A few weeks ago, the tinnitus was so bad I had to go to a doctor. I couldn't sleep over the noise, I tried stopping headphones for a week, no luck.

Then I looked into it, saw all the available "causes" for it(most of them are wrong) .

After looking through and trying everything... quitting chocolate made it go away, completely. Four days with no chocolate, and it's better. A month, and I don't even have it anymore.

Try it... it worked for me, might work for you. Hearing artifacts in music is a lot easier now, I remember it being hard to ABX anything above -q3 Ogg Vorbis, today I did so easily to a -q4 on the same song. It's great not to have the ringing anymore... but I want my chocolate back.

QUIT CHOCOLATE????!!!!????

I'd rather die.

I've had an.....*ahem*.....M&M problem for years now. I eat perhaps a bag per week. OK, two bags per week. OK, *four* bags per week. But they're little ones. Well, medium-sized. OK, they're *big* bags...but I'm trying to cut down, really!

Seriously, though, I've been lucky enough never to have had tinnitis (that I was aware of), but now I wonder whether my hearing sensitivity could be slightly affected after all. I wouldn't know for sure unless I.....ABX chocolate.....right? All you'd have to do is ABX some audio samples, store the results, quit chocolate, wait a week, ABX the same samples again, and then compare the results with those from the first test cycle.

I've heard of some pretty strange causes for tinnitis, but chocolate is a new one! To be honest, I hope it's not affecting me, but I'm sort of curious now. Thanks for sharing that discovery, but I'm sorry to hear you have to quit something so wonderful to maintain good hearing.

Hmmm...I wonder if mass amounts of caffeine would offset "chocolate tinnitis", without having to quit chocolate?

In order to do this, you should get a false chocolate that looks and tastes like chocolate, and switch blindly between true and false chocolate. Every month, you write down if you have a tinnitus. Then after 8 monthes, you look if your tinnitus answer matches the nature of the chocolate of the month

Seriously, isn't it possible that it is a coincidence ? You tinnitus might have gone for another reason.

I don't know, I probably wouldn't be fooled by false chocolate, no matter how good it was.

That's a good point about whether the tinnitus may have been caused by something else, though. Even if you run ABX listening tests on the exact same audio samples and come up with significantly different results after a chocolate-free week, many other things could affect hearing ability in that time...like allergies, emotional/physical stress, or even biorhythm (if you believe in that sort of thing).

http://allergies.about.com/library/blificitch.htm

Apparently, chocolate is not a common cause of food allergy. There are other ingredients in chocolate which could be responsible: milk, soybean, almond, peanut and vanillin.

If you are concerned about it, you should see an allergist for double-blind, placebo controlled skin tests to find out exactly what you're allergic to, if that's the problem.

ff123

The problem with chocolate is because it has caffeine in it.
I've got Menieres Disease, and chocolate is one of the things I can't ever have again.
That and allot of other things I used to love.

"Avoid caffeine-containing fluids and foods (such as coffee, tea and chocolate).
Caffeine has stimulant properties that may make your symptoms worse.
Caffeine also may make tinnitus louder. Large amounts of caffeine may trigger migraine
(migraine can be difficult diagnostically to separate from Menieres disease).
Chocolate is also a migraine trigger. "

I hope you never get to this point like I did.
The ringing in my right ear never goes away.
Sometimes it gets a little less noticable, like during the day.
Occasionally at night it wakes me up.
And all that's on good days.
But I've learned to live with it.
Be thankful you're young and have good hearing.
Never take it for granted.

Man, that really looks like a nasty thing to have, I feel for ya. Must be something like drinking too much and the spinning/nausea that comes from that, I just can't think of a worse feeling than that... is it a serious case?

I occasionally get strange things like sudden LOUD tinnitus or a feeling of total blockage in one ear (usually my right) that just goes away after awhile... don't think it's anything serious but it's definitely strange...

Soft drinks containing caffeine is the main reason why someone won't see me guzzling them anymore, and since the stuff rots teeth.

As for what causes migraines can comedown to an individuals chosen diet (what that person consumes), and the consumed quantity of a triggering food source. I contribute sodium (salt) which is used in virtually all food products as a preservative and rather difficult to avoid even when trying to buy "healthy foods" for being the root of why I've had migraine headaches at least twice a month for twenty years.

I have had Tinnitus since about age 7 (2nd grade) following some significant hearing loss in my right ear. I haven't had any chocolate in probably years...never been much of a fan of it. Various psychotherapeutic medications made pronounced increases in the frequency of it and others seemed to lessen it to the point it was rare to occur more than once or twice a month. One thing though, it's a progressive disease so if you eliminate all the possible factors that could cause it and you still have it...then that means it's going to keep going the rest of your life. I have heard that it can get worse and worse with age people can actually go insane it will get so bad. Right now when it happens it can be so intense sometimes it actually feels like my skull is rattling due to some huge blast of noise. That is just my personal experience with the matter and I know it varies widely from person to person.

I've got a schedule and all set up to ABX chocolate. I'll post the results in this thread in a month.

If tinnitus progresses to the point of Meniere's Disease like mine did,
it gets pretty serious at times.
I may go weeks without an attack, even though the ringing
and fullness in my right ear is always there.
But when it hits, I'm pretty much useless for a while.
Headache, lightheaded, dizzy, sweating and nausea.
I haven't progressed into Vertigo yet, but I'm sure that's coming one day.
The sad thing is there is no cure for what I have.
We are trying to contol it with Lasix and a strict diet.
But keep in mind that not everyone with tinnitus progresses this way.
Allot of people who have tinnitus wake up one day,
it's gone, and they never have it again.

It's funny to read that you're doing a test with chocalate and audio.



Can't wait to hear (no pun intended) your results.

I never knew tinnitus (and it's more serious variants) was so prevalent on an audio-centric internet forum. Even one person with it would be too many, IMO.

I truly feel for anyone who has this condition, and it makes me want to be more careful about my diet and health in the interest of maintaining my hearing ability. Thanks to everyone who posted here for making people like me who were ignorant to the seriousness of this condition more aware. I'll certainly be cutting down on chocolate and caffeine now!

yay, another reason to ditch cokes! (I'm addicted to soda, sadly >_< ).

I have tinnitus as well...sometimes, in my right ear, I'll hear a scratching noise that disrupts the incoming soundwaves and even makes me wince. I know it's due to the years of loud events I used to attend.

I have it on occassion, always have. I will just be acting normal when I notice the audio go down in one ear (almost like a volume control turned it down), and then a ringing will commence is it for a few minutes. Usually happens in my left ear, which is also the ear I used most commonly to listen to Sonar and track Active contacts. Ugh, being a submarine sonar technician was awful for my hearing, but it seems to still be better than the hearing of most people that I know. I think I had tinnitus before the Navy, but it just comes and goes rarely and randomly.

Kimberly, former STS2/SS on the USS Portsmouth (SSN 707) and USS Alabam (SSBN 731G).

Ahh, former STG/SN in the navy reserves here ('83-'89)... of course as a "weekend warrior" I ended up doing very little aside from sweeping floors or whatever, dinking off until it was time to go home... the usual lack of motivation. Not sure I ever actually sat in front of any sonar equipment!

Yep, I get that sort of tinnitus too... sudden drop in volume followed by *loud* ringing that goes away after awhile. Perhaps it's just normal, a sort of biological nervous system realignment of the ear or something.

Ah, bugger, so that's what that is! I've been experiencing that my entire life but could never figure out what it was...

Oh Yeah.... Carob for the control sample... Nobody can tell that from chocolate!

Are caffine and chocolate known sources of the illness for everyone? Or does it require some level of allergy or intolerance for them to trigger tinnitus?

I eat more than my fair share of chocolate, and suffer from a mild ringing in both ears, only noticable at night when it is silent. I don't have any known allergies, just a bad reaction to bleach - which is a great excuse for never cleaning the kitchen or bathroom