Pain in your face – you likely have a problem elsewhere…

Maybe you feel a ‘stabbing’ pain behind your eyes and it makes it hard to concentrate. The pressure on your sinuses is enough to make you think you are allergic to everything! The slightest touch to your cheeks leaves you reeling from the discomfort.

Most health care professionals know when you experience pain in your face, you likely have a problem elsewhere. The conclusion a lot of them don’t reach is your facial pain’s relationship to TMJ. (Temporomandibular Joint Disorder)

Your neck, head and face have nerves, muscles and joints that communicate with one another. If a nerve in your neck is pinched or aggravated, a signal can travel up that nerve and cause pain in your face. TMJ affects all the muscles, specifically your head, neck, face, shoulders and back. It makes perfect sense then, if you suffer from TMJ, you will feel the effects in your facial muscles.

Additionally, a “bad bite” – in which your upper and lower teeth do not come together in proper alignment – dislocates the placement of the jaw and the surrounding muscles. This imbalance in the bite-jaw-muscle relationship is what causes facial pain or pain behind the eyes.