. I had to do that for 12 hours one time my worst time.

dathos 3y ago
Interesting, I have issues with jaw clenching and a damaged TMJ. I seem to always notice the (incorrect) position of my jaw, and when this is in a worse position the clenching increases and with that my tinnitus. I always assumed the softer bones around my ears get deformed because of this which in turn causes me to be affected by tinnitus. Honestly the thing that helped best was meditation. I tried guards, even a specialized one to realign my jaw slowly, but I feel those are just symptom relievers.
- dghughes 3y ago
  I also should have added as a child I had constant ear aches. This was before the time of tubes being inserted for drainage. But also my Dad smoked so it may have been partly due to that. Once the bars here banned smoking and overall smoking in public was more controlled I noticed a big drop in any sinus and ear issues, finally! I never smoked but it was the 1970s and 1980s I got more than enough just second hand. Many factors I think can cause ear and hearing problems smoke, sinus, jaw clench, stress.

ajkjk 3y ago

It's fascinating how many people have various versions of these problems and a bunch of their own theories about it. And how many of them are frustrated by orthodontistry for not helping or causing it or making it worse.

deng 3y ago

Yes, this is called somatic tinnitus and is actually quite common. Like you, I had this since I was a little child and thought this was normal. Only when I first heard of tinnitus as a juvenile, I realized that this is what I had. There have been small studies regarding somatic tinnitus, see for instance https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2633109/ https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2633109/ For modifying tinnitus loudness, the most common is that it increases when clenching the jaw. In the above paper, the cerebral blood flow was measured with PET, and for people with somatic tinnitus, when clenching their jaw, in addition to the sensory-motor areas, the auditory cortex became activated as well. However, the underlying reason is unknown. In my case, I had pretty severe hearing loss as a little child because of liquid in my middle ear. Due to that, I continuously had my mouth open so that I could hear at least a little bit through the eustachian tubes, and I guess this might have influenced the interactions between these brain regions. But who knows. In the end, my parents realized what's going on and I got tympanostomy tubes, and I'm hearing fine now. Of course I don't know if the tinnitus really comes from that, because I cannot remember (I must have been around 3 years old).

Natsu 3y ago
It seems like some cases of tinnitus may be due to tight muscles, too. I don't usually suffer it, but when I do, I've noticed that sometimes massaging the back of the head or jaw can make it just go away. I doubt this works for everyone or for every cause, but it's simple enough to be worth trying to see if it does anything helpful.
- codethief 3y ago
  Can confirm, I once had an annoying episode of tinnitus for a couple days in a row and it went away once my physiotherapist addressed my neck pain.
- sokka_h2otribe 3y ago
  This sounds like the tmj type. Probably most common type I've heard for muscular related, and even some ENTs will know about it Grinding teeth at night is a common influencing factor, many other causes for tight tmj muscle Scm area and neck-shoulder is a slightly lesser known but common category I've heard of where muscle s can influence tinnitus. I've heard forward neck posture and less developed core / & core breathing can be common influence for this kind, but similarly there many are other causes/influences. It also iirc stretches more than one muscle in the neck to shoulder that's common. When learning more about these things, I liked a lot 1) "A multidisciplinary European guideline for tinnitus: diagnostics, assessment, and treatment" 2) Tufts eye and ear tinnitus seminar (video series from several years back) Probably a few other resources, but those seem like the best to advertise on HN. There is extensive information elsewhere but more filtering required. E.g, some of the forums have great posts, but also a lot of other posts less great for general topic intro. Sympathy and love, though, if anyone reading is having a hard time right now w/tinnitus. It can be difficult at times and in some circumstances. Id also like to note if you do have tinnitus and don't want to read more, that's ok too! For some people reading is the last thing they really need, and that's ok

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ricardobeat 3y ago

I was curious and tried 'jutting my jaw forwards' and got a very loud whine in my ears. I've had ringing in my ears before but never diagnosed with tinnitus, now I'm worried...

nullserver 3y ago

Could be TMJ. Look up TMJ massage by Bob and Brad. Could also be high cranial pressure. Look up IIH for that.

sdiupIGPWEfh 3y ago

I've just discovered, thanks to this, that my tinnitus stops for a brief moment if I move my jaw forward. Thanks for the moment of relief.

bradknowles 3y ago

Jutting my jaw forwards has the same effect on me. But not the other two. Makes me curious!