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Before I’d ever heard the term TMJ, I used to refer to my “crunchy jaw” when discussing my stress levels with friends and family. The tension in my jaw, the headaches, the clicking sounds and teeth grinding – which are all symptoms of TMJ – would come and go depending how wound up I was feeling from one week to another. But though some weeks were better than others, I largely felt as though the tightness in my jaw had always been there.
The more I read about TMJ, the more I started to understand that jaw tension isn’t usually something you’re born with. Your jaw might be painfull because of physical injuries and misalignments, which some people can experience from birth, but on the whole, your jaw usually starts to hurt because something has damaged it or because you’re experiencing high levels of stress.
For me, both things were true. My jaw had never clicked before I had Invisalign. After the aligners came off, my bite was totally different. I could barely open my mouth and my jaw clicked loudly every time I tried to take a big bite of something. There were also crunching sounds if I tried to open my mouth wider. Sure, I now had very straight teeth, but something in my jaw felt very off.
In addition to mishaps with cosmetic dentistry, I’ve also experienced tension headaches and teeth grinding since my teens – for as long as I’ve practiced yoga my teachers have instructed me to relax my face and unclench my jaw. I’ve made some progress with tensing my muscles and gritting my teeth over the years, but not enough to eliminate the headaches or the teeth grinding entirely.
If you’re anything like me, you’ll know that simply relaxing and letting go of the stress you hold in your body is not that easy. TMJ can be incredibly painful and paracetamol rarely helps. Sometimes I sit there with my jaw jutting out looking like a bulldog because stretching the masseter muscles gives me a little relief – I look a little crazed, but it’s a small price to pay.
Over the years I’ve spoken with a host of experts on stress, muscle tension, hormones and dentistry to find out what causes TMJ and how to treat it. The clearest answer is: be less stressed. But alongside that, I’ve discovered modalities and treatments – some thousands of years old – that have helped soothe my symptoms.
The best treatments for TMJ
Before you go straight for the Botox – and yes, I have tried Botox for TMJ – there are smaller changes you can make to your lifestyle that make a big impact. I used to chew a lot of gum because I thought it would give me fresh breath and a snatched jawline. But chewing constantly meant that my poor overactive jaw muscles didn’t have a chance to rest. Like any muscles or joints in the body, the jaw needs a break and constantly working it can cause more pain and tension. So I gave up chewing gum. It wasn’t hard to do, I’d already read about it being bad for your gut health and potentially containing toxins so that part was easy.
Physiotherapy and posture correction also helped me to identify other tense and overactive muscles in my body and surprise, surprise, they were all linked with my jaw. My neck and pelvic floor were both incredibly tense so posture exercises and somatic movements helped with loosening all my muscles and relaxing my nervous system. The beauty of these kinds of exercises is that they’re simple and you can do them at home. Yoga and straightforward posture exercises combined with breathwork helped me to both chill out and gently stretch tight muscles.
Read more: Five stretches you should be doing every day, according to a flexibility expert
TikTok is filled with influencers who’ll insist they have used posture exercises to completely cure TMJ and drastically alter the shape of their face. Posture and TMJ are linked and relaxing your joints and muscles, redistributing your weight and improving your balance and mobility will help to lessen the severity of your symptoms, but posture exercises probably won’t cure you entirely. These exercises also won’t dramatically alter your appearance and most of the influencers who argue otherwise have likely lost a lot of weight and had a few tweakments in those “after” photos they’re sharing.
Nose breathing and mouth taping are also hot wellness trends on TikTok but hear me out on mouth taping. I’ve found that I grit and grind my teeth less and there’s less tension in my jaw after a night of breathing exclusively through my nose. Of course, you don’t need to tape your mouth shut, but experimenting with nasal breathing can help with learning to relax your jaw and release tension.
A good sleep can also reduce stress levels so I’ve been much more mindful about the quality and quantity of my sleep, using my WHOOP to analyse rest and aiming for at least a 90 per cent sleep score each night. I’ve tried not to let sleepmaxxing dictate how much fun I can have but going to bed earlier has definitely helped with lowering stress during the day.
Facial massage has helped with easing tension too, and I’m now a pro with my gua sha, but there are some things that can’t be achieved at home. As much as I rub or press my face, there are certain outcomes only a professional can achieve so for the more intense treatments – we’re talking physio, acupuncture, buccal massage and Botox – I’ve turned to the experts. Some of the results have been truly outstanding.
The first time I had a buccal massage I struggled not to laugh as Charlotte Mernier, the incredibly talented founder of My Osteo London, put her hand inside my mouth to massage my cheeks. After the treatment, which also included some deep neck and temple massage and swiping rapidly across the facial muscles, my jaw felt light for weeks. It was as though all the pressure had been lifted and there was no clicking or crunching either.
Specialist professional massage and muscle manipulation has helped hugely with alleviating pain and tension in my neck and jaw. I trust my neck with very few people but after one session with physiotherapist Laura Wilson of The Swiss Touch my TMJ symptoms, neck pain and posture had improved. A relaxing massage at the spa, this is not and the saying “no pain, no gain” certainly rings true here. A session with Wilson can feel uncomfortable but the results speak for themselves.
Before I tried Botox, I also looked into facial acupuncture for TMJ. This was during a particularly bad spell in which I experienced near constant aching in my jaw and horrible tension headaches. Having never had an acupuncture treatment before, I expected I’d have a few pins inserted my lower face and that the experience would be uncomfortable.
My experience with acupuncturist Harriett Hargreaves was surprising. My face was covered in pins, along with my legs and my hands. I also received a pin in the top of my head which felt strangely satisfying. Hargreaves specialises in treating TMJ, jaw tension stress and women’s health issues and the treatment definitely did the trick. My jaw pain was gone for at least a couple of weeks.
Read more: What is an acupressure mat and can it help with back pain?
“The growing popularity [of acupuncture] is super interesting.” Hargreaves says. “I do wonder if a huge contributing factor to this is simply that waiting times for treatment on the NHS have got so long – people are really desperate for relief.”
“I think there has been a sea change in the culture and we are recognising the importance of actively participating in finding solutions for our health challenges. We don't want to be taking medication indefinitely. This is driving people who previously might have been a bit skeptical about ‘alternative medicine’ to come to these practices with more of an open mind.”
My mind was certainly opened after my initial experience, but I’m already convinced of the benefits of blending alternative modalities with more traditional approaches so I didn’t expect to be disappointed by acupuncture.
“Western and eastern medicine work beautifully together but it's important to make sure you are safe and supported by all of your care givers,” says Hargreaves, who recommends taking care when seeking out an acupuncturist. “I would personally always go for a recommendation of mouth. Of course you can search via the regulatory bodies such as BAF and AA, but I don’t think there is anything better than having a practitioner recommended.”
A recommendation was what finally had me checking into a London clinic for masseter Botox. I’d resisted Botox for many years because too much can result in the degeneration of muscles. If you suspend a muscle, you naturally lose volume and though many people view this as a bonus outcome of Botox in the jaw muscles because it slims the face, I didn’t want to become dependent on a treatment that could result in weakened atrophied facial muscles. Of course, you’d need a lot of Botox over many years for this to be a likely outcome, but nonetheless, it was a concern for me.
This was until I met a woman who also struggled with TMJ symptoms who told me that masseter Botox had eradicated her jaw pain and changed her life. I decided to try one round of injections to see whether the treatment could be a holy grail for me too. I visited Ardour Clinic, specifically to see founders Dr Paris Acharya and Anna Miller. The pair create bespoke treatment programmes tailored to treat the symptoms and root causes of stress
“Stress tends to play a part for most people,” says Dr Paris Acharya, co-founder of Ardour, discussing the causes of TMJ. “Wherever there’s inflammation in the body there are trigger points – we get headaches, jaw pain, shoulder pain. So we look at those trigger points and think about management. It's about identifying what things we need to put in place to make us more comfortable and working on that over time.”
“That might be injections, it might be regular facials to give you time to just disconnect, time to meditate and really evaluate things. It might be coaching sessions and looking at what therapies can bring down your cortisol levels to get you out of that deep stress state,” explains Dr Acharya.
In my case, masseter Botox was paired with a coaching session with Miller – which did wonders for my self esteem – and a facial, which was a nice treat and gave me a lovely glow that propped up my ego for a day or so. The Botox itself seemed to lessen the TMJ symptoms, making them less irritating in general. Unlike the acupuncture and massage which prevented the symptoms entirely for a week or more, masseter Botox reduced the pain and the tension in my jaw, but it wasn’t gone completely. On this basis I can say that it worked, but it wasn’t the be all and end all.
Largely, the only way to fix TMJ is to repair injuries and misalignments and reduce stress levels but I can safely say that many of the treatments and lifestyle changes I’ve tried have helped. There’s no magic bullet when it comes to health, and stress reduction is still one of the best ways to reduce inflammation in the body – as a wellness editor, I know this only too well. But on the whole, my crunchy jaw is less crunchy, and that’s all thanks to my discoveries, the experts I’ve turned to and the small changes I’ve made.
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