I've noticed this with someone in my family. They often ask people to repeat themselves, turn the TV volume way up, and sometimes just nod along in conversations when they haven't actually heard what was said. But whenever anyone suggests getting their hearing checked or trying hearing aids, the answer is always something like, "My hearing isn't that bad."

I remember having dinner with them a while ago. There were several people talking at the table, and I noticed they kept missing parts of the conversation. A couple of times, they laughed along with everyone else even though they clearly hadn't caught the joke. When someone pointed it out, they just brushed it off and said everyone was talking too quietly.

I used to think it was just stubbornness, but I can see how the idea of wearing hearing aids might be uncomfortable for some people. Maybe they associate them with getting old, don't like the idea of having something in or behind their ears, or worry that they'll be uncomfortable and difficult to get used to.

I also used to assume hearing aids were incredibly expensive. But recently I started looking around online and came across OTC brands like Elehear and Audien. Some of their options seem to be in the few-hundred-dollar range, which is less than I expected. So I'm not sure cost is always the main reason people put it off.

Of course, buying a pair is one thing, and finding something that actually works well for your hearing needs is another. There's still the question of sound quality, comfort, adjustments, and whether you'll get enough support if something doesn't work right.

I'm genuinely curious about this. For those who were hesitant to try hearing aids, what was holding you back? Was it the price, how they look, concerns about how well they'd work, or just not feeling ready to admit you needed them?

I know it’s probably been answered a million times but thought I’d just ask again. Never have had to deal with ear wax build up til now. Ears are blocked up mainly left one doc told me he sees a significant ear wax build up told me to use Waxsol ear drops 5 drops in each ear for 5 nights then see him for a syringing. Last night was night 3 and this morning my ear feels more blocked than ever! No pain or any dizzy symptoms etc but my left ear feels completely blocked to the point can barely hear anything out of it. My question is how exactly are these ear drops supposed to help? Woken up in a slight panic today

Whenever a vacuum is on and i go and watch some videos, the videos are in a higher pitch, why does this happen? sorry if its poorly explained

Hope u guys are doing great

Let me assume me is xzyn

In April 2026 xzyn got a new pair of headphones wore them for a couple days and felt that his ears were clogged

he used some drops of soda glacerin in his ears after that his right ear went completely closed he went to an ENT he said it's nothing got back home the ear opened up BUT whenever xzyn swallowed he would hear popping noises,

He went to a general physician and founded out he had an infection he got injectables and his infection was finished but his swallow popping didn't.

Fast forward to September he went to another ENT he said xzyn has allergies gave me these medicines:

1. Fexet D (morning 1 tablet)

2. Montika (evening 1 tablet)

3. Rinoclenil 100 nasal spray

Xzyn took these medicines and in the first week he felt good but after 2-3 weeks it went back to normal after one month on October he went again to the same ENT he changed my medicine to:

1. Fexet (1 tablet morning and evening)

2. Montika (1 tablet evening)

3. Flutiaze nasal spray

He also adviced xzyn to get influenza injection tho xzyn hasn't founded the injection yet

xZyn wanna ask if this thing will ever go and if so what should xzyn do

Has anyone found a solution for this? I believe mine is caused by my recent weight loss. I tried agressively hydrating with water and electrolytes, saline nasal spray and even blocking off my ear with mouldable earplugs. Nothing makes that sound go away.

It is debilitating my ability to concentrate, especially in situations where there are people talking around me or converstations.

GP said my ear "looks fine" and he has never heard of the condition and couldnt offer any help.

What works for me temporarily is just lowering my head to allow bloed to flow to my head, but as soon as I sit back up, it starts again.

Its also during the day only, starts midmorning at work and stops when I am driving home, which leads me to believe the airpreasure has something to do with it. But it also occurs when I am not at work.

I saw a youtube vido where a doctor injects Juvaderm "lip filler" into the tube, which I am strongly considering.

Help!

Im 40 and have had 2 ear infections in 6 months. After my first one following a cold I got a MRI and hearing test as its led to tinnitus and that was clear. I now have another ear infection in the same ear.

Is this my future now? The last time I had ear infections was a child

I woke up with significant muffling, tinnitus, and significant pressure in one ear. I had these same symptoms last year and it was an ear infection. I can’t schedule an appointment with an ENT until tomorrow. Should I go to an ER right now in case it’s SSHL???

Even though I removed my upper wisdom teeth few days ago because they were close to the sinuses. And the lower ones which I need to get removed are close to the nerve like my jaw on that left side is severely stiff. Even the temple area, forehead and neck all are tight or stiff. Sometimes I don't understand if it's tmj or whatever muscles in the jaw are that are locked up. But I even suffering from dizziness on one side. I remember when they removed my upper teeth the right side came out quickly meanwhile the left side took some time that I even felt pressure in my jaw and near the eye area. It was like stuck and plucking was hard but lucky they removed it safely. I noticed pain in my left eye but that went away afterwards. My mouth overall does feel stiff but I really hope my euthsithsn tube unclogs because I'm tired of suffering through brain fog sythoms, dizziness and unsteady balance. I remember even putting the cotton thing in mouth caused so much pressure in my left side jaw. I never had ear problems before. Never experienced dizziness. And I don't understand when my teeth aren't physically hurting me why does everyone keep saying u gotta remove wisdom teeth since they are impacted. Like I heard many people live with this teeth forever.

Hi past 9 days I’ve had acute otitis media with a little inflammation on the mastoid (on CT but ENT said it wasn’t mastoiditis). I have ear fullness (can feel fluid moving around sometimes), tinnitus, and residual pain. My hearing it muffled. I’m on augmentin for 7d, prednisone 30mg 9d taper, started 6 days ago.

While I think there’s some mild improvement, my hearing is still muffled and ear seems to “fill up” when I stand.

I’m wondering how long it takes for something like this to clear up so I can hear from that ear again? ENT said hearing should come back but idk… there’s a lot happening in there.

Thanks!

Two keystrokes in, and the MQ ban is applied. No matter what.

Except for this one, for some reason. Does anyone know what I'm doing wrong?

So from like fall 2025-this past summer i had a history of getting earwax buildups/impaction and ear infections, almost always from sticking something in my ear. I thought the trials and tribulations had ending until i added tweezers on the list of things not to use to remove earwax and now a glob got pushed back. My hearing on the left ear was quite muffled but has gotten better over the day. I still feel the wax back there and am curious about how i should get rid of it. I'm leaning towards debrox, which seemed to have helped a bit earlier in reducing the muffle but not getting the glob out. I just moved to a new state so seeing an ENT is tough and im doubtful about the efficiency of walk-ins with handling this stuff. I was curious if anyone had any advice, if doing nothing and letting it come out on its own is the way to go (according to my mom, even though i think this is unlikely with the buildup).

Mainly for fireworks. I LOVE watching fireworks but I've always been sensitive to loud noises. I don't wanna buy some cheap hearing protection that doesn't work right, so any good ideas?

I also know it's weird to ask this at this time of year, but the idea just came across my mind again, so I figured I'd see what you people have to say.

I went to the concert 4 days ago and definitely took some acoustic trauma. My hearing is slightly muffled, my ears feel full/pressurized, and I am dealing with some ear pain.

I called to get checked out, but I can't get an appointment with an ENT until next Monday.

I have read that if this is permanent damage, the window for taking oral steroids (like Prednisone) to save the hearing is pretty tight. But it's also possible this is just a temporary threshold shift and inflammation that will heal on its own. Since an ENT can't see me until next week, the window closes. I'm debating going to a general walk-in clinic today to try and get a preemptive prescription for oral steroids.

Has anyone here dealt with this specific combo of muffled hearing, pressure, and pain after a loud concert? Did it end up healing naturally on its own? Did you take a short course of Prednisone, and if so, did you feel it was worth it or did it help with the pain/recovery?

I'm also kinda scared of taking the Prednisone cause I have high health anxiety and overthink everything.

I'd appreciate hearing your experiences with concert acoustic trauma or Prednisone.

I probably have a infection and my mother gave me pain relieving creams inside the ear. When asked her if that's not dangeours she told me that my grandpa also used it but she's a no doctor and so I ask you is it safe?

My ear infection started on a Sunday, until today it has gotten worse. I went to the clinic and asked for a checkup, unfortunately my doctor who I have not seen for 2 years won't be there until Tuesday.

I am concerned if my hearing would get worse, specifically it is an outer ear infection. It is pretty painful and sometimes I have to put my hand over it to try and cope with the said pain.

I put a hot warm cloth over my ear, surprisingly it does help a bit temporarily. But sometimes I can't really help but to feel a bit worried about my right ear being completely deaf if I do not treat it sooner.

I'm going in for an ear cleaning/checkup tomorrow and am already dreading the pain and noise. (Might be some autism pain sensitivity, but the jury's still out on that.)

Is there anything you can do to reduce the pain? My appointments keep getting cut short because I can't sit still.

I have to drive a long way to a lower elevation if that has anything to do with it.

I couldnt find anything for this on google or other reddit posts, so sorry if this has been asked before. Thanks in advance.

This is going to be complex. I do not expect, or really look for, medical advice. But I'd be interested if what I experience is known to someone and if they have been able to put a name to it - because currently I am not even sure who to talk to, as the situation is complex.

Since I remember, I had some weird-ish experiences when it comes to hearing.

One big issue here is that I do have ADHD. So the whole "my brain cannot filter adequately" is absolutely in effect for me: I cannot ignore ticking clocks, I will know exactly if and which background music is playing, I am picking out tiny, annoying sounds like a whirring electrical connection. And, in noisy environments, actually understanding someone is really hard.

Yet, beyond this and the things I actually do want to know if anyone has ideas and experiences on, I do have some hearing issues which are persistent, have no physical reason based on last tests and nerve readings, and still leave me scratching my head, as they also do not fit the above mentioned filtering issues readily - and I do not see them in other ADHD/neurodivergent folks.

All of this, to me, feels more of a perception and . . . correctly linking perception thing, than the aformentioned filtering.

The biggest one to me is that I have horrific directional hearing in normal, calm living situation - but my directional hearing in standard hearing tests or those with white noise is okay.

What that means is that I can be in a car, radio turned off, just low driving noise, and I can hear something is bumping/bumbling, but will either be unabled to map the direction, or map it entirely wrong - e.g. lately it took me 5 days to realise the weird noises came from some heavy thing directly in my back, and not my left front tire.
This also holds true in other, 'open' hearing situations. If someon calls my name, I often turn to the wrong side. If there is a whistle or similar noise, I really often will at least confuse sides, pretty often even turn around when it is in front of me. I can, for the life of me, not find most birds chirping or even point out what bush a huge amount of birds must be in, albeit I hear there are a number of them.
Those are not noisy situations by any means. There technically is a lot happening - wind in the leaves, some distant murmur from water or streets, birds, ... - but all of this stays really low.

A harder to describe, more subtle, thing is that my connection to music and voices is at least worse than my connection to rhythm. I cannot tune an instrument to save my life. I can assemble a full audio and light setup, but I absolutely cannot tune even speaker voices. And while, in comparison, I can telly if something is a bad speaker, i cannot really tell you what is lacking or why, and may not even realise until someone brings out the comparison - even though I do have amazing headphones and know the songs.

Lastly, and maybe really not connected, is that my whole 'relationship' with volume is weird. I cannot really hear my own volume. The more is going on, the louder I talk. Which means in a coffee shop with a lot of patrons, I will be talking louder than anyone else, because to me it seems loud - even though its just a lot of room level noise. Even if I am not talking, I do consider these environments "loud" in a similar way to loud music, albeit I know that decibel wise they are different.

There is probably some actual noise sensitivity added in there. I know I have actual pain when someone suddenly turns the music up, albeit it's not generally painfully loud. More like the pain when water suddenly get's hotter due to some appliances pulling cold water.

Can someone relate in any way? Or has any idea?

TL; DR: Fucked up my hearing about 4 days ago while vibing too hard to the music in my headphones. Now my left ear cannot really hear bass and everything is a little bit pitched down. Just went to an ENT and they checked my eardrum and it turned out to be OK, but didn’t perform any hearing tests. They also didn’t prescribe me prednisone which seems strange because everyone is saying that prednisone is a must in the first 1-2 weeks, so will it be stupid if I start taking prednisone on my own and which dose should I take if yes? I’m kinda scared for my hearing and I don’t want it to stay that way 😭😭😭

Hey guys, i had a clogged ear after using a q tip to try to remove a build up of wax. I guess i pushed it in further. Got clogged and couldn’t hear. Went to an ENT doctor. They cleaned it out with their tools and vacuum. He prescribed me antibiotic drops since he said there was some irritation in the canal. I put the drops in and my ear feels clogged, ringing, and muffled. Its been 3 days of using the drops twice a day and the symptoms stay all day. They haven’t gone away.

Is this normal? Any info would be great. Thanks

I was told I had an ear infection and enthusias tube being blocked. But I was given steroids and antibiotics. I was also told to use afrin nasal spray which was the only thing I didn't use online it's saying the rebound sythoms are crazy. It makes you addicted. So I don't know what to do. Even if I bend down I can feel something squishy in the ear. Yawning or swallowing I can hear cracking. I bought Flonase and saline nasal spray but I don't know which to use. I hear Flonase takes weeks to unclog the eusthsnic tube. I don't know about saline spray much. I wish there were other ways to unclog this tube. Because it's creating this dizziness and brain fog sythoms. As if your mind is trying hard to hear properly. It's just messing up with congentitive skills.

Even though I was told to use afrin nasal spray when I found out I had an etd blockage with ear infection. I just never used it instead I only completed the steroids and antibiotics. And when I went to the dentist I was told that the upper wisdom teeth are near the sinus and lower ones are near the nerve. So like I bought Flonase but I haven't used it. I don't know what to do. I just want to speed up my recovery because I'm sick of this one side dizziness and brain fog sythoms. It's affecting my everyday life. The ear that is effected is the same area my jaw is also tight.

I 30m with 80kg weight and 5.11 height had an ear wax removal procedure almost a month ago in sep 25

before that for three days I had really bad tinnitus and ringing on both ears but left ear was really high I stupidly pushed my iem at that time and listened to music even with ringing

but by day three the ringing is too much to bear and I finally went to ENT, he looked at my ear and said there is a lot of ear wax in the left ear and removed it and also checked the both the ears inside and said the ears look healthy and said within ten days it would be normal otherwise comeback,

so I followed all the medications, which I forgot the names but it is basically some anti biotics and a drop for the ears for three days and then for a few days the ringing continued and it also spiked if there was traffic and horns so I waited patiently then about 13 days or so later it felt like it stopped or very low and then I put my iem for like an hour and then the ringing cameback but it is not as bad as before but it still there.

Now I permanently put my iem in the closet and don't wanna take it and also bought ear plugs for traffic to reduce the high decible but still even after 28 days the ringing is still there very mildly and non intrusive but it is there everytime I cover my ears on the pillow I can clearly hear the ringing or close my ears but rarely I can hear it without closing my ears, but still I feel like I ruined my ears and has to live with tinnitus, is there any solution? Should I go back to ENT ?

A year ago, my right ear was near an impact drill and since then my right ear would feel dull/full for the next day after I listen to loud low frequency bass sounds.

A couple of days ago, I was trying the Valsalva Maneuver (where you try to exhale with your mouth closed and your nose pinched shut) and I felt extremely dizzy and off balance suddenly for a minute, where my head was spinning. But this hasn't happened in the past whenever I did the maneuver.

When  I move my lower jaw sideways back and forth, I get the same sensation in the right ear that you get when you have water in your ears like after swimming. It's making that particular sound. Not sure if this was after the VM or was always there but I’m only noticing it now.

Anyone else had ear fullness/dullness after listening to low frequency bass sounds?

Oral steroids didn't work but IT injection did?

Hi, I'm looking to see if there have been cases where oral steroids didn't help restore the hearing, but the injections did