TMD

[courtney251]

Hi,

I have been depressed recently about four months now. Two weeks ago I started getting pain at the back of my head and neck. Since then I have had severe jaw pain and ear pain as well as my jaw clicking. I have been diagnosed with tmd. I'm in skit of pain. I have been prescribed strong pain killers. Just wanted some reassurance I guess that it is manageable and other peoples experiences. Trying to make sure I'm not clenching my jaw and trying to relax but finding it hard.

Me and my sister get this. It seems to come and go, weirdly. See your dentist and ask about a mouth guard for sleeping, it should help. You can also try acupuncture, that's quite good as well.

@daisyjgrey thanks for your reply!!

Do you get it often? This is my first episode of it. I've been super stressed and I think I clench my jaw without even realising. I'm in a lot of pain. It's hard to explain it's like the bones just in front of the ears feels super tight. Driving me mad. X

Yes it's mainly when I'm very stressed or if something has physically affected my face/jaw. My sister gets it when she's stressed and when she's pregnant, presumably from all the hormones and being tired etc.

My dentist said to not eat things like apples whole, and make sure they're cut up to lower the risk of it getting stuck (wildly painful).

Weirdly acupuncture really helped me, whether that was just pain relief or relaxation (or placebo I suppose), it definitely made a difference. My sister has mouth guards for nighttime as she was clenching her jaws so hard she was starting to wear her back teeth down and the headaches were getting worse.

If you can, your best bet is to book an appointment (or a double one if you're very lucky) with your dentist and have a good chat about it/X-rays taken and see what they say. A mouth guard might really ease it or I think that there is something Botox related that can be done to stop you tightening the 'wrong' muscles as much.

I did ask if there was anything permanent they could do and it's essentially a lot of horrible and complicated facial and jaw surgery, so I passed on that...!

@daisyjgrey

I went to the dentist today and to be fair he was pretty unhelpful and said there wasn't much that he can do and that he would refer me to a specialist dentist. He did make an impression and said they will make me a guard but he said it's not gonna make much of a difference because I'm not grinding my teeth it's because he thinks I'm clenching during the night so he's not sure how much help the Guard will be.
Feeling really shitty today I'm at the point where I can't imagine how life would feel without this pain it's so bad I just can't see how I can make it go away but I have booked in for an acupuncture appointment today so really hoping that helps release some of this tension in my face.

Well that's wildly annoying, what a crap dentist.

Maybe it's mainly muscular then, rather than anatomy based, in which case it's the crap job of "trying to relax", which in itself is not at all relaxing.

Hopefully the acupuncture will begin to help, a word of warning, it won't help immediately, and you might feel a bit crap for the first couple of weeks (you might not notice if you already feel rubbish) but you should start to turn a corner after 3ish sessions. It's a sort of cumulative practice.

You can also try something like Pilates, which addresses your posture and how you hold yourself and will help to correct a natural imbalance in how you're holding the muscles in your head and neck, if you're got a good Pilates teacher then they should know how to address it when you bring it up as an issue. I do reformer Pilates and it's helped a lot of things but also tension headaches from where I'm sitting/standing all tense and scrunched. We carry a lot of stress in our shoulders and jaws!

Hi @courtney251, as a fellow tmd sufferer I fully empathise with your post. Have you tried osteopathy/physio? Also, amitriptyline/nortriptyline can be prescribed for chronic pain. How did you find the acupuncture?

@JustLikeJesseJames the acupuncture definitely help relax me and I felt that light I got a better sleep and maybe didn't clench as much so the next day felt better but it still hasn't gone. Do you get flare ups often? And if you do how long does it take to go away? It's been over a week now and I won't lie mentally it's affecting me massively I just can't see the light at the end of the tunnel at the moment