An end to my pain

Many of you know of an incident that happened to me over a year ago that caused me to have lasting TMJ disorder.
Since that "incident" I have had tremendous amounts of pain in my face and jaw. I have seen two Specialist Doctors on TMJ but all they seemed to want to do was put me on drugs and in a night splint and hope that my TMJ would heal itself.

In the end though, I was only dependent on prescription drugs to be in LESS pain in my face and jaw, than with out the drugs. I wasn't healed or even close to it, these treatments were doing nothing for me. I was at my wits end with this pain and suffering and did not know who or where else to go to help me feel better.

A few months back my Mom called and told me that her Dr. (Dentist) that she works for had his Chiropractor come to the office and talk about TMJ disorders and how chiropractics can help. She shared a little of what he said but didn't remember a whole lot, just that "K should try this."

I thought about it for several weeks and decided to start researching Chiropractors in the area that dealt a lot with TMJ patients or had some experience working with TMJ patience. I found several, but none of them were close to us, they were 30 minutes on the other side of town.

I talked to C about my Mom's idea and told him I would give it a try. I told him I had no luck finding a near by Chiropractor that had dealt with TMJ cases. One day C was going out for a ride and took a wrong exit off the highway and saw a Chiropractor office next to an oral surgeons office. So he came home and told me about where it was located (a lot closer than the others) and said I should look into that one.

I looked them up and saw he worked with TMJ patience. I liked that he was located a lot closer to us, and so I decided to go in and check it out.

I think Chiropractics is great. I always have, but it's not for me or so I would tell myself. OK so I HATE them :) I don't love getting my back popped, at all. In fact I avoid it at all costs. I remember my Dad popping my back when I would feel injured during gymnastics, I never loved it but thought maybe it would help. I HATE getting my neck popped. I don't even like people touching my neck. I only let people I love and trust give me neck massages etc. other wise, NO TOUCHY! So the thought of me going to a chiropractor kind of scared me a little but I was desperate to be out of pain.

With in that week of looking into a chiropractor I had my free consultation and decided to just go for it. We don't have chiropractics covered on our health insurance but decided to pay out of pocket, it was worth it to me, I just wanted to feel better.

After the consultation I went in to review my x-rays and find out just how bad my back was. I knew it was bad. I suffered many years of torture that gymnastics does to your body, I knew it was going to be bad. I found out my neck is straight (it shouldn't be, it should have a 40 degree curve in it) I found out I had a slight case of scoliosis in my mid back and that my hips/lower spine were off balance. Sadly these are all things I knew (except for the neck thing) but did nothing about for years.

It's like people who don't go to the Dentist for years, for me it's the chiropractor. They know they have to go, they know they have pain in their teeth/mouth but they avoid it because they hate the Dentist. When they finally break down and go because they are in so much pain, they find out just how bad it got. Well that is me, with my back. Years of neglect and abuse and that is what you get, my bad back. It is a wonder why I survived two pregnancies with a back like mine.

The Doc and I laid out a treatment plan for me:

3 days a week for 4 weeks
Then 2 days a week for 6 weeks
Then 1 day a week for 6 weeks

This is a long process (6 months) and a lot of visits to the office but it gives the body time to adjust and to heal itself.

I was actually really skeptical if this would even help my jaw at all. To my surprise after just two weeks of going three days a week, my face hurt a LOT less. I started weaning myself off of my meds right away. After less than three weeks I was medication free and pain free! I was healed, I felt better, a lot better. I was surprised to say the least, that this actually worked.

I am so glad my Mom told me about this option and I'm glad I gave it a shot. I feel so much better. I have been going for, coming up on my 5th week and though I feel like I am there a lot I know it is so worth it to me. I cannot tell you how good it feels to be pain free. I have had daily pain in my face for over a year and it feels good to have little to none!

So for those of you skeptics of chiropractics, it may help you, it has helped me SO much. A warning to you though, Chiropractors are weird. They are wonderful but a little weird if I do say so myself. I don't really care though about his weirdness, he is the only person who has helped get me out of pain and weird or not, I am thankful to him for that.