Haven't had a moment's peace

Karen Sawyer, 33, from Poole, has been suffering from tinnitus for more than six months. It has become so bad that it is stopping her from living a normal life.

"I started hearing the tinnitus around February of this year. There was this constant loud low pitch humming sound, like the sound a fridge makes, only much louder.

"I saw my GP who was very sympathetic and she referred me to an ENT specialist. The specialist ran some tests and found that I had otosclerosis. He suggested that I might need an operation, but decided that as the hearing loss was minimal, it wouldn’t be worth it, because the tinnitus probably wouldn't stop. At no point did he offer me any treatment for the tinnitus.

"The impact it has had on my life is huge. My job requires me to be quiet and concentrate, but I am finding that very difficult to do nowadays. I also need to have some noise on in the background otherwise I will obsess over the tinnitus. Even in the bath I have to have a personal stereo on!

"I wasn't very good at dealing with stress before the tinnitus, but now the tinnitus makes me very stressed and that in turn makes the tinnitus worse, it is just a vicious circle. I take tablets every night just to get some rest.

"I can honestly say that in the last six months, I haven't had a moment's peace.

"My social life has also been affected, I can't hear what people are saying in a noisy environment and it's really embarrassing to have to ask people three or four times to repeat what they have said. No one who hasn't suffered from tinnitus can fully appreciate how terrible it is. I had heard about it before but had no idea it had such a negative effect on a person's life.

"My brother-in-law had tinnitus a few years back and he tried acupuncture for a month and it went away. So I felt I had to try it; it didn't work. I have also tried ginkgo biloba, as I read it was meant to help, but I couldn't feel any change.

"I have actually found it easier to cope since I stopped expecting the tinnitus to just go away. Now I wake and know it will be there."