A. How To Stop Grinding Your Teeth At Night Naturally
Like many of you, I grind my teeth at night and unfortunately this is a problem I have been dealing with for quite some time. If you clench your fists or twist your neck, these are signs that you are likely to react to stress with tension. Teeth grinding can be something you also experience as a result of it.
1. The solution that dentists recommend
Teeth grinding is not only uncomfortable, it’s a habit that has resulted in high dental bills. My dentist recommends wearing a mouthguard, but I hate it. For those who have used it, it’s uncomfortable and makes a drooling mess. I notice it more when I wake up in the middle of the night.
2. How did I get to the bottom of the problem?
To save the mouthguard and as someone who also suffers from sleep issues, I turned to natural remedies to help me relax as most teeth grinding is stress related. With this direct correlation, the more comfortable I felt before bed, the better I slept at night. Before I share what works for me, I would like to state that you should continue to wear a face mask until you learn to relax and calm down before bed.
3. Natural remedies to help stop teeth grinding
- Turmeric Milk: Tryptophan is an amino acid in milk that helps the nervous system relax, while turmeric acts as an analgesic to relieve jaw pain and headaches.
- Magnesium: You can take it in pill form or take it in a bath with Epsom salts, which helps bind serotonin in your brain to help you relax and reduce stress.
- Hot Baths: If you’re not a fan of baths, you can soak a towel in warm water. Warm water helps relax your jaw, so a shower before bed can help immensely.
- Essential Oils: Spritz some on your pillow. I personally love using pre-mades. Spray onto a piece of wool or silk and place in your pillowcase for maximum effect.
- Muscle Massage Balm: My tension zone is usually in the neck, so applying some balm will help the muscles in that area relax and prevent teeth grinding. The smell helps too.
4. How your senses solve your problems
It never ceases to amaze me how often essential oils come up as research-backed solutions for relaxation. I’ve always believed in the power of the senses and it’s more evident than ever after trying these natural remedies. Reducing stress has not only gotten to the root of my problem, but it has also stopped grinding my teeth and given me the restful sleep I need to be successful in my daily life.
B. How To Stop Grinding Teeth At Night Without A Night Guard?
Teeth grinding is also known as bruxism. It is a very common sleep disorder that causes people to grind their teeth at night and are usually unaware of it.
It is very harmful to general health as it:
- Drop your teeth
- Disrupts tooth enamel
This necessitates the need for serious dental work such as crowns, bridges, root canal implants or dentures. If it gets worse, it can change the appearance of the face or cause temporomandibular joint dysfunction (TMJ). Therefore, it is very important to get the right treatment before it’s too late. Visit a specialist dentist in your area to get the most suitable option for your problem.
1. Top ways to quit grinding without a mouthguard
To treat bruxism, you should first find out the cause of it. Talk to your doctor or sleep specialist if you’re suffering from depression, anxiety, stress, or a misaligned jaw. Finding out the reason for your grinding will make it easier to choose the right option. Mouthguards or night protection are also very useful. Your doctor can give you a custom rubber or plastic night watch that will protect your pearl from damage.
2. Treat stress and anxiety
Ranger is more common in young children and less common in older adults, according to the American Academy of Oral Medicine. Stress and anxiety play a key role in bruxism, according to a study by the Finnish Dental Institute, and nearly 70% of bruxism is due to stress. So if the bruxism habit is due to underlying stress and anxiety, you can count on the help of psychological treatments like cognitive behavioral therapy. It’s talk therapy that explores your inner thoughts and feelings and helps you build healthier habits. It has the potential to manage stress, break unwanted habits, and relieve stress. To relieve stress, you can also sleep well at night. You can even take deep breaths, do yoga, massage and read, listen to your favorite music and shower before bed.
3. Break your habit
You can try habit reversal techniques to break your grinding habits. Habit reversal techniques are used by specially trained therapists. Once you’re aware of how often you’re grinding, it’s easier to break the habit. Whenever you notice a creaking sound during the day, stick your tongue between your jaws. This will relax your jaw and eventually reduce your habit.
4. Treatment and prevention of dental problems
To prevent dental problems, regular dental check-ups are important to prevent further damage. If your grinding is due to a misaligned, cracked, crooked, or missing tooth, it can be corrected with crowns or overlays. These treatments help reshape the chewing surface so you can stop chewing.
5. Get self-help
There are some things you can do yourself to treat your condition, such as:
- Avoid consumption of alcohol, tobacco, smoking and caffeine.
- Avoid chewing gum or chewing sticks, pencils, nails, or other hard objects.
- Avoid eating foods that require a lot of chewing, such as nuts.
- If you notice creaking noises at night, stop immediately.
6. Try to play
It is a therapeutic method of psychological acupressure and is considered an emotional release technique. According to research, it has been found to help treat post-traumatic stress disorder, so it will help with stress-related disorders.
7. Use acupuncture
This technique can help treat bruxism, according to the American Physical Therapy Association.
8. Physiotherapy
According to the American Academy of Craniomandibular Disorders and the Minnesota Dental Association, physical therapy can help treat temporomandibular joint disease (TMD). It can reduce inflammation, relieve pain and restore oral function. Grinding is also very common in children and can cause problems like headaches, TMD, jaw pain, wear and tear. Make an urgent appointment with a doctor if they complain of jaw pain or tenderness.
C. How To Stop Grinding Your Teeth At Night Naturally: 10 Remedies
Teeth grinding, or bruxism, a relatively under-discussed condition affecting about one in ten adults, shouldn’t be ignored, even though many people don’t even know they have it.
1. What is nighttime teeth grinding or sleep bruxism?
Teeth grinding is a common involuntary response to stress, anxiety, or anger and can occur while awake or asleep, but tends to be much less audible during sleep. This is mainly because many people are unaware that they are doing it. However, not recognizing bruxism can have serious consequences. Because people don’t feel the force of their bite while they sleep, the force exerted when the mouth is squeezed tightly can cause serious problems to both the teeth and jaw. In fact, studies have shown that up to 250 pounds of force can be applied during episodes of sleep bruxism — or nighttime teeth grinding — but many people often don’t realize the effects of their actions until it’s too late.
2. How common is nighttime teeth grinding?
Because many people are unaware that they grind their teeth in their sleep, statistics on sleep bruxism are often difficult to ascertain. But that didn’t stop us. Studies estimate that the problem is most common in childhood, with anywhere from 6% to almost 50% of children experiencing some level of nighttime teeth grinding. This is widely believed to be due to the process of teething as a child, with the overall process taking anywhere from 17 to 25 years to develop a full set of adult teeth from birth.
3. What is causing this?
Although there is usually no specific cause for nighttime teeth grinding, the condition is usually associated with feelings of stress and anxiety. The hypothesis is that when we’re stressed, we build up a large amount of tension in our bodies throughout the day, and people with sleep bruxism tend to relieve that tension by grinding their teeth during sleep. .
Teeth grinding can also be caused by a variety of existing sleep problems and disorders. For example, several studies in recent years have linked conditions such as obstructive sleep apnea, sleep paralysis, Parkinson’s disease, epilepsy, and ADHD to sleep bruxism. Certain medications are also often associated with teeth grinding. This includes legal drugs such as antidepressants, alcohol, nicotine and caffeine, and illegal drugs such as ecstasy and cocaine.
4. What are the consequences of teeth grinding?
If left untreated for an extended period of time, teeth grinding can cause significant damage to teeth, making them feel incredibly painful or even eroding them over time. Additionally, for people with fillings, dental crowns, or implants, these can become damaged over time, leading to a potentially expensive – and quite painful – problem to fix.
One of the most well-known consequences of teeth grinding sometimes doesn’t even affect humans themselves. Much like the sound of nails on a blackboard or a baby crying, teeth grinding makes one of those sounds that resonates with many people — and that includes partners.
5. 10 natural remedies to help stop nighttime teeth grinding
The first step in treating sleep bruxism is recognizing that you actually have it, but that can be a lot easier said than done. So if you’re not sure, you can ask your partner to monitor you while you sleep, wear a sleep tracker, or see a dentist/doctor for a sure diagnosis.
So if you know that you definitely have sleep bruxism, trying some of the home remedies below can help treat the problem and stop you from grinding your teeth in your sleep as naturally as possible before it becomes a bigger problem :
a. Watch what you eat
What you eat as part of your diet can make a world of difference when dealing with sleep bruxism. Hard foods like nuts, popcorn, and lots of candy should be avoided at all costs, while special care should also be taken with sticky and difficult-to-chew foods like peanut butter. However, magnesium-rich foods like green leafy vegetables, yogurt, and brown rice should be favored for their ability to reduce inflammation while you sleep.
b. Drink warm milk
Drinking warm milk with turmeric can do a lot to naturally overcome sleep problems associated with nighttime teeth grinding. This is largely due to the action of tryptophan, a milk-based amino acid that relaxes nerves, combined with the power of turmeric, a spice known for its ability to reduce inflammation and pain in the body.
c. Avoid alcohol and caffeine
As previously mentioned, any beverage that contains caffeine or alcohol should be avoided when trying to overcome sleep bruxism. This is due to the effect of these substances on disrupting sleep patterns, causing the jaw muscles to become hyperactive and teeth grinding.
d. Include essential oils and aromatherapy
Essential oils can be your best friends when trying to reduce stress — the number one cause of sleep bruxism. Herbs such as lavender, cedar, bergamot, and chamomile have been shown to have particularly calming effects on the brain and are commonly used in a variety of aromatherapy-based techniques. So it can be a good investment to get an oil diffuser to naturally treat your nighttime teeth grinding.
e. Massage your jaw with lavender oil
Massaging a few drops of lavender oil into the bottom of your jaw before bed can help release tension you may have unconsciously built up in your mouth throughout the day. Additionally, the repetitive circular motion will encourage your mouth to open, allowing you to sleep in a naturally more relaxed state of mind.
f. Practice meditation
Numerous studies over the years have demonstrated the effects of mindfulness on mental health, with techniques such as meditation and breathing exercises being found to be particularly helpful in relieving feelings of stress and anxiety. Meditating to relaxing sounds like ocean waves, raindrops, or classic white noise has been shown to calm the autonomic nervous system, help slow breathing, lower heart rate, and improve sleep efficiency.
g. Get into yoga
While most types of exercise help relieve sleep bruxism in some way, yoga is particularly good at reducing the inflammatory symptoms associated with the condition. Practicing poses that focus on stretching the neck, jaw, and mouth areas, such as 24-hour eyes, camel, or bridge pose, can help relieve the pressure on your face Reduce and stop teeth squeaking more naturally at night.
h. Try the herbal tea
Because nighttime teeth grinding is made worse by nervousness and tension, drinking caffeine-free herbal teas — like green tea or chamomile tea — can be a great way to relax your mind and body and relieve pent-up feelings of stress. associated with the condition.
i. Use a hot compress
Regular use of a hot towel, compress, or heating pad has been shown to relax the muscles around the teeth, jaw, mouth, and neck. This, in turn, helps increase blood supply to those specific areas, improving circulation and—ultimately—reducing the potentially harmful effects of grinding your teeth while you sleep.
j. Invest in a bite guard
While the idea of wearing a bite guard might conjure up the image of a rugby player, these mouth guards are designed to significantly reduce tooth damage caused by teeth grinding. This is due to its ability to create a barrier between your upper and lower teeth and help cushion the effects of clenching your teeth while you sleep.
6. Which natural nighttime remedy for teeth grinding is right for you?
Finding the best natural remedy to treat teeth grinding usually requires a bit of trial and error. So it’s generally a good idea to try each type of treatment in isolation, keep a sleep diary to track the effects, and then figure out which remedies make the biggest difference in your life and sleep pattern.
