r/TMJ

I've been failed at every possible point regarding TMJ for the last 2 years.

I've had dental negligence lead to losing a molar which fucked my bite.

Ive then spent £250 on a nightguard that didn't even fit. £300 on a nightguard that only my molars touch and i was told "yeah that's normal". £2000 on a TMJ specialist who shaved my teeth down and just fucked me up even more. Hundreds of pounds on at home impression kits and boil bite guards which did nothing, I've been on multiple different medications to try and stop it hurting. Ive tried physical therapy. I've tried so hard to fix this and i still have absolutely no answers or reasons.

I'm just fucking done.

I don't go a day without pain across my jaw like I've been laughing at a comedy show for 10 fucking hours straight.

I don't have a single area where I can eat without being in pain from sensitivity or pressure pain.

I cant just go to bed without thinking about how the proceeding sleep is going to fuck me up more.

I literally don't see a point in my life where this gets better so what's the fucking point.

My wife has been through something I’ve never seen adequately documented, and I’m hoping someone in this community recognizes her story.

The trigger: A routine dental procedure. Jaw held open too long by a dental bite block, in an abnormal position. What followed wasn’t just soreness — it was a cascade that took years to get diagnosed and treated.

What happened:

•	TMJ disc displacement

•	Adhesions and synovitis

•	Burning pain across her face, mouth, and tongue that never went away

•	Eventually diagnosed with PTTNP — Post-Traumatic Trigeminal Neuropathic Pain

Provider after provider. Years of being dismissed, misdiagnosed, and told it would resolve on its own. It didn’t.

On April 2, 2026 she finally had bilateral TMJ arthroscopy performed by an oral and maxillofacial surgeon at a major U.S. University. Three weeks post-op and we are cautiously, carefully hopeful for the first time in a long time.

I’m documenting her entire journey and writing a book about it.

But before anything else — I want to find the others.

If a dental procedure kicked off your TMJ spiral, your facial burning, your nerve pain, or led you to a PTTNP or trigeminal neuropathy diagnosis — I want to hear from you.

You are not crazy. You are not alone. Drop your story below or DM me.

So far I have only seen two options that seem incredibly sketch. I am shocked this is not on the market given the rise in microplastics (I am a molecular biologist and the research that is coming out on microplastics is horrifying. Including a recent a study on dental wear plastics). Both the fancy guards from the dentist and the OTC ones are plastic based and the type of plastic they use (acrylic (hard) or ethylene-vinyl acetate (EVA)) are known to leech off microplastics that are toxic and potentially carcinogenic (obv the research is very new on this so take with a grain of salt).

Does anyone have ANY recommendations out there? I am straight up considering starting a business to get this product out. I believe in several years the entire market is going to switch to a plastic free option.

But for now I am worried about my own bruxism and clenching.

so i’ve been struggling with ear block, slight jaw numbness and eye pressure ever since i’ve gotten my braces off. It has since then escalated into anxiety, depression, exhaustion, and just not wanting to live anymore. I am currently seeing a therapist at my college but i don’t think even that can help. Here are just a few of my symptoms: cold hands and feet, tingling all over body (stuck on fight or flight), eye pressure, ear block, tingling on the head in particular when i try to sleep, shivering and crying randomly. Mind you i have not suffered any type of stress or trauma but my body is persistent on acting like i have some sort of concussion. and i know that my tmj has affected my nervous system in the past so it could be that as well.

either way, im a commuter in college, kind of alone, wasting all my youth fixating on this.

i dont know if i can live like this any longer.

i have tried physical therapy, TMJ specialist, and an ENT, all saying that it’s mainly stress. my orthodontist said a splint could possibly help but i don’t grind my teeth that much.

i’ve tried doing TMJ exercise but that alone can’t regulate my nervous system.

i was googling ways i could potentially just unalive myself because it is better to be dead then to ask every other doctor in the planet about what’s wrong with me. my muscles are tense, and my posture is broken as well.

i have not stopped crying since morning.

i don’t know what to do.

i feel so dramatic writing this shit out but i honestly can’t pretend that everything is okay anymore

Missing work because of high pain days, days I really can’t function or even stand up. I was told to go to HR to log my “health problem” but the world doesnt really qualify this as a health problem, does it?

How do you all deal with this issue?

I'll leave my answer to that comment and post it here as is:

I want to give you hope by telling you my story.

I finally fixed my TMJ after 2 years of being aware of it and probably having issues for 18 years in total. I just realized this after every single bodily problem i had, went away in the matter of ~ 48 hours.

My issues were:

Headaches, tinnitus, bad sight, nerve pain in my face, arms, hands, 6 of my fingers, every part of my back, including a herniated disc that needed surgery because i could not move my left leg anymore and had nerve pain from absolute hell like my legs are on fire and being electrocuted 24/7. Pain in my hip, hurting knees that constantly made sounds, more, other pain in my feet. I am pretty sure i forgot some of them.

I also thought i was mentally ill because i could not concentrate, had social anxiety, even though only weeks earlier i had no problems speaking in front of a lot of people.

I had lost nearly all of my friends and didn't even want to meet anyone. My life was absolute hell.

I will spare you the whole path of finding out what the issue was, but the most important parts on my way to solving my personal nightmare were a good physician who has some special, certified training for treating TMJ and, although not cheap, Botox injections.

After around 3 weeks not all but a lot of my symptoms just disappeared. All the others were at least slightly better. Most of them still a lot better than just weeks ago.

At that point i actually seriously considered to be mentally ill afterall because the difference was crazy.

What followed were different treatments with a bite splint, occlusal splint and night guard and a few things i forgot. Some helped a bit, most of them made it worse. What helped me a lot mentally was the fact, that i could use my Botox Joker if i really needed to. Knowing this alone made me calm down as much as possible, given the situation. In total i had 3 injections over the course of ~ 2 years. They were like a vacation. Sounds weird but it felt like it. I was able to recharge my batteries and i am convinced that this gave me the energy to keep going and just testing everything while giving each enough time.

It turns out, that my dental bridge i got a looooong time ago was the problem. It was just a bit too high and after i finally convinced my dentist to sand off just a tiny bit, it only took around 8 hours until the first changes happened.

In the evening i sudenly got extreme headaches and lost my hearing for a few seconds. What followed was the most euphoric feeling you can think of. I got goosebumps in showers that whole evening and i suddenly had the urge to go for a walk even though it was already dark and quite cold. And while walking the first few meters i suddenly had to RUN! I ran until i couldn't physically move my legs anymore and suddenly i had to cry out of happyness.

In the following days i noticed that i slept like a baby nearly every night. Something that before only happened after an injection.

The symptoms also returned after a certain time of day. But that time shifted back nearly every single day. I was actually excited to see when that would be the next day.

I also "forgot" to think about it most of the day. Something that didn't happen ONCE in the 2 years prior.

One week later my nerve pain in the legs was still there from time to time but just for a few minutes and way less. I can live with that - no problem. Especially after what happened before. ALL my other problems went completely away. Turns out that my knees are still good. It wasn't the fact that i am getting older. I remember feeling like i had jetpacks under my feet. Life felt like "easy mode" instead of "very hard". Especially because i still had goose bumps several times during the day. In the end it settled on "normal" and i am fine with that.

My social anxiety also went completely away. That evening after my dentist appointment i made new friends.

I know that this sounds absolutely crazy and like i pulled this out of my ass and i wish it was. But it is exactly what happened. Just shortened the suffering part a bit.

I also remember saying "WHAT. THE. FUCK?" several times a day. The difference was that immediate.

So please don't give up. Learn some strategies that help you with getting the energy it takes to tackle this issue (again and again) and try to stay positive.

Feel free to ask me anything if you have questions. I still have the deep desire to share whatever might be helpful to others because i am so shocked about the difference this tiny change made.

I was just eating until I opened my mouth to hear a crunch sound, I figured out it wasn’t food and was coming from inside the right part of my jaw. I never have any noises come from my jaw except small pops. I do have braces and did have a temporary filling put on so i had to leave my mouth open for a while. I do not claim to have TMJ, but im sure a lot of people in this subreddit are somewhat educated about jaw health. If anyone could give me a hint to what this could be and how to fix it, I would appreciate it

Hello everyone, I wanted to share my TMJ story.

I’m a 25-year-old male, and my TMJ issues started after a dentist appointment in 2022, when I had a cavity filled. Later that day, when I got home and ate something, I heard a loud cracking sound in my left TMJ. Since that moment, I’ve been experiencing crepitus/ Crackling sound in both joints.

Because I have a pretty obsessive personality and struggle with severe OCD, I became completely fixated on the noise. For the next 4 years, I kept “testing” my jaw by opening my mouth very wide and moving it around constantly, sometimes every few minutes, just to check if the noise was still there.

It had a huge psychological impact on me. I became really depressed and convinced myself it was arthritis.

Recently, I noticed that when I stopped testing it so much, it seemed to improve. So I decided to stop completely. After about a week, the noise went away.

At this point, I’m starting to think my problem may have been more related to irritation from constantly checking it than to actual structural damage.

I wanted to share this in case anyone else is going through something similar.

Hi, I’m 21F and I have bad health anxiety. A month ago I discovered a lump under mastoid process. It is rock hard, feels like a bone but I’m not sure. It doesn’t move and it is very palpable when I bend my neck towards the side my lump is on (left). I also feel the similar thing on my right side but it is smaller and takes me a few more seconds to find it. When my head is in neutral position it kind of feels like a hard rope that goes across my SCM (not down my neck but towards the back of my neck). My doctor says it’s the attachment of SCM to skull but it genuinely doesn’t feel like a muscle. Does anyone have a similar story because I genuinely don’t know who to ask anymore.

I’ll keep this short. At first, I didn’t know my pain was related to TMJ. I had a severe toothache on the bottom right side, so I went to the dentist. They told me I was clenching my teeth, and I started using a mouth guard, but it didn’t help at all.

After a few weeks, I went back to different clinic, and the doctor said I had TMJ. They recommended massage therapy and physiotherapy. I tried both for a couple of weeks, and while it got a little better, the pain didn’t completely go away.

Later, I was talking to my sister, and she suggested trying castor oil after reading online that it can help with muscle tension. She thought it might help me too. I started applying it before bed and during the day, and I actually felt some relief the next day. After a couple of days, I was feeling much better.

I got mine off Amazon for around $15, and I was honestly shocked by the difference. If you’re dealing with TMJ pain, it might be worth trying. You can check pretty much any castor oil on Amazon, just make sure it’s cold pressed and hexane free.

I know how miserable this kind of pain can be, so I wanted to share in case it helps someone else. Thank you!

since the beginning of this year, I have had chronic mild pain in my lower left jaw, right where the platysma meets the masseter and the pain is also felt at the bottom of the platysma muscle connecting to my collar bone. Why is it not going away despite physical therapy and clean X-rays? TMJ specialist, primary doctor, and physical therapist all point to it being muscular but shouldnt it heal by now?

I have a sudden onset of severe tmj due to a badly find filling putting my bite out of alignment. I seriously cannot sleep. The pain is so severe. I’ve taken as much otc pain relief as I can. How do people cope with this?

i got an arthroscopic tmj joint surgery in the early 2010’s. completely failed if not worsened things. now 10 years later every dentist i go to is appalled when they hear i went through this surgery. everyone keeps acting like it’s archaic and “a scam” and “those things never work.” the guy did make us pay in all cash

did anyone get it and actually improve?

What was the most effective in reducing Muscular tmj symptoms (traps,scm, masseter and temporalis tightness). Temporalis tightness is easily the worst symptom as well as overall jaw tightness. Is anyone able to do PT, retrain breathing or any specific exercises, core work or myofunctinal/anything else that helped jaw tension? How long did it take you to reduce substantially or stop jaw tension?

This can get extremely longwinded so I'll try to keep it as straightforward as I can (while still getting my point across).

My symptoms:

I have run the gauntlet of TMJ/TMD symptoms. Initially, I was waking up with horrible headaches and horribly sore jaw/temples. Then I went to a dentist and had my first ever cavities in my early 20s... followed by a few more because I was grinding away the enamel on my molars. Throughout the years I began wearing a nightguard and grinded my way through a couple, I began getting masseter Botox which FINALLY helped but is SO expensive. I was getting anywhere between 50-60 units each time I went which was costing around $1,000 a couple times per year. Finally I got a referral to a TMJ specialist who sent me to a PT. PT treatments were working for the pain, but I was still grinding and if I slacked slightly on my at home sessions then I was back to square one.

What I learned:
Fast forward to my savior: INSTAGRAM! I was doom scrolling and found Dr. Travetti (https://www.instagram.com/p/DW\_nSf4CMAa/). This video in particular was speaking to everything I had ever experienced. Throughout my PT sessions I learned that my tight shoulders and neck are interconnected with my jaw issues, but this one video showed me HOW many symptoms I have that I didn't even know where symptoms: chronic neck pain, constant fatigue, scalloping of the tongue, extremelyyy narrow/small palate, tongue doesn't fit on the roof of my mouth, etc.

I had a complimentary phone consult with that Dentist's office and they further explained EVERYTHING to me - without me even telling any of my symptoms they were able to hit the nail on the head time and time again.

Unfortunately this dentist is located in Austin and I am in Charlotte. They said they could mail me a ring that I would wear when I sleep to do a remote sleep study, but I of course would have to fly to Austin for treatment. For now I am looking for dentists in the Charlotte area who will do this thorough treatment (they do palatal expansion, orthodontic alignment, myofunctional therapy, and release of tongue ties!!). BUT the silver lining is I feel SO educated now on what the root cause(s) of my issues are and I am extremely confident on the treatment plan I want moving forward.

So if you can't pinpoint the root root root cause of your TMD - check those palates!!

Hello all.

So last year, I got Invisalign for 5 months from my general dentist (big mistake) to fix some minor issues with my bite. I never had jaw pain or clenching issues. Then, in October, I got them off and immediately felt like my bite was weird and my jaw and face were constantly hurting. I told my dentist, and he said everything looked fine, even though I developed an all-around open bite in which none of my teeth touched except my back two molars, which were very painful. He shaved them down and then gave me a mouth guard, which didn't help, and when I went back, he said it must be stress. I also developed ETD, and my ears pop every single time I swallow and never go away. Sometimes it wakes me up at night, it's so loud. I've been struggling with this for 7 months and will be seeing a TMJ and airway specialist ortho in hopes he can help me with braces. I've gone to a jaw specialist and ENT with no help from them. So, with that said, has anyone experienced this, or know of anything that might help or give me some type of hope? I'm unable to do many things in life now, as I'm in constant pain most of my days, and would just like advice or success stories.

Thank you.

This is a mixture of a question/discussion post. I was diagnosed with TMJ disorder in December by an ENT because I thought I had a bad ear infection (news flash: I did not). I have had probably 1-4 “flare ups” a week. I have only ever used/tried Ibuprofen, cold and hot compresses, and even diclofenac sodium. I am currently a post-grad back in school and don’t have an abundance of money to spend on doctor’s visits and treatments (unless absolutely necessary), so I wanted to see what methods - whether traditional or not - have worked for your management of TMJ symptoms and pain? Obviously if I find no relief, I’ll bite the bullet and go to the doctor but I want to try other modalities first. To add, Ibuprofen works decently well but I do not want to have to rely on it long-term, especially since I am likely to have a predisposition to the development of ulcers.

Anything helps and thank you in advance!

Sometimes when I’m on my phone too much I’ll get a headache in my temple area. But recently I was eating cereal and on the phone (with that same headache). Soon as I finished my jaw started hurting. I noticed it felt worse when I would talk. Then I took a nap and fell asleep on that side and woke up & after that it hurts even when I don’t talk. I can’t keep taking this pain so I made a Dr appt. I’m suspecting TMJ since it’s jaw pain and pain in my temple and side of my side. The jaw pain is the WORST though. This is all new to me.

Hello people! I'm a 20 y.o. girl recently diagnosed with tmj disc displacement. Right now it's little to no pain for me, but I know it can get worse if untreated, and I unfortunately can't afford medical expenses any time soon.

I've always been an outcast, growing up I've been bullied a lot. I've worked on myself a lot to challenge my insecurities, learn how to talk to people and make myself socially acceptable, I actually started having fun living only this year, and now I'm getting this scary thing. I wish for nothing more than experiencing normal teenage girl things and feeling like a normal ordinary human being. Experiencing my first kiss and stuff. But I don't know when I'll meet someone and date someone for the first time, and how it will go if it happens when I'm 30 or older with a messed up locket jaw at that point of my life. I've read a lot of stories from people who's dating life was destroyed by tmj issues, and mine haven't even started. I'm in huge stress about it, I feel like it's kinda over for me now, because nobody will tolerate it and be actually happy with me like that. Unless I go outside right now and kiss the first guy that I see while I'm still able to do it, haha

I wanna hear from someone who met their partner while already having this condition. How did they react? Were they frustrated that they had to potentially subscribe to a lifetime with a partner who might never be able to kiss and do other things normally? Or if you have a partner with tmj issues, I would like to know how you feel about it. Do you feel like you're missing out on easier life and consider finding a new partner without such problems?

So along with bruxism, having TMJ for nearly two decades, nocturnal and daytime clenching, narcolepsy, sleep disordered breathing (most likely apnea—testing is on the docket), narcolepsy with severy fragmented sleep and frequent awakenings, REM behavioral disorder, sleep talking (and now singing/humming is a thing too 😵‍💫😐which has been a bizarre new twist), POTS/dysautonomia, RLS, PLMD, ADHD, severe trauma and CPTSD, reactivated Epstein Barr, being a shitshow, 24/7 tension, TMJ, sleep deprivation, and migraine headaches, severe ear and jaw pain with stiffness and muscle weakness, trigeminal nerve pain, and running out of any non -surgical solutions for severe deviated septum….

I’m in the market for a new quality cervical support pillow for side sleepers! I’ve always preferred being in a raised portioned sleep but am finding even the 5.3 inch loft pillow height is not enough, most pillows are too soft, or there is still a gap between my neck and the surface of the pillow, making my face tilt down towards my chest and leaving my neck straining or out of alignment, giving me shoulder pain. I need major neck support and a deep intention for my noggin. Any suggestions?!!!