What tinnitus can involve
Tinnitus is sound with no external source: ringing, buzzing, hissing or humming that only you can hear. What varies isn't usually whether it's there but how much room it takes up. Tiredness, stress, a quiet room or a bad night can each move it from background to foreground, and that shift is what makes concentration and sleep hard.
Because nobody else can hear it, the distress is easy to underplay and difficult to describe. Recording how loud it seemed and what it interfered with, day by day, turns something private into a record. It also shows the days it receded, which is worth knowing when it feels constant.
Symptoms checklist
Tinnitus symptoms checklist to take to your GP
Below are some of the symptoms associated with Tinnitus. You can print the Tinnitus checklist and weekly diary and fill it in by hand.
See what applies to you, note how often it happens, and take it to your appointment, so the conversation starts further along. It describes your experience. It does not say what is causing anything: having many of these does not mean you have Tinnitus, and having few does not mean you do not. Only a clinician can work that out with you.
- Ringing or buzzing
- How loud it is
- Difficulty concentrating
- Sleep disruption
- Distress
- Sensitivity to sound
- Fatigue
- Something else I want to mention
Print the Tinnitus checklist and weekly diary Download as PDF
The list comes from the NHS and charity sources linked further down this page, and from what people living with tinnitus tell us they keep an eye on. It is a starting point, not a test.
How a day can feel
If your days sound anything like this, taluvu was made with you in mind.
- “It isn't the noise, it's that it never stops.”
- “Quiet rooms are the worst, which nobody expects.”
- “I can't concentrate and I can't explain why.”
- “Some days it's background. Some days it's everything.”
- “Nobody else can hear it, so I stopped mentioning it.”
These are the kinds of things taluvu invites you to say in your own words, never a checklist of what anyone “should” have.
