My right ear has been plugged up and couple days later, ringing has ensued. I did some Googling and see all types of replies about how people have had this experience and seen a doctor and still no solution! I even read one completely lame article that says tinnitus can be so annoying it can lead to suicide, and then in the same breath, they say deal with it! I also have some cold symptoms that are coming along for the ride today. I read that I could use warm olive oil and then a bulb syringe with baking soda and water, but I don’t have the syringe on hand.
This “condition” is making my head feel weird, which I assume is a symptom of the ear being plugged?
Yes. Make a doctor’s appointment. Your doctor can either scoop it out with a tool or a sonic device that breaks up the plug. I did it a couple months ago at my girlfriend’s insistence*, and it worked like a charm.
*My left ear was badly plugged. Her father is deaf in his left ear. My turning my head to the right to hear her better was a little too much.
There are over the counter ear wax removal systems that basically consist of a flushing bulb and a small container of mineral oil. The oil softens the wax and then you flush it with warm water. Works for me.
If you’re having some sinus issues try taking Sudafed. My daughter was sick and had clogged ears for a month, trying every home remedy she could to clear out her ears. One dose of Sudafed straightened her right out.
yeah get an ear wax removal kit at any major drug store. the drops will be an oil and peroxide which softens the wax and allows the syringe to flush it out with warm water.
give it a try. you will need it if you are a wax accumulator.
if you can’t get it all out then go to a clinic for them to clean the packed in stuff.
your ear may feel strange as you or someone cleans it. that small discomfort is far less problem than the loss of hearing or tinnitus the wax produces.
This is what I was going to suggest as a first step. The OP’s ears may “feel” clogged, but there could be fluid somewhere that could be hit with an OTC medication and be cleared up (as opposed to a waxy buildup).
I woke up one morning a few years ago with my head spinning to the point I could barely walk. Took a decongestant and a little while later back to normal.
It seems I have developed hayfever in the last few years. Asked the pharmacist about what I could get to unclog my ears, he suggested Benadryl. Worked. Also came in handy for a few other non-life threatening allergic reactions.
Thank you. I used phenylephrine HCI because I went to a store with no pharmacy inside so couldn’t get pseudophedrine. My ear still feels plugged and ringing, so guess I will check into the earwax removal products.
Check for hearing loss. Put on a set of headphones in both ears and make sure some sound is coming out of them. Pull out the one in the good ear and see if you hear anything in the bad ear. Now switch the headphones and put the side from your good ear into the bad ear (leave the headphone on your good side off). If you still don’t hear anything, you may have “sudden hearing loss”. There are NO symptoms of sudden hearing loss other than the fact that you can’t hear in that ear anymore (and tinnitus). If you have pain in your bad ear, you don’t have sudden hearing loss.
This happened to me 4 years ago. My right ear felt plugged and I had bad tinnitus in it. When I did the hearing test I described I heard NOTHING in the bad ear.
I don’t want to scare you, but…: sudden hearing loss is considered a medical emergency. If you hear nothing in your bad ear, go to the emergency room** right now** and ask them for an ENT consult. There are some treatments that might work for sudden hearing loss, but you have to start them early. Wait 2 weeks and the doctors won’t even try them.
J.
p.s., I’m now permanently deaf in my right ear. The treatment didn’t work for me, but at least it gave me a shot.
Still got my hearing.
In fact, last night, I was on Youtube trying to find some relaxing rain to listen to, and I found some “tinnitus masking” videos. Boy, the internet has everything!
For purposes of future ear ringers who may Google these symptoms, I went to the doctor this morning and found that both of my ears are fully impacted. So much so that it messed with my equilibrium and caused nausea this morning. Per the doctor, I will be using an earwax removal system and then return in 2 days so they can clean it out.
ear wax impaction can be slow or sudden. you can have some dry and some more liquid, it can shift and flow so you could have a big difference from one day to the next.
if you are an ear wax accumulator you need the ear wax removal kit. also handy, if you have family or friends, is an otoscope (ear looking thing). you can find all plastic ones at major drug stores and you can be looked at how your wax farm is doing. it does clean out easier to do it before you have a lot to remove.
I had this same thing a few years back. Got to where I could barely hear anything. ENT doc cleaned me out (there was a sick amount of wax he got out). The scooping out was… unpleasant. But the results were instant.
I guess I had gotten used to the hearing loss because I distinctly remember everything being REALLY LOUD after I left the doctor’s office. The city streets had seemed quite serene before…
There seems to be a lack of good evidence for any particular type of earwax softener/remover being better than plain water, though there are various recommendations for Colace, hydrogen peroxide etc.
I am also informed that hard cloggy earwax is more common as one ages and that those prone to this affliction should consider regular prophylactic wax softening followed by removal with warm water with the aid of one of those drugstore squirty bulbs.
