How much of this could be anxiety?
So first off, this is not me suggesting that any of us 'have it easy' or that tinnitus is no big deal. Tinnitus brings a special kind of suffering that's difficult for people who don't have it to understand.
I've struggled with tinnitus for the better part of a decade now. And in that decade I'm happy to say that most of that time has been okay. I've had times where it feels like my tinnitus is gone completely, or that it's so quiet it doesn't bother me. And I've had ups and downs, and spikes during that period where I'm like "Omg omg omg this horrible! I'll never be happy again!" where I feel extremely anxious and depressed. And well I'm going through one of those now.
But you know what I notice? When I listen to this, it doesn't sound that much louder than it has before. I know that I've had plenty of moments in the past where I could literally hear the tinnitus in a completely silent room and be like 'pfft, whatever.' I could even sleep with no maskers and it didn't bother me that much.
But yet here I am, going through a spike, and yet it doesn't actually sound any louder. But I *am* noticing it a lot more.
How much of this do you think is anxiety? I have anxiety bad and have been anxious all my life. From what I understand, anxiety is something that is able to exist within you and then 'latch on' to something as a justification for that. And that the thing that you think 'caused' your anxiety really just provided an excuse for your anxiety to make you freak out.
Do any of you feel this way? That it's sometimes not so much the ringing or the sound, but the anxiety and negative feelings AROUND the sound? And that sometimes things can get worse even if the sound hasn't actually increased that much?