There are a number of possible causes of exhaustion, everything from not being able to sleep at night to respiratory problems like sleep apnea. But many individuals are surprised to find out that persistent fatigue and exhaustion can also be caused by something fairly common: hearing loss.
That’s at least partly due to the fact that hearing loss usually develops gradually over time. You might not immediately distinguish the symptoms and, as a result, you may feel as though you’re constantly tired for no reason. This experience can be very frustrating. This exhaustion can frequently turn into irritability which could cause you to socially isolate yourself. The good news is that treating your hearing loss will often boost your energy levels, reducing fatigue and exhaustion.
Your brain will compensate for slowly developing hearing loss
For the majority of people, hearing loss is a very gradually-progressing condition that grows worse over time. In its early stages, you likely won’t even notice that you’re developing hearing loss. Even common symptoms, like turning the volume up on your TV and smartphone, can be easy to miss if you aren’t looking for them.
Fatigue is one of the most noticeable symptoms of hearing loss. Regardless of how much sleep you get, you could still feel fatigued. Unfortunately, many individuals don’t intuitively connect this symptom with hearing loss.
That’s because the cause happens in your brain. When your ears aren’t receiving as much information, your brain works harder to make sense of it all. This constant extra work is exhausting in the same way that long periods of concentration can take a toll. Your ability to perform daily tasks and your overall quality of life can be substantially affected over time as your untreated hearing loss grows worse.
Stigma plays a role
So when individuals start to feel fatigue, why wouldn’t they simply consult a hearing specialist? One partial explanation is that individuals just don’t associate tiredness with hearing loss. But there’s another reason that might ultimately be more damaging: stigma. There’s a feeling that hearing loss is bad or ruins your life or that there’s nothing that can be done about it. All of these things are false, and they stop many people from finding treatment.
However, as more people are open about their hearing loss experience, the stigma has begun to disappear. Many people understand that hearing loss is not some kind of social failing, and the very small nature of modern hearing aids makes them easy to hide around people who unfortunately will not let go of this stigma.
It’s unfortunate that this social stigma can make it harder for people to find the care they need because this often leads to hearing loss that gets worse over time when it might not need to.
How to manage hearing loss-associated fatigue
The earliest stages of hearing loss may not have any apparent symptoms. That makes it difficult to effectively take a reactive approach, and it’s why many hearing specialists favor preventative techniques. Hearing specialists recommend routine screenings in order to create a baseline of your healthy hearing, that way they will be able to identify changes to your hearing in subsequent screenings. Once this baseline is achieved, early intervention is often much more effective.
You can lessen hearing loss associated exhaustion by taking a few proactive steps. A few of the easiest and most common steps include the following:
- Consult a hearing specialist: Keeping an eye on the state of your hearing is important. Consulting a hearing specialist can help you detect hearing loss in its early stages when it’s less of a problem and your brain doesn’t have to work as hard to compensate.
- Try to find more quiet, isolated spots for conversations: When there is a lot of background noise, it can be challenging to sort out voices, even with hearing aids in some instances. Moving conversations to an area with less background noise can make it easier for your brain to focus on the voice you’re attempting to hear, lessening fatigue in the process.
- Be sure you use your hearing aids as frequently as you can: Hearing aids are designed to help you focus on the sounds of human speech, meaning conversation will be substantially easier to make out when you are hearing them. This means you won’t be as fatigued because your brain won’t have to work so hard.
- Give yourself a rest in between conversations: In between conversation, take a quiet rest somewhere. This can help your brain recuperate from all the work it’s doing and make day-to-day communication a little more sustainable.
So if you’re experiencing an unusual amount of fatigue and tiredness, with no evident cause, it might be time to schedule a visit to your hearing specialist. Treating hearing loss can help you minimize your exhaustion and boost your energy. Don’t let stigma cause your hearing loss to continue to be untreated.
