TMJ Hurts More With Guard?!
Question: I was diagnosed with TMJ last week was put on the 6 day Methylprednisolone packet, which I think really helped. Because I could not open my mouth and now I can but still have pain when I do.
I got my guard on Friday, I was told to wear the guard day and night for 3 weeks. Now the pain is acutally worse, as before only the left side where the loud pop and clicking is was hurting. Now he right side is hurting also.
I have also been getting terrible headaches and have ear pain on the left side. Was given Oxycodone for the pain but afraid to use that and only using Advil.
MY TMJ was caused by a blow to my jaw and going for MRI on Wednesday. He wanted it done last week, but did not have the money.
Has anyone else had a problem with the guard, causing more problems? Is there anything else I can do, as this is interefering with my sleep, I wake up with pain in the middle of the night.
I am already only eating soft foods.
Answers: I was diagnosed with TMJ last week was put on the 6 day Methylprednisolone packet, which I think really helped. Because I could not open my mouth and now I can but still have pain when I do.
I got my guard on Friday, I was told to wear the guard day and night for 3 weeks. Now the pain is acutally worse, as before only the left side where the loud pop and clicking is was hurting. Now he right side is hurting also.
I have also been getting terrible headaches and have ear pain on the left side. Was given Oxycodone for the pain but afraid to use that and only using Advil.
MY TMJ was caused by a blow to my jaw and going for MRI on Wednesday. He wanted it done last week, but did not have the money.
Has anyone else had a problem with the guard, causing more problems? Is there anything else I can do, as this is interefering with my sleep, I wake up with pain in the middle of the night.
I am already only eating soft foods.
You guard might need adjusting, it may be a little high and thus it can aggravate the condition. Try only wearing it at night, to give your mouth a break, a guard is designed to relive the stress and pressure on the joint, but if not fitting correctly (aka: being slightly high) it can make it worse, especially if you are wearing it day and night. Take it back to the dentist and have he/she adjust it.
Also, the guard might, in rare cases, be causing problems because it is actually forcing you to stay open....we have a natural vertical position of rest which means that our mouths are naturally in a postion of open (slightly). You will notice that your teeth aren't always touching when in a position of rest, notice right now, you actually have to manually close down to have your teeth touch. Well, sometimes, a guard will exaggerate that natural postion and aggravate your situation further. This happened to my husband, he had a blow to the head also that caused his TMJ issues, he tried a nightguard and it made it worse, he said he felt that the guard was forcing him to open wider.....nightguards are best designed to help against grinding, it takes the stress off the teeth and TMJ, but in a situation with a blow, your joint has been misaligned and therefore the issues that you are having may be permanent and may require surgery if severe enough.
A guard is more pallative in nature, takes the stress off the joint, that is about it, it won't heal the problem.
So, my suggestions would be, try to have it adjusted first, you may find this works and try to give is a break, wear only during the day or only at night. If you find yourself clenching and grinding, that can be a result of stress as well as an injury, then wear it at those moments. But I think that your mouth has had so much going on, it needs a break at times.
The best treatment is ice and heat therapy, ice to help inflammation and heat to helps relax the muscles as well as anti-inflammatory meds such as motrin 800 mg (need a prescription for that)
See how the MRI goes and take it from there. Good luck, I know that this is a hard and stressful thing to deal with.