How to Sleep With Tinnitus: Finding Peace Despite the Noise

If you’ve never experienced a constant ringing in your ears, it can be difficult to imagine what living with tinnitus is like.

The condition can significantly impact your everyday life: from your ability to think and focus to your ability to fall asleep. When the noise never stops, finding a moment’s peace becomes a daily challenge.

Having lived with tinnitus for a few weeks back in college, I can still remember how insane it drove me at night. Here’s what I’ve since learned about managing tinnitus enough to achieve quality sleep.

Key Takeaways

• Tinnitus is the perception of a ringing or buzzing in the ears without an external source. Tinnitus can be a symptom of an underlying issue.

• Tinnitus can be caused by age-related hearing loss, exposure to loud noises, ear infections, certain medications, head and neck injuries, high blood pressure and even stress and anxiety.

• The constant buzzing can make it difficult to fall asleep, since some people notice it more at bedtime. Masking the sound with white noise, practicing good sleep hygiene and enhancing your sleep environment can help.

Table of Contents

• What Is Tinnitus?

• How to Sleep Better With Tinnitus

• Conclusion

• Frequently Asked Questions About Sleeping With Tinnitus

What Is Tinnitus?

Tinnitus is a common condition in which a person hears ringing, buzzing, hissing, roaring or other sounds without an external source.

The symptoms of tinnitus can vary from person to person. You may hear the sound in one ear or both ears. It may be soft or loud, low or high-pitched. You may hear it all the time, or it may come and go.

Depending on the loudness and persistence of the sound, people suffering from tinnitus may be able to ignore it completely, or it may significantly interfere with everyday activities. Bothersome tinnitus can make it difficult to concentrate, sleep and socialize.

It can take a toll on your mental health, increase levels of stress and anxiety and even lead to depression and social isolation.

What Causes Tinnitus?

There are multiple possible causes of tinnitus, most of which are related to hearing loss. Some of the possible causes include:

• Age-related hearing loss

• Damage to the inner ear caused by exposure to loud noises

• Earwax buildup or other ear blockages

• Ear infections

• Certain antibiotics, diuretics and anti-inflammatory medication, especially in high doses

• Diabetes

• Head or neck injuries

• Stress and anxiety

How to Sleep Better With Tinnitus

Nighttime can worsen tinnitus symptoms. With less activity at night and fewer background noises to mask tinnitus sounds, you can become increasingly aware of it as you lie awake in the dark trying to fall asleep.

Tinnitus can cause stress and anxiety, leading to fragmented and restless sleep. If something else wakes you up in the middle of the night, the tinnitus can make it harder to fall back asleep again.

Tinnitus can lead to disrupted sleep, increased irritability, and daytime drowsiness due to the lack of sleep. Paired with other sleep disorders or sound sensitivities, it can trap you in a vicious cycle of anxiety and sleeplessness.

Instead of losing sleep, here is what you can do to sleep better with tinnitus:

Mask the Ringing With White Noise

White noise can be used for tinnitus relief, especially at nighttime. Instead of letting the lack of background noise worsen the ringing in your ears, mask it with a soundscape of your own choosing.

Use a white noise machine to play pleasant or calming sounds. Ideally, you will adjust the volume to just below the volume of your tinnitus. This will help you ignore it and drift off more easily.

Soft and consistent noise will also help mask other intrusive sounds that might otherwise wake you up. Another benefit is that you won’t have to wake up to complete silence, which can make the perceived loudness of the tinnitus worse.

Create a Soothing Bedtime Routine

The worst part about living with tinnitus can be the increased levels of stress and anxiety, which often get worse as the day progresses, making it difficult to fall asleep.

As you know, managing stress improves sleep, so creating both a physical and a mental wind-down in the evenings can help.

Find a way to relax your body. You can try gentle yoga exercises, a stretching routine, or go for a soothing walk. Deep breathing exercises coupled with mindfulness meditation are also a great choice.

Choose a relaxing way to calm your mind, too. It might be reading a book, coloring, journaling, or listening to relaxing music. You can even combine these activities and read in the bath, for example.

Journal Before Bed

Dumping all of the mind chatter onto a piece of paper before bed is a great way to reduce stress. It helps you put worries aside for the night and to make room for sleep.

By writing down any negative or intrusive thoughts, you can effectively “get rid of them.” It can help you work through your emotions, stop overthinking and make falling asleep easier.

You can write down your thoughts, how you felt that day, or create to-do lists, reminders or keep a gratitude journal.

Limit Your Screen Time

In order to fall asleep, your body needs to produce a hormone called melatonin. During the daytime, sunlight naturally prevents this process, so you can stay awake. At night, the absence of sunlight triggers melatonin production.

Since the blue light emitted by all kinds of screens mimics sunlight, looking at your phone, tablet, computer screen or TV before bed signals to your body that it's not time to sleep yet.

Stop looking at screens at least an hour before bed. Engage in your relaxation routine instead, and help your body shift gears and prepare for rest.

Enhance Your Bedroom Environment

Try to create the best sleeping environment for yourself. That way, you’ll not only look forward to going to bed, but you’ll also manage your tinnitus better.

Start by making your bedroom darker. You can use blackout curtains or blinds, and remove all electronics that have blinking LED lights. You can also use Manta Blackout Stickers on any devices you want to keep in the bedroom.

If you want to use a night light, opt for a red light like Manta TrueRed Night Light. White or blue light can disrupt your sleep if you get up in the middle of the night to go to the bathroom or have a drink of water.

The best temperature for sleep is 60 to 67 degrees Fahrenheit, so aim to cool down your room before going to bed. The best humidity level for sleep is between 30% and 50%, so you can also consider investing in a humidifier.

Improve Your Lifestyle Choices

There are other small lifestyle choices you can make that will improve your sleep:

• Go to bed and wake up at the same time every day, even on the weekends.

• Limit your caffeine intake.

• Refrain from drinking alcohol before bedtime.

• Move your body every day: walking is a great option, especially if you can do it in nature.

• Don’t eat heavy meals before bedtime.

• Eat a balanced diet full of fruits and vegetables.

• Limit your intake of processed and sugary foods.

• Drink plenty of water.

Speak to a Doctor

If your tinnitus is keeping you awake and significantly impacting the quality of your sleep, speak to your healthcare provider. They may recommend sound therapy or another kind of treatment that can help you better manage your symptoms.

Try Cognitive Behavioral Therapy or Tinnitus Retraining Therapy

Cognitive behavioral therapy can be used to manage tinnitus. It involves identifying the negative thoughts that the ringing brings up and replacing them with more positive ones.

It is managed by a therapist or an audiologist, and will require you to keep a journal about your thoughts and emotions. It will take some time for your thought processes to adjust, so stick with it.

Tinnitus retraining therapy is another treatment option. It is a combination of talk and sound therapy. You are exposed to low-level external sounds that aim to mask the internal ones, teaching your brain to filter them out. At the same time, a counselor or therapist will teach you how to reframe your perception of the ringing.

Conclusion

Living and sleeping with tinnitus can be challenging, but don’t give up hope. A medical professional may be able to help you discover the underlying cause of your tinnitus. In the meantime, practicing relaxation techniques and being mindful of your lifestyle choices can help reduce tinnitus symptoms.

Do you have a constant ringing in your ears? How do you manage it? Let us know in the comments!

Frequently Asked Questions About Sleeping With Tinnitus

Why Does My Tinnitus Seem Worse at Night?

Tinnitus seems worse at night because there are fewer distractions and background noise to mask the ringing and buzzing in your ears.

There are also fewer distractions, so it will be easier for your mind to focus on the annoying noise. After a long day, you are likely to be under some stress and feel tired, which can also contribute to the perceived loudness.

Can I Use Earplugs If I Have Tinnitus?

Yes, you can use earplugs if you have tinnitus, but you need to be aware that it could make your symptoms worse.

When earplugs block out the majority of external noise, you may perceive your tinnitus as getting louder and more annoying. This can make it more difficult to fall asleep or focus, which is probably why you wanted to use earplugs in the first place.

You should certainly use earplugs in loud environments, like construction sites.

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