Does external noise cause any of you anxiety?

Folks,

So work makes me pretty anxious, annoyed, and upset because of the amount of noise in the office (that shouldn't be present based on the nature of the job).

Is there a word/medical term for this? Sensory sensitive? Something else? I wonder if my doctor can diagnose me with something that could lead to more happiness at work.

This is kind of an oddball question.

Thanks,
smooth

Lendi,

Thanks for getting the official name for me.

The noise here is basically co-workers speaking too loudly. While trying not to generalize, I'm noticing it's a particular type of person, which makes up the brunt of this office. Ear buds, plugs, etc. have been frowned upon unfortunately. Perhaps I'll bring it up again and if no dice, I'll try the doctor. Dress is formal, but people with foot issues can wear comfortable shoes. This shouldn't be any different.

smooth

Hi Friend.

I recall this always being an issue for you with this crowd at work, but I don’t recall you ever mentioning sound sensitivity in any other aspect of life.

Do you think it’s your overall frustration with work and these people in general and you’re simply becoming agitated because they’re not being accountable for getting their work done, etc.?

I know for me sometimes if I’m mad or frustrated, even with my kids, sometimes their constant chatter and saying my name just makes me feel like I’m gonna lose mind.

Just a thought! Hope you’re well otherwise! Missed you!!

I'm sound sensitive to certain tones (lower bass tones with a lot of vibration)...and if my anxiety is high overall, loud noises can startle/set me on edge.

It is hard enough to concentrate with an anxiety issue...that distracting sounds at work must just make things that much harder. You are already stretched thin as far as what you can tolerate because managing anxiety is already exhausting at times, right?

Any luck with finding noise cancelling headphones, or was that a no go?

S.C.

Medicine makes your ears more susceptible to sound.

Are you taking any medicine? And this condition can build as this situation goes on.

Were you bothered by people's voices inside before you started taking medicine?

In high school, did the lunch room talking bother you?

John,

I'm extremely sensitive to noise and sound, and vibrations (if that's even a thing?). I think it comes with the anxiety, as our nervous systems are already always on high alert. Definitely invest in some good ear plugs- it softens the blow a bit.

You say you take many medications and you have sensitivity to sound. From what I've experienced, it's from the medications. Medicine and noise constricts the blood vessels, including the tiny blood vessels to the inner ear, as told to me by someone versed in such ear problems as I was wanting to know what was going on with my increased sensitivity to sound.

You say you've been on medicine for six years, which is a build up type of situation.

You say you weren't bothered by the lunch room sound in high school, which shows when you weren't on medicine, you weren't sensitive to sound. You say if you expect it, sound doesn't bother you, but yet you're expecting noise (people talking) in your office and it still bothers you.

You also mentioned several times that music bothers you. It also bothers me very much, because it's high pitched, to the point that I watch TV on closed caption because I know they're fixing to play some music.

You also say you go to concerts. Uh, oh.

OK, let's see what we've got here. We got you taking medicine. Taking medicine for 6 years. Can't stand even talking in the office. Music bothers you. You're getting up in age where people can't tolerate sound like they could at 16.

And you go to concerts, which is the worst of the worst. At the concerts, you're already on your meds, which make you ears even more sensitive to sound. If you take a drink of alcohol, that makes the situation worse.

Hyperacusis is what it is, as has been mentioned. But you can't do without your medicine.

I would absolutely stay away from concerts and probably music of any kind and alcohol, and sugar and caffeine and wheat, makes it worse.

Try staying away from loud machines, like lawn mowers, get somebody else to cut the grass.

Try not to get a cavity, because the dentist drill (steel on hard tooth) will be an inch from your sensitive ear drum. I do this by, no sugar meals, then brush, floss, because the tooth brush can't get between teeth, then gargle with Listerine Total Care Zero which has fluoride that kills germs that cause cavities.

I do this all 3 about once every 3 days, or so, or when I feel a tingling between teeth and I know a cavity is forming.

What makes it better is, cold ice pack on your ears (it reduces the inflammation), warm, moist heating pad on your ears (it increases the blood flow to the inner ear). Also helping is hot, spicy food like spicy cheese, certain sauces, hot peppers (all of which increase the blood flow to the inner ear).

Try something like that at the office lunchroom and see if it helps you handle the talking better.

Your ears are depending on you to figure this out. You can also try to stay positive that you have other things going for you in your life, and that you can figure these and other problems out one by one.

1039smooth:

I think you have hyperacusis, in that everything sounds too loud, for I have that.

Are all medications prone to causing h. Probably, in my view. But, the same medicines solve a lot of problems so we can’t really do without medicines.

So you’re taking, “blood pressure medicine, an antidepressant, two for anxiety, and a mood stabilizer.”

So you’re taking five medicines. In addition to one med can cause h., five adds to the problem. But those medicines are also keeping you alive, so we have to glad that we have those medicines and are getting those extra years of living and functioning.

You say, “I'm certain it's been longer than six, but that's just how long I've been at this job.” When you first went on the job, did talk in the office bother you? Or, in the job prior to this one, did talk cause you problems?

Trying to figure when this h. may have started.

You probably need to cut back if not eliminate music, for it’s high pitched and can be damaging to those with h. And the songs you like you may turn up the volume, but that can be even more dangerous than the lower level songs you don’t like. Your adrenaline kicks in and you think you can override your h., but you can’t.

It’s good that you are giving up on the concerts. Did you notice the music from those earlier concerts were not good for your ears?

Oh, your tolerance for sound.

Talk in the office gives you a rough time. Speech is 60 dBAs, which is probably your highest level of tolerance for sound. You need to know that. Then you don’t have to wonder, “Oh, can I cut the grass?” No way.

Why? Because the sound level of a lawn mower is 90 dBAs. And your sound tolerance is only 60, but we’ll give you 70 tolerance level because you’re such a great guy. You still can’t cut the grass.

How do I know? Because I use to try to cut it myself at that tolerance level, and while we could cut grass in the past, and that’s what our “good thinking” is going on, we can’t cut it now.

You want to stop one short of, “Why did I try to keep doing that (cutting the grass, going to concerts, listening to music, staying in a job where they talk too loud and play the radio)?”

Using the sound level chart, and knowing your sound level tolerance, you can use those two to predict whether you should go around certain machines or situations. Like concerts for instance.

Also, like airplanes. The chart tells us jets at takeoff are 140 dBS. OK, let’s say in the cabin, the sound is 100, plus or minus 5 or 10. Your tolerance is 60, will give you 70 for this. You cannot even stand 80 dBS, so even if the plane is 85 to 90 inside, you don’t want to go there. At the very least you’re taking a big risk.

What we lack in ears, we have to make up for in increased thinking.

One day you'll be offered an MRI by a very well meaning doctor. Just go in for a headache. Right. OK, MRI has about 120 dBS. And you're inside the machine when you first realize how loud it is. I was offered one once, turned it down after just listening to it from 20 feet behind a glass, and it was so loud I thought I was dead.

You said a vacuum cleaner get to you. Well, the MRI is like 10 vacuum cleaners. High pitched whine.

I took a quiet ultra sound, instead, and there was no problem to begin with.

You say, “My goal is to stop most of my medications as I see little benefit in them. Before I do so, the people I am under the care of have to approve it.”

Um, you’re probably not going to really be able to do that. You can’t go off blood pressure med. If you try to go off your psychic meds, you’re going to become depressed, manic, anxious.

Dental, you need to floss in addition to brush and gargle Listerine Total Care Zero. All 3 at the same time every few days, or when you feel a tingle between teeth.

You say, “I try not to consume caffeine. Wheat and sugar are a little tougher. I wonder what the correlation with sound exists here?” Try lowering wheat, because everybody is allergic to it, as they are with cows milk (lactose or milk sugar) so I use goat's milk.

Sugar, as in no sugar with h. Lilvestrong.com says, about tinnitus, which is ringing in the ears and can lead to hyperacusis:

“The Blood Sugar Link
The inner ear requires a continual supply of oxygen and glucose, or sugar, to function. According to the authors of the June 2004 study, elevated blood sugars can cause tinnitus in at least 3 ways. First, long-term high blood sugars can damage the eighth cranial nerve, which is the nerve that transmits sound and balance data from the inner ear to the brain. Second, high blood sugars can also damage the blood vessels that supply the ear with oxygen and nutrients necessary for proper inner ear function. Finally, even mildly elevated blood sugars can interfere with the functions of the sodium-potassium ATPase pump, which is responsible for creating the optimal potassium and sodium concentrations in the inner ear fluid -- something required for balance and proper hearing.”

Sugar also leads to cavities, no way I'm drinking a cola and letting it coat my teeth and in between. This helps avoid the loud dentist drill. Otherwise, they just pull your teeth out. Sugar also leads to diabetes as you get to 50. I drink water.

Treatment for h: There is an ear clinic (Ear Research Foundation, 1901 Floyd Street, Sarasota, FL USA)
which can put a part of your skin on your eardrum and it will very much help your h. If there is any way you can contact them and get there, I would recommend it.

A local ear doctor could do this rather easy in-office procedure if they will take the time to learn the process. It is called, “Round and oval window reinforcement is a minimally invasive option for treating hyperacusis when usual medical therapies fail.”

I just saw my skin doctor today, and she said her nephew has the same ear condition, and I told her about the clinic in Sarasota, Fla., that puts skin on your ear drum. She asked me for the data and I’m going to send it to her.

You are not doomed. You are negative, as I was before reading a column on being positive that said you can better solve a problem if you will be positive going into it that you can solve it.

1039smooth:

You said, “At this job, I don't recall if the excess talking bothered me at first. I really don't think so.”
It shows that your ear situation developed in the last six years while on this present job. Since you’re not in a noisy job, it indicates to me it’s the medicine you’re taking which is causing this.

Not that you can stop taking the medicine, if you’re smart, but if you’re wondering where it came from, that is my guess.

You said, “As we speak, a loud office tool is being used in the back and it's really grating on my nerves and the person using said tool is probably 50 feet away. I have listened to it up close, and oh my God. If using that tool was my duty, I'd need ear plugs.”

What tool was that? It can’t be as loud as a lawn mower, but yet you still use a lawn mower, which the sound charts say is 90 dbs, and you are right behind it for 30 minutes, an hour or more. It’s outside, but it’s still 90 dbs.

I did not want to give up on things, either, but you’ve got two ways of learning this, the easy way or the hard way. Right, I learned the hard way. You can pay someone whose ears are good to cut the grass.

With hyperacusis, you have to learn to dodge sound.

You’re giving up concerts, which is good. Next I hope is lawn mowers.

You said, “However, I do consume my share of sugar and then some.” I would start with colas, then desserts, then sweet rolls, then candy, and you’re almost there.

You said, “How...can I get diagnosed with this? I've not been to an ear specialist in... oh, ever."

You can read up on hyperacusis to see if that gives you enough information about if you have that. Ear specialist can tell you that, but I’ve been disappointed for they don’t know anything about h.

Positive. Were you raised in a negative household? I was, and I came away with a neg. attitude.

I didn’t know it, but when I went to solve problems, especially those of a certain level, I had a neg. attitude about if I could solve it, part from my raising, part from my bipolar, probably.

Read a column that said: If you’re neg., you probably aren’t a good problem solver. But if you have a positive attitude going into a problem that you can solve it, your chances double that you will solve it.

I told myself, next time you have a problem, don’t think about the problem. Say to yourself over and over, “Think positive, think positive, think positive…” trying to drive out any hidden, uncon. neg.

It worked. I had been tripping myself up because of what I had learned as a child. I was half expecting/wanting to lose, to prove my neg. thinking was right.

By thinking positive that you can solve it, opens up areas of your brain which are looking for ways to succeed, because you told your brain to do that. When you tell your brain, I think I’m going to lose, it opens up areas of your brain to look for ways to lose, because that’s what you told it to do.

Your brain’s just waiting on orders from you. And with this column I read, I don’t have to be positive all the time, just when I’m trying to solve a problem. I can still be me, whatever that is, in between problems.

Tim,

Job, Medicines
I have disliked excess noise for as long as I can remember, but it's coming full circle now. I can think of instances in college. Back then, I was very difficult to get along with. Honestly, with all the cigarette smoke, etc., around, I'm not sure how I survived it.

Despite medical "opinion", my goal is still to stop most of these medications soon (namely the antidepressant and mood stabilizer(s)). I see no benefit. I am of the opinion that doctors prescribe things to pad the pockets of pharmaceutical companies. If I get worse, I will take them again. The last step is to meet with my psychiatrist and hopefully it is the last time I see him. I wouldn't expect any of my doctors to be able to associate my medicines with my hearing since my pharmacist couldn't.

The tool is an old timey stamp used for a numbering system here at work. Electric staplers are rather loud, so it could be compared to that.

I seldom mow the yard. Frankly, there isn't that much to mow.

Giving up sugar
I almost had the sugar addiction licked (ha!) years ago. Then a friend said I deserve a candy bar and Pandora's Box opened. That s.o.b.

Hyperacusis
The brief snippet I read suggested sounded extreme to me and I don't think I'm there.

Household
I would say the household I grew up in was pretty neutral, BUT, I more so remember the negative. While she was an awesome lady, much revolved around my grandmother. She lived with my parents and me or we lived with her. Whatever. There were some mental issues there, but my family is riddled with mental illness.

Bipolar
Saying I'm bipolar wouldn't be a stretch of the imagination. Were you diagnosed or did you deduce such on your own?

Positive attitude
I will spare my reason(s) as to why I pay little credence to having a positive attitude, but will you spare you those reasons as I believe it will be of detriment to you.

However, I will say the mind-body connection is very real. I will make a note to speak with my therapist about my specific hangup next time. Related, but not, I used to say, "Positive thinking? Been there. Tried that." ...yet, here we are.

Best,
John