New Here: Telling My Story

So, I've never done anything like this before but I thought I'd give it a try. This is my story and I'm sticking to it.

I'm 17. Young, right? Well I feel a lot older, like 35. About a year and a half ago, I noticed whenever I woke up and brushed my teeth I could hear a popping noise when I opened my mouth. Some time later, probably no more than a few months, my face would start to hurt whenever my jaw popped and soon enough I had constant headaches. I took some Aspirin and roughed my way through my junior year of high school.

Junior year was in my opinion, the hardest year a high school student goes through. I lived with the headaches and jaw pains thinking it was just stress. Well, I went to my regular dentist [I have an orthodontist because I did have braces for 10 months in 8th grade] and told him of my pains. He got to thinking and told me I might have TMJ.

Honestly, I had never heard of it before then so he told me anything and everything about it. As it turns out, looking at my back teeth [12yr molars, etc] I grind my teeth severely at night. At first he said not to worry about it, that I would be fine.

Fast forward by half a year. My mouth still hurts, and even more so than before. He made me a mouth guard. [The retainer I had from my braces I subconsciously spit out at night and broke over a period of less than three months] He did impressions and it took forever to make so in the end, he gave it to me for free. I took that home and wore it at night like he told me to. Three days pass. I wake up on day four, take out the guard and notice a huge crack that goes right down the center of the curve. I broke it in half.

So, my dentist says see such-and-such. He's an ENT and oral surgeon. That doctor didn't seem at all interested in me and gave me a prescription for an anti-inflammatory and 6-8 weeks of physical therapy. I hate taking pills but did it anyway and it helped, just not in the long run. At the beginning it gave me short term relief for a few hours then slowly but surely it didn't seem to do anything at all. The therapy helped, though. Three days a week of working my jaw with therapists I did not like.

Well here I am, a year later and in so much pain I cannot eat. Last Friday I saw my regular dentist for a routine check-up/cleaning. They said I had three or more cavities! The nurse was in my mouth no more than ten minutes and my jaw hurt so bad I had tears in my eyes. She called the doctor and he said to see my ENT. My wisdom teeth are coming in and there is absolutely zero room in my mouth for them to come in. If I feel in the back of my mouth I can feel them trying to surface. They both said to have my wisdom teeth removed. Well the ENT is an oral surgeon but won't pull teeth so I have to find yet another doctor...

So, the ENT gave me two prescriptions: one for an antibiotic [apparently where my molars are coming in there's a chance there could be an infection?] that's a horse pill. I have to take two a day for 7-10 days. The other is for pain; an anti-inflammatory that puts me to sleep in a half hour flat which I can't take during school even though that's the time I have the most pain. He also said that I have to come back in 2 weeks if I don't feel better and he'll give me a shot at the site of pain. I'm not sure what the shot is for, he didn't specify and I didn't want to think of it at the time. I'm going to call him tomorrow and ask about it. I've never been afraid of needles until now.

I'm so stressed with college next year and working and home and now this! If you've actually read everything I just typed, thank you. Thank you so very much. I feel like no one even cares! My mom just says to take the pills and then walks away. My dad ignores me altogether and my sister doesn't know what's going on. Even my friends are getting annoyed with me always saying my jaw hurts that they too ignore me. The only person who cares is my best friend. I just need someone who can relate, I don't know anyone else that knows what this is like...

Thanks,
Miranda