I know some people blame the covid vaccine. I had tinnitus before the vaccine and it got louder when I took the vaccine and then got quieter later. But it gets louder with other medications too. I suspect anything that causes inflammation can increase tinnitus symptoms, and the covid vaccine does temporarily increase inflammation. This could easily push someone who hasn’t noticed their developing tinnitus over the edge and suddenly they notice it and associate it with the vaccine. What they don’t know is that they might have noticed their tinnitus 2 months later if they hadn’t taken the vaccine. Statistically, I would expect there to be lots of people, like maybe as much as one or two percent of the population (which amounts to a few million people in the US) who might legitimately associate their tinnitus with the covid vaccine, even if the vaccine actually had nothing to do with it.

The same explanation goes for ANC - when you cut out all the noise, suddenly it’s way easier to notice the tinnitus you already had.

There might be something with the neck stiffness idea. I do get the feeling my tinnitus lessens when I’m using cervical traction and doing neck stretching regularly.