A friend of mine used to listen to loud music then starting about 15 years ago he started turning the music down because it bothered him.
With his job he’s around loud noise every day.
He works building and rebuilding drilling rigs, mainly offshore rigs. Steel on steel banging around him for hours.
Because of the noise he has to wear earplugs. When he takes the earplugs out everything is loud to him.
Even with earplugs he’s lost some hearing in certain sound ranges but at the same time he can hear or possibly just pays attention to sounds he never heard or paid attention to before.
That’s almost exactly the same with me.
I’ve wondered if all people can actually hear the sound but the brain just doesn’t process the sound until you loose some hearing then the brain starts processing the sound to compensate for the loss.
One doctors theories on this deals with the Cerebellar/Vestibular System where the Inner Ear's signals are processed in the brain. Any breakdown or dysfunction in that communication loop can result in anything from almost unnoticeable symptoms to disability like my cases is.
I've also worked around loud machinery. I've worked around Centrifugal Chill Water A/C units used in large commercial applications. They have a real high pitch sound. But I've had life long Vestibular {Inner Ear} issues. I'm at 60% hearing loss in the talking range and over 40% loss overall. IOW without my hearing aids I can't even hear birds.
BTW Vestibular Disorders are a major culprit in persons having Panic Attacks and being misdiagnosed with Anxiety Disorders. SSDI has me listed as having General Anxiety Disorder. I pinned down the Vestibular origin of it a few years later. I had to retire over 18 years ago at age 36.