Am I hearing things (you don't) ????

I've had the same thing for years. At first, it was a very depressing issue for me as listening to music brings me so much joy. To this day I still have it, just to a lesser degree.

Thankfully, for me, I had a large wax build up that was exasperating the issue. I now wash my ears out every two months.

I feel for you brother. Hang in there.

@prof 

Excellent, very helpful and informative post!
Agreed the OP should be seeing a specialist asap but at least he can now walk away with the knowledge that it is NOT the end of his world.

Thank you sir!

I'm 60 yrs. old and have had tinnitus since I was in my mid 20's.  Mine sounds like a continuous ssssssssssssssssss sound or if your familiar with the sound of sand blasting that's what I hear.  I also from time to time hear a specific tone that isn't really there that I've identified as 260 Hz.

My tinnitus was the result of a 24 hour viral infection. 

A particularly interesting aspect of my condition is that it's volume cycles up and down over roughly a 3 day period from extremely intrusive to mildly annoying.

Interesting, andolink.

My tinnitus can be astonishingly loud.  Sometimes if I'm in silence, like lying in bed, it can give me the impression I'm at a Van Halen concert where feedback is just being pumped out at "11."

Which makes it all the more remarkable to me that I can actually ignore it and sleep and do other things.  And when I'm not paying attention to it...it isn't there.  For instance, even if I walk in to a silent room I won't hear it as I'm not trying to hear it.   It really does show how much of an "attention" issue tinnitus is in terms of it's effects on many people. 

Over the decades I've had tinnitus (since playing in a loud band in the late 80's) it has rarely, in of itself, impacted my listening to music or high end audio.  Usually I just can't hear it when I'm listening to music.  But sometimes it gets bad, what is called "reactive" tinnitus in which it reacts to loud sounds and gets subjectively louder.  During those periods it can actually be audible riding "over" the music almost no matter how loud I play it.  That's a real bummer when it happens, but fortunately also very rare.  I just take it easy when it happens and it's gone in a few hours or the next day.

The noise generators I'm using right now aren't strictly to treat the tinnitus (that's a slightly different protocol, though using the noise therapy).  Nonetheless, it still seems to have some effect on lowering my tinnitus.  When I take the generators off to sleep everything sounds so quiet, including my Tinnitus, that for short periods it's almost like I don't have it at all.  

At age 60 you have lost some of your hearing, i don't care what kind of job you had, its just the aging factor, we lost approx 1/60 every year after 35, Get a good hearing check from an ENT doc, he will be able to tell how much you lost and your current auditory range !!