I developed tinnitus in 2009, a neurological "gift" from a case of swine flu. (The other gift was chronic paroxysmal hemicrania, a nightmarish migraine-like condition that threatened to destroy my life until I got it under control with medication.) The tinnitus was exacerbated a few years later after a freak accident while inflating a mountain bike tire. The tire exploded off the rim, more-or-less directly into my right ear. I'm now partially deaf on that side, but of course I hear the tinnitus load & clear.