I deal with the pain in joints. Sure it hurts. Yeh, unless I really concentrate on moving beyond the pain, my grip is weaker, for example. Big deal. It’s the worsening tinnitus that ranks right up there at the top.
I’ve fairly well (roughly) isolated the frequencies that result in the most pain/inducement of harmonic disturbances via interaction with my tinnitus. I try to avoid those, but the greater the range of frequencies (and harmonics, overtones, etc.) expressed by a piece of music, the greater likelihood of problems on my end. And that’s a BIG PITA since I really, really find great pleasure in music. (I was actually making significant–to/for me–progress with my lil Bach Strad Cornet before I put it away because playing it just hurt too much. *shrugs* At least I can still “play” it in my head.)
Of course, some of the loudest frequencies in my tinnitus are those ranges also inhabited by the enunciation of consonants in speech, hence a growing dependence on watching an interlocutor, since all the vowels are clear as a bell, and only consonants seem seriously affected by being overwhelmed with noisy tinnitus.
Other frequencies above and below my tinnitus are only interfered with my the apparent “loudness,” which varies according to other conditions. As recently as a couple of years ago, for example, I was able to hear the “mosquito ring tone” us Olde Phartes are supposed to be unable to hear. *shrugs* It was outside those frequencies masked by my tinnitus and the examples I listened to weren’t on any “conflict overtones”.
I hope that the trials on a vagus nerve treatment for tinnitus are successful in humans and are approved for general treatment sometime soon. That would be cool. I could deal with arthritis pain while playing a horn. Heck, I might even try singing again.
Let me dream, OK?