When chewing hurts so much you've switched to soft foods

What follows combines several people's visits into one reconstructed account. It is not any one person's story, and anything that could identify someone has been removed.

How do people describe it when they come in?

They say their jaw hurts sharply when they open their mouth or chew, so they've started avoiding tough foods and eating only soft ones. Mealtimes have become a burden.

Many come to us after trying several other places. They say treatments to relax the muscles eased the stiffness for a while, but the pain when chewing stayed the same.

⚠️ Are there cases where a dental check comes first?

Yes. If it hurts only when you bite on one particular tooth, your gums are swollen, or cold things make your teeth ache, have your teeth and gums checked first.

It's hard for patients to tell jaw joint pain from tooth pain. We also rule out that possibility first.

What do we look at?

We press around the jaw to find which spots hurt, and check whether the jaw shifts to one side when you open your mouth. We also check the upper part of the neck.

We often don't see it as a jaw-only problem. If the upper part of the neck is twisted to one side, extra force keeps landing on the jaw.

How do we treat it?

We treat the jaw and neck together. We use pharmacopuncture (herbal acupuncture) on tissue that has been stretched by repeated inflammation, and loosen the neck and shoulder muscles that hold the jaw, to widen how far it can open.

If we adjust only the jaw and leave the neck, it won't last more than a few days. The same goes for loosening only the neck and leaving the jaw. So we work on both on the same day.

How do we judge progress?

Rather than a pain score, we go by what you've become able to eat. Each visit, we ask what foods you can now eat that you couldn't last time.

There's a reason for this. How much it hurts shifts with your mood and tiredness that day, but "What did you chew yesterday?" doesn't shift.

We won't tell you it's improved by some percentage. That's not something we can measure that way.

What are the limits of this approach?

If the inside of the joint is already badly worn, or the disc in the joint is severely out of place, how much function can come back is limited.

One more thing: we don't tell you in advance how far you'll get in how many sessions. If after a few visits the foods you can eat haven't increased, we recommend other tests.

If you have the same symptoms

1. If one tooth hurts or your gums are swollen, a dental check comes first.
2. We look at the jaw and upper neck together on the same day — doing only one won't last more than a few days.
3. We judge progress by "what you've become able to eat."
4. Pain levels shift with how you feel that day, but the foods you chewed don't.
5. We won't tell you it's improved by some percentage.

We look at the neck, jaw and back together. Only by finding where it started can we keep the same spot from stiffening up again and again.

If the same spot keeps stiffening, or the tension starts in your neck and climbs up to your head, come in and get measured. It doesn't take long to find where it started.

How much function comes back differs from person to person, depending on the condition of the joint.