Do You Have Tinnitus? You May Benefit from Tinnitus Retraining Therapy

Can you Benefit from tinnitus retraining therapy? Tinnitus is a result of the brain’s perception of sound when there is no existence of sound. It mostly emerges naturally due to aging or is a result of over-exposure to loud volumes over the course of a lifetime. Patients with Tinnitus may also experience low tolerance to sounds or hypersensitivity to high frequency sound, which is a condition known as Hyperacusis. Auditory conditions like these have no cure or proper treatment. People with conditions like this resort to therapeutic solutions that help them habituate to the problems that emerge after Tinnitus noise interruptions.

TRT: Habituation

Habituation is a process that our brain undergoes everyday in our lives. Our brain’s neuroplasticity enables us to adapt to new information and change thought processes. Each time a new situation arises in our lives, we try to adopt new habits in order to better tolerate those situations. People who live near train stations habituate to the noisy trains passing by and carry on with their lives. The brain plays an important role in habituating to loud noise by examining the sound and evaluating whether it is life threatening or ordinary. Our brain convinces us in recognizing certain sounds as safe, normal and usual.

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Tinnitus Retraining Therapy

Tinnitus retraining therapy implies the habituation model to treating people Tinnitus. It attempts to enable people to learn to live with it. It implies that there is a non-auditory component in the problems of Tinnitus, which involves the limbic system and autonomic nervous system inside the brain. This part of the brain is responsible for the link between memory and emotion, along with the fight or flight response.  These systems inside the brain are responsible for the severity of Tinnitus and the stress and anxiety that is associated with It.

Tinnitus retraining therapy aims to make slightly better improvements of the reactions made because of the links between the autonomic nervous system and limbic system. Its goal is to make the person suffering from Tinnitus habituate to the sounds and perceptions its brain is making. The Tinnitus retraining therapy involves several techniques that can achieve this.

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TRT: Counseling

One-on-one counseling with a professional can be helpful is numerous ways. It can serve the purpose to habituate to the noise. The therapist provides the individual with tinnitus with extensive information about the condition and information specific to his condition in order to normalize the situation of irritability. It also helps in desensitizing the person from any kind of trauma and negative thoughts that are hiding in the subconscious. Psychoanalysis is a recognized and proven Freudian technique when it comes to healing the sub-conscious mind.

Counseling not only provides information about the condition but also helps you in reactions to the occurring sounds and explains ways to live life in order to get the possible results. It incorporates other methods like sound therapy in order to get the best possible outcomes. Its ultimate goal is to train your brain to ignore and not pay attention to the Tinnitus sounds.

TRT: Sound therapy

In this method, the noises and sounds of Tinnitus are interfered with certain other noise. Noises that used to interfere to Tinnitus signals can be white noise, music or environmental sounds. You can do that by wearing sound producing device in your ear, which is going to help hide the Tinnitus signals and encourage you to habituate to it.

Takeaways from TR Therapy

Tinnitus retraining therapy or TRT takes a significant amount of time and effort by the person. It can take approximately about one or two years of tinnitus retraining therapy to start showing results. This is because the process of habituation takes time, especially when you have to habituate to unpleasant and displeasing stimuli. It has shown to display better results when incorporated with other therapeutic methods. It involves educational counseling and the use of sound therapy. It strives to improve or reduce the perception of the brain to the Tinnitus signals so the brain no longer perceives the noises as dangerous and continues to ignore them.

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Final words

Tinnitus is a very common condition known to affect the lives of millions of Americans. Its treatments lack adequate research but many trials prove that Tinnitus retraining therapy is better than standard self-care. It is also a relatively safe therapy with no negative drawbacks. Only negative aspect about this therapy that may concern you is that it is time consuming. Changing the neural pathways in the brain takes time; however, it can be wondrous and impactful for someone suffering from Tinnitus. Our facility provides the most proper step-by-step Tinnitus retraining program that we have tailored to each individual’s unique requirements.

If you or anyone you know suffers from Tinnitus and seeks help from a professional, visit us at Tinnitus Cognitive Center.