It's not always TMS - the story of a tooth

You all know that we have a caveat at the bottom of every page to have concerns checked out by health professionals "to rule out anything serious" before assuming it's TMS. Dental concerns are high on the list of issues that people have checked out - over and over again, in many cases. My old (retired) dentist was totally on board with the TMS concept, as is my new one - and I suspect that many dentists believe in the connection because they see SO many mysterious dental issues in their highly-sensitive patients. They experience the truth of TMS just as Dr. Sarno did.

But anyways... a little more than a year ago, just as I found out that I needed to find a new dentist (the location of my guy's successor was super inconvenient) I started having bite pain in a lower molar. I eat a LOT of whole foods and grains, and the pain happened with those. I assumed it was TMS, but it was consistent, and did not subside, so after several weeks I found a new dentist who squeezed me in for a quick appointment and Xrays - and found nothing. The pain was reproducible with a bite test. The tooth had an older crown on it, which she said was made with a super-hard porcelain that was popular at some point in the past, but was abandoned by the profession because it caused problems - although typically the problems were in the tooth opposite the crown. Anyway, she did the carbon paper thing and figured she could adjust my bite a bit, and I went on my way. I remember us both agreeing that "Tooth pain is WEIRD".

The adjustment seemed to help, but the pain never really went away - and I figured it was going to be one of those TMS symptoms that was annoying, but not harmful, and that it would disappear eventually without me noticing.

Unfortunately, by the time I went in for my second cleaning with this new dentist at the end of 2023, I had to tell her that the pain was still there, still only upon biting, and it was maybe a teensy bit worse than eight months prior. Another Xray showed nothing, but my exam revealed that the upper tooth opposite had an old crown that was failing (see above, about the hard porcelain issue!) We decided to do the new crown then wait and see. There was no improvement, so in a followup she spent a LONG time on the bite, having me sit up in between each grinding to do the carbon paper thing in a position simulating how I would sit while eating, rather than reclining. Up and down and up and down multiple times in the big chair, so much fun. We were both confident that this time, the pain would resolve.

It did not. Since it only hurt upon biting, I was mostly chewing on the other side, and I was really working on giving it a rest, in order to calm down and think about the error of its ways, but there was no change, in fact it might have been worse but I really did not want to believe that, figuring it had to be TMS.

And then it happened - a month ago the old crown popped right off. At night, of course. I was enjoying one of those super-chewy ginger candies, and all of a sudden there was this strange hard thing loose in my mouth - holy crap it's the crown from that lower molar! VERY freaky. After calming myself down, I left a message for the dentist, and pondered what to do. I did not want an open nerve socket all night (eek!) so I figured I had to see if it would go back on. It was fully intact (have I mentioned the super-hard porcelain? ) so I carefully cleaned and sterilized it, brushed and rinsed my teeth really well, and popped it back on - and it was totally secure. So secure that I slept fine without any concern that it would fall out. They got me in the next afternoon, declared the crown to be in perfect shape (super-hard porcelain, baby!) fixed it up with the very latest cementing technology (blue light thingy?) and she said I could go home and eat or drink right away. Which I did, and.... the bite pain was gone. 100% instantly gone. Never to return.

By this time, it had been a year since the pain had first appeared, and now, a month later, I still sometimes anticipate pain, but there actually isn't any, and this too will pass.

So there ya go - an actual "It's not always TMS" dental story. Interesting, perhaps useful - who knows?

Fair warning: I will not answer any questions about the details of my experience, because every single situation is different and unique and my experience will not apply to you. You have to use common sense, trust your instincts, and apply TMS knowledge to the best of your ability. At no time did I experience pain that I considered alarming. My dentist could not find anything to be alarmed about, so I ended up tolerating a very minor amount of pain and I seriously did not worry about it. It was slightly annoying, but it wasn't something that I thought about except when I bit down on certain things. I only mentioned it to my dentist again after about eight months because I was already there for a regular checkup. All of this is definitely a function of my TMS management skills.

Even if you somehow had the exact same situation as me, your pain could end up being much worse because you've catastrophized yourself into a neuropathic expectation that something is horribly wrong. Which you can also do when there is really nothing going on, because dental pain, as my dentist said, is WEIRD.

PS: for some reason, threads about dental issues seem to attract spammers trying to post links, so if I get any of those, I'll shut this thread down.

 

AWESOME!

 

But don't forget, the candy provided the solution, perhaps sooner rather than later. Not only that, my dentist is so confident in her work (and technology) that she didn't even tell me to avoid it in the future. Go figure.