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Originally Posted by WT Sharpe
How did you manage to stop?
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They can make retainers that essentially hold your mouth in a specific position. They are uncomfortable at first but you get used to it. We used a series of them when I was diagnosed with TMJ. The doctor wanted to realign the jaw so I had one I wore at night which pushed the jaw out, stretching the disc and allowing it to heal over time. As the tissue healed, we used a new retainer to slowly move the jaw back into its normal allignment. I had a different retainer I wore during the day to help with allignment issues but it wasn't nearly as restrictive as the night time one.
They can do something similar with a mouth guard so that your teeth are held in place to stop the grinding or they have mouth guards that cover the teeth so the grinding doesn't damage them but that won't help the headaches.
But the biggie is learning how to deal with stress which is one of the major causes of grinding. A combination of moving, graduating high school, and developing self confidence reduced my stress levels. The move actually helped a lot, once I got over the stress of moving, because a new school and teachers who couldn't compare my learning disabled but intelligent self to my genius brothers stopped a lot of the negative comparisons and helped me a ton.