Tinnitus -- The Ringing in My Father's Ears

My father is now 83 years old. For nearly three years in his late 70s, he had two illnesses -- ear ringing and body itching -- that pained not only him but also us, his children. The body itching didn't let him sleep. Even though we took turns in scratching, patting, striking or massaging his body, he could only sleep for a while, and then wakes again because of the itch.

There were even times I asked God to take him and let him rest in his bosom if the itching doesn't stop, as I couldn't bear seeing him suffer. Years later, he recovered from this illness because of his belief in God, but it's another story, as the focus of this article is on ear ringing.

My father also suffered incessant ringing in his ears, but he suffered quietly. He didn't see it as an illness; he didn't even know that there's a name for it. I myself previously didn't know that other people has it, that it's a disease, and that it's called tinnitus. My father thought that the condition was unique to him, or that everyone who went through the same situations as my father's has ringing in the ears.

I came to know that he's suffering from tinnitus when I chanced upon an article on ringing of the ears. It was then I realized that it's an illness, but I didn't tell my father. I realized also immediately that a big part of handling tinnitus is not to be too conscious of its existence.

Like the disappearance of his itching, the disappearance of my father's tinnitus is also credited to God's mercy. This is not to say that if itching and tinnitus are not cured in some cases, there's no mercy from God. It's all case to case. Different situations, different ways of receiving healing, different times of receiving God's mercy.