A few months ago, this is how my conversation with Ms. M began in my clinic...
"So since when has your jaw pain been a concern for you?"... She promptly retorted back."Since my 23-year-old moved back in with us."
The relationship between stress and pain has been well research and published over the years. Stress overload can result in a compromised immune system and result in poor healing and recovery from injury. Stress also affects sleep quality which in turn also prevents speedy recovery from physical ailments. So, here is the analogy I used to explain this to Ms. M or for that matter to many of my patients in similar situations... Our present day stress response mechanism is an highly evolved version of its primitive past in our prehistoric ancestors... Our cave dwelling ancestors, when under stress, like while facing a grizzly bear in the wild, their stress response kicked in, their eyes dilated, ears perked up and their arms flexed to fight or flight from danger. This does not happen as a clearly thought out process, they do not think to themselves "Okay, so now I dilate both my eyes and flex the biceps and elevate my pulse rate!" No, this just happens. Just like that, today, when we face danger, our muscles tense up, flex and we tense and clench by reflex, this is our natural protective survival reflex. Thankfully our stressors are not usually as grave as the grizzly bear but they come pretty close to it... like the recent financial turmoil in our society, or like in Ms. M's case, the 23-year-old that moved back in!! The key is to not fight the stressor but learn and build skills to respond to stressors appropriately so as to not hurt ourselves in the process: to systematically learn to unclench and relax as and when stressors affect us. So, for Ms. M the treatment plan included stress management strategies along side pain management strategies. She even got a mouthguard for her symptoms...I know!.. mouth-guards! I'll talk about those in my upcoming post. Meanwhile, you may be interested in knowing during my recent follow-up with Ms. M she mentioned that her 23-year-old has found a job and is planning to move- to Afghanistan as he had enlisted for the Army- and she had thought that the move-in was stressful!! Anyways, so what makes you clench? Is it the rush our traffic? Is it the neighbor's dog that barked all night? Please share your thoughts and comments!!!
