I help people with jaw pain find support and help in several ways.
Evaluate your jaw problems.
Do you clench your teeth?
Does your jaw hurt when you chew?
Do you have problems sleeping because of jaw pain?
The Jaw Pain Quiz takes 3 minutes.
You’ll be asked 25 simple questions about your symptoms, history, habits, stress, and quality of life.
Based on your answers, you can determine what your right next step is.
Join the Facebook group.
Join the community. You are not alone.
Word of Mouth: Resources for Relieving Jaw Pain/Dysfunction is a growing Facebook group for people who want to find solutions for their jaw pain.
Schedule a TMJ Relief assessment and/or session.
So many people spend years suffering from jaw pain because it’s hard to find someone who can really help.
Most massage therapists and physical therapists do not specialize in intraoral therapy for TMJ issues.
Skilled help with jaw issues, beyond simply wearing a dental appliance, is available.
You’ll feel a difference after your first TMJ Relief session with me.
What are your goals for treatment?
The TMJ assessment helps me learn about you so I can better address your specific issues. I’m interested in learning about your symptoms, history, and habits, and in looking at possible co-factors for TMJ issues.
During the TMJ assessment, I teach you how to transform a clenching habit into Relaxed Resting Mouth Position, if that applies to you.
This will be homework for you, to repeatedly use a simple technique that replaces a habit you don’t want — that strains your jaw muscles and causes pain — with a new habit you do want.
It will feel odd at first. Once the new relaxed habit is ingrained, you’ll notice feeling a calm alertness instead of tension.
When the assessment is over, if you’ve chosen an assessment with a session, it’s time to get on the table and receive some skilled bodywork!
What happens during a TMJ Relief bodywork session?
TMJ Relief sessions are designed to start with relaxation, followed by releasing tension in neck and external jaw muscles.
The intraoral work comes next. I know, it’s really weird to have someone’s gloved finger in your mouth!
I work as gently as I can to start with, and I watch you closely for signs of discomfort and remove my finger at the first sign.
I know exactly where to touch, and people tell me (after I take my finger out of their mouth, of course), “You were in exactly the right place. No one has ever touched me there before.”
It may feel like a “hurts so good” pain. That’s your tense internal jaw muscles responding to gentle massage. I may increase pressure if needed, modifying it based on your tolerance.
Then I invite you to move your jaw and feel the difference, before and after.
TMJ Relief sessions end with cleansing and relaxation techniques to help your system integrate the therapeutics.
Following up
Jaw tension often reverts somewhat after a single TMJ Relief session, especially when your body-mind system has been holding this strain pattern for months, years, or decades, and when your clenching or grinding habit keeps contributing to it. (See homework, above.)
It often takes several TMJ Relief sessions to train your system to retain the new, healthier pattern of ease and spaciousness in your jaws.
With each session, along with you changing your habits, your system becomes more familiar with this new way of holding itself, and at some point, it determines that the new way feels better, and that becomes your new default: a more relaxed, aligned, functional jaw.
For this reason, I offer a package of Four 75-Minute TMJ Relief Sessions .
For best results, schedule these sessions over 4 to 8 weeks.
You have better things to do than suffer.
