Training Without Hearing Protection

The only advantage to hearing loss is that the VA sends me money every month for it. I got most of the loss while using double protection around jet engines. I would gladly give back every cent if the ringing in my ears would stop, it is driving me crazy now even with the background noise of the TV trying to drown it out. Another "benefit" is I will be going to bed soon and the ringing will be more noticeable and make it even harder to go to sleep.

Use hearing protection for anything that can cause damage, not just shooting!

At least it's tolerable. It's middle E
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Mine is more of a high C sharp or D flat, if you prefer. Strangely playing the piano will sometimes calm the ringing.
 
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From personal experience, as a teenager, damaged my hearing through shooting without hearing protection (shotguns, 30-30 hunting, and .357 outdoors and on occasion from the cab of the truck at jackrabbits), and listening to LOUD rock music. DUMB...DUMB....DUMB!!

My kids KNOW there will be a beating if they refuse to wear hearing protection. They see my father and I saying "huh?" a lot. The ringing DOES NOT go away.
 
Mine is more of a high C sharp or D flat, if you prefer. Strangely playing the piano will sometimes calm the ringing.
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You understand, then, probably. certain tones, flat or sharp, would be worse to deal with. Like listening to an untuned piano all day.

As bad as it is, I've managed to adapt to it and not notice it most of the time.
 
Some people suffer immediate hearing damage when subjected to an unprotedted gunshot .. others suffer no damage at all.
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You had before and after hearing tests?

Not all damage manifests as ringing.
 
WHAT???? CANT HEAR YOU.......

Wear em when practising is the best bet for your ears. I wouldnt take time to put em in if it was a HD situation
 
Take it from a guy that is recently 35 and deaf. Do not screw around about protecting your hearing, and vision. Heredity has a lot to do with the amount of hearing loss that I suffer from. Though I admit my part with loud music, guns, race cars, air planes, and working in an idustrial setting without hearing protection.

Try having people look at you like you are not quite right because you keep asking them to repeat themselves because you could not make out what they were saying. Not to mention how hard it is to speak with children, and women with high pitched voices. Oh and if someone has a thick foreign accent I can not make heads or tails out of what they say. It makes life hard when you can not hear.
 
I am willing to accept that the db from a gun shot can damage my hearing if that is the cost for saving my life. I will NOT expose myself to that level of db in some sort of odd-ball training experience, not even once.
 
You have a choice. Wear hearing protection all the time every time and be able to listen to your wife, children hear music and enjoy life.

Don't wear hearing protection. Have a constant hum in your head. Not hear your children, wife and music. Lay awake at night because of the hum in your head.

Mine is a harmonic of a 400 hertz generator.
 
We always used ear protection during live fire. Come to think of it we even wore em while on patrol on my last deployment. We would put a foam plug in one ear and the headset to our radio over the other. Cant hear much over a hmmwv anyway.
 
I only noticed the "hum" in my ears a few winters ago.

I woke up one morning in January and thought "wow, the cicadas are already out."

Then I realized that there are no cicadas in Chicago in January.

I have a constant buzz in my ears that sounds like cicadas in the summer.

I own a Casio watch but the alarm on it is completely useless. I can't hear the beeping of the alarm at all. I must have bumped it or something because it was beeping in a meeting and a guy next to me was kind of aggravated and he turned to me and said "Are you going to shut that off."

I had to explain to him that the alarm must have gotton turned on by accident, because I never use it and that I can't even hear it because one day - like a dumbass, I listened to some jackass who said that in order to be ready for real combat I needed to do realistic training and not use hearing protection while I shot my pistol and because of that I lost my fricking high-frequency HEARING !

And even if I hadn't lost my high frequency hearing I'd never be able to hear the alarm anyway over the buzz of the <redacted> cicadas !!!!
 
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hmm I maybe just wierd but i had a baseline hearing test done when I came in the military. Before I re-upped I had to get another test I was at the time working on Parris Islands Rifle range as an instructior and was speing all day on the firing line with sustained and rapid rates of fire....I know stupid, but I had no protection in so I could better hear the people yelling from center line and such and the recruits asking questions. For some strange reason My heaing baseline improved by 20% when I re-enlisted the first time. I did the test again last month to re-enlist again and it is still 20% up from the initial when I came in...explain that. I have no constant ringing, and I can hear things most people cannot like bumps in the night my wife and kids dont even hear.
 
What about if your totally deaf? I am totally deaf in my Left ear and 50%in my right due to a past brain tumor. I do wear a plug in my right ear but thinking in my left.
 
No hearing...

Whaaaat? I can't hear you. Did you say something???

Ya, you'll become deaf pretty damn quick. Stupid.

It's like saying I wonder what it feels like to be shot? So, I'll just get shot and see....
 
In over 2 decades thus far of full time LE, I have never trained without hearing protection, on departmental time or my own. In fact, whenever I'm shooting, I double up with both ear plugs as well as headphones. Anyone who recommends otherwise is someone I'd ignore.
 
So, do any of you actually train by firing your weapon without ear protection?
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Not only no but, HELL NO! I can't improve on anything Kraig said, but I am with him 1000%

Living with impaired hearing is no fun at all.
 
Wow! just Wow!
No amount of Hearing loss will EVER help you anywhere in life..
(unless your at a highschool musical)

Im not just an NRA instructor.
I also Own a Recording studio and am a 16 Year Veteran of Live Sound in Stadium Venues so..

Heres a review that should shed some light on this subject.

http://www.amazon.com/review/R16YG7R1B1FW0O/ref=cm_cr_pr_viewpnt#R16YG7R1B1FW0O

In this case, I am not endorsing the Product Line as much as the Philosophy of Use.
 
" What about if your totally deaf? I am totally deaf in my Left ear and 50%in my right due to a past brain tumor. I do wear a plug in my right ear but thinking in my left. "

Yes, put plugs in both. If a med breakthrough comes along to fix your problem, but things are too damaged by loud sounds, the fix won't work.
 
Yes, put plugs in both. If a med breakthrough comes along to fix your problem, but things are too damaged by loud sounds, the fix won't work.
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I was born deaf and almost always wear hearing protection for this reason. Not sure if i would choose to repare my hearing if it becomes possible but i would rather have the option.
 
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