You’re lying down in bed attempting to sleep when you first hear the sound: Your ear has a whooshing or pulsating in it. The sound is beating at the same rhythm as your heartbeat. And no matter how hard you try, you can’t tune it out. You have a big day tomorrow and you really need your sleep so this is bad. Not only are you not feeling tired, you feel anxious.
Does this situation sound familiar? Turns out, tinnitus, anxiety, and sleep are closely related. A vicious cycle that deprives you of your sleep and impacts your health can be the result.
Can anxiety trigger tinnitus?
Tinnitus is typically defined as a ringing in the ears. But it’s a little more complicated than that. First of all, the actual sound you hear can take a large number of forms, from pulsation to throbbing to buzzing and so on. Essentially, you’re hearing a sound that doesn’t really exist. For many, tinnitus can occur when you’re feeling stressed out, which means that stress-related tinnitus is definitely a thing.
An anxiety disorder is an affliction where feelings of fear, worry, or (as the name implies) anxiety are hard to control and intense enough to interfere with your daily life. Tinnitus is only one of several ways this can physically manifest. So can anxiety cause tinnitus? Absolutely!
What’s bad about this combination of anxiety and tinnitus?
This combo of anxiety and tinnitus is bad news for a couple of the following reasons:
- You might be having a more severe anxiety attack if you start to spike tinnitus symptoms. Once you’ve recognized the link between anxiety and tinnitus, any time you experience tinnitus symptoms your anxiety could rise.
- Usually, nighttime is when most individuals really notice their tinnitus symptoms. Can anxiety cause ringing in the ear? Sure, but it’s also possible that the ringing’s been there all day and your normal activities were simply loud enough to mask the sound. This can make it more difficult to get to sleep. And more anxiety can come from not sleeping.
There are situations where tinnitus can start in one ear and at some point move to both. Sometimes, it can hang around 24/7–all day every day. There are other situations where it comes and goes. Either way, this anxiety-tinnitus-combination can present some negative impacts on your health.
How does tinnitus-anxiety impact your sleep?
Your sleep loss could absolutely be the result of anxiety and tinnitus. Here are a few examples of how:
- The longer you go without sleep, the easier it is for you to become stressed. The higher your stress level, the worse your tinnitus will tend to become.
- It can be difficult to disregard your tinnitus and that can be very stressful. In the quiet of the night, your tinnitus can be so persistent that you lie awake until morning. Your tinnitus can get even louder and harder to ignore as your anxiety about not sleeping increases.
- Most individuals like it to be quiet when they sleep. It’s nighttime, so you turn off everything. But when everything else is quiet, your tinnitus can be much more obvious.
When your anxiety is contributing to your tinnitus, you may hear that whooshing sound and worry that an anxiety attack is near. It’s not surprising that you’re having trouble sleeping. But lack of sleep leads to all kinds of issues.
Health impacts of lack of sleep
The impact insomnia has on your health will continue to become more severe as this vicious cycle carries on. And your general wellness can be negatively affected by this. Some of the most prevalent effects include the following:
- Greater risk of cardiovascular disease: Over time, lack of sleep can begin to impact your long-term health and wellness. You could find yourself at a higher risk of heart disease or stroke.
- Increased stress and worry: When you don’t sleep, it makes those anxiety symptoms already present even worse. This can result in a vicious cycle of mental health-related issues.
- Reduced reaction times: When you aren’t getting sufficient sleep, your reaction times are more sluggish. This can make daily tasks like driving a little more dangerous. And it’s especially dangerous if you run heavy equipment, for instance.
- Inferior work performance: Obviously, your job performance will suffer if you can’t get a good night’s sleep. Your thinking will be slower and your mood will be less positive.
Other causes of anxiety
Of course, there are other causes of anxiety besides tinnitus. It’s important to recognize what these causes are so you can stay away from stress triggers and maybe reduce your tinnitus at the same time. Here are some of the most common causes of anxiety:
- Hyperstimulation: An anxiety attack can happen when someone gets overstimulated with too much of any one thing. For example, being around crowds can sometimes cause an anxiety response for some people.
- Medical conditions: In some cases, you may simply have a medical condition that makes you more susceptible to a heightened anxiety response.
- Stress response: When something causes us extreme stress, our bodies will naturally go into an anxious mode. That’s fantastic if you’re being chased by a lion. But it’s less good when you’re working on an assignment for work. Sometimes, it’s not so clear what the relationship between the two is. Something that caused a stress response a week ago could cause an anxiety attack tomorrow. You might even have an anxiety attack in reaction to a stressor from last year, for instance.
Other causes: Less frequently, anxiety disorders could be caused by some of the following factors:
- Lack of nutrition
- Exhaustion and sleep deprivation (see the vicious cycle once again)
- Stimulant usage (that includes caffeine)
- Some recreational drugs
This isn’t an all-inclusive list. And if you believe you have an anxiety disorder, you should consult your provider about treatment possibilities.
Treating anxiety-related tinnitus
With regards to anxiety-induced tinnitus, there are two general options available. You can either try to address the anxiety or treat the tinnitus. Here’s how that might work in either circumstance:
Addressing anxiety
There are a couple of possibilities for managing anxiety:
- Medication: Medications may be utilized, in other situations, to make anxiety symptoms less prevalent.
- Cognitive-behavioral Therapy (CBT): Certain thought patterns can inadvertently exacerbate your anxiety symptoms and this method will help you identify those thought patterns. By disrupting these thought patterns, patients are able to more successfully prevent anxiety attacks.
Treating tinnitus
Tinnitus can be treated in a variety of different ways, especially if it presents while you’re sleeping. Some of the most common treatments include:
- White noise machine: When you’re attempting to sleep, use a white noise machine. Your tinnitus symptoms might be able to be masked by this strategy.
- Masking device: This is basically a white noise machine that you wear near your ear. This might help your tinnitus to be less obvious.
- Cognitive-Behavioral Therapy (CBT): When you have tinnitus, CBT strategies can help you produce new thought patterns that accept, acknowledge, and decrease your tinnitus symptoms.
You may get better sleep by dealing with your tinnitus
You’ll be at risk of falling into a vicious cycle of anxiety and tinnitus if the whooshing and ringing are keeping you up at night. One solution is to focus on fixing your tinnitus first. Give us a call so we can help.
