Tinnitus: Please protect your ears

I've listened to a LOT of hard rock, country, and metal thru the years at numbing decibel levels but avoided standing right in front of speakers and such. I get the occasional (maybe once every couple months) ringing for a couple minutes or so and then it stops. I still work out to heavy metal and use power tools, but I begin to doubt the cause is loud music.
Also, they've found that the subs don't affect hearing; it's distortion and extreme volume at upper pitch levels that cause hearing loss, so good equipment is a must. My hearing is also still quite good; only slightly deficient in a couple frequencies.
I seem to recall some site that said tinnitis was also caused by a mineral deficiency, but I can't imagine what that was. I seem to recall it was a metal.

 

I am same way, Some days it is really bad but most days just a slight ring. I think I killed my hearing working on race cars and trucks. But I really don't notice it till I'm in a quite place. I really notice it when I get a hearing test in the little booth and they ask you to raise your hand when you hear a beep.

Seems each year company sends me I loose another frequency. A couple of times the nurse doing it has even came in to see if it was working because I was like "duhhhhhhh what beep."

 

I have tinnitus in both ears -n- wear hearing aids that should give you some idea of what tinnitus can do

 

After a year in an infantry platoon in Vietnam and 25 years in a truck .... my hearing is so bad that I can't hear my tinnitus anymore ... huh?????

 

Field Artillery rounds going off a couple of miles from my barracks every night for two years and spent most of my life around heavy equipment......

Yeah...I wish they had decent ear plugs back then.....cigarette butts didn't do the trick....

 

Roger on that ... got blown off a apc when it hit a mine ... when they found me I was bleeding out my eyes, ears, nose, mouth and rectum ... methinks the concussion and shock wave busted all my capillaries ... screwed my thought processes up for about a week ... but not so long that it prevented me from participating in the next air mobile. That was a pip ... navy 8 inchers coming in so close that the shock waves were picking us off the ground when they impacted ... other than that, it was a beautiful morning ... sky was sooooooooo orange!

 

I have had ringing in my ears it seems to come and go, and have noticed that I don't hear as well as when I was younger

I guess all those years of driving loud cars, motorcycles, snowmobiles and listening to loud music is starting to take its toll

 

If any of you will see a good ENT specialist you will learn alot more than what you are from online. Tinnitus isn't caused by loud noises (at least not all of the time). Also not all hearing loss is sensory. This means that while many of you may have done damage to your ears through loud noises it may not be the root of the problem. Many people actually have organic hearing loss, this is a result of essentially having a bad connection somewhere between the ear drum, the bones which make up your inner ear, or the nerves at the end of the system.

I'm not saying that loud noises don't cause the problem but I have had Tinnitus as long as I can remember (my earliest memory of it is thinking there was a parade somewhere because it sounded like marching in rhythm perfect lock step), and I have been dead in my right ear for years.