Yesterday I went to the TMJ doctor. My dentist didn’t really care when I told them about my jaw, and my orthodontist thought I was being overly sensitive when I said my gums(not many teeth left infact very few)ahahaha didn’t feel like they met the same way anymore(TAK SAMA MACAM TIME DATING2 DOLU2). So the pain and cracking sound has been bugging me for the past 3months and finally gathered enough courage to go see a specialist. I got a recommendation for one from my doctor friend and I made an appointment.
They’d sent me a a stack of papers to fill out about my history and any past treatment and all the xrays, scans and semua yang ada lah, so I handed those in when I first got to the office. I also had records from my doktor gigi sent there ahead of time. Then the doctor took a few minutes to look over everything before I went into his office to meet with him. We basically went over everything I’d written out, and he kind of restated things in his own notes. He also looked at the x-rays sent by my duktur gigi. (While he was looking, he was like, “Oh, you got your wisdom teeth removed?” and I was like, “Um, no, I don’t have wisdom teeth.” it was removed when i munch on jagung many moons ago hehehehehe
Then we moved into the examining room, where he looked at every tooth did not take long as there were only 6 left hahahaha and made comments on it while his assistant wrote everything down. Then he took some measurements with a very tiny ruler. The jaw is one of the most complex joints of the body, because it can move up and down,(like when you are doing rock and roll) to the tune of Elvis songs heheehehe, left to right, and forward and back. He measured my jaw doing each of these movements, to see how far it went in each direction. He also noted at approximately how many milimeters it would make a popping sound. (Only the left side pops, but it pops loud! Both he and the assistant were commenting on it, like, “Wow, I heard that one!”) He also noticed something that I’ve kind of felt and suspected for a long time, but no one has picked up on – when I open my mouth, my lower jaw kind of swerves to the right after the left joint pops. When he went to measure the forward/backward motion of my jaw, there was no popping noise. That was odd. It turns out, I was unconsiously swerving my jaw to the right while doing that move, too ni semua belajar tango from Lee lah tu. When he held my jaw so it couldn’t move to the right, it made a loud pop as it moved forward.adoi sakit nya,ni nak mula manjah lah ni mana dia INA yang ada cuma nurse nak pegang tangan takut nanti nurse kepak,nah tak sakit jaw sakit lain pulak... hehehehe
He did all the measurements again, to see how far I could close my mouth and everything, while wearing those. He also tried to slip a piece of paper out from between my back teeth. A thicker piece of paper could be held between my teeth, but he was able to slip out the thinner paper. After all the measurements, he felt around different areas of my face, neck, and shoulders to see if there was any pain.rasa macam dia ni er suka aje buat cam ni jangan2 ah tak lah my imagination kut hehehehe. There really wasn’t much sakit(except for the pain of him pressing my face).Ingat nak tombok tadi as my grandson would say,and i nearly laugh out loud when the the thoughts of HAVE YOU BRUSHED YOUR TEETH THE TEACHER ASKED AND THE ANSWER YES TEACHER I HAVE BRUSHED YOUR TEETH,ADOI KENA CONTROL HAHAHAHAHAHA
The doctor left the room, and came back with a chunk of hot wax that had been formed into a vaguely retainer shape. He put the wax into my mouth and had me bite down eeeyak tak sedap langsung, and positioned my jaw in a certain way, to make an impression. Then he ran some cold water over the wax to harden it. He put the wax back into my mouth lagi rasa eeeyak yak yucky, and with my jaw in that position, I opened and closed my mouth. There was almost no click!! In maybe five times of opening and closing, there was a very slight click twice. It was amazing!Wah dah cure lah ni ithought to myself,senang aje i think i can open TMJ kelinik kut,heheheheheh
Because he was able to get that paper stuck between my teeth, he said I was really able to clench my jaw at night. What he wants to do is put an additional piece on my upper gums that will keep my mouth further open. This is something called (TIN)apa it means i tak kuasa tanya by then dah penat. The theory behind this is that the usual mouthpiece people get to treat nighttime tooth/gum grinding (the kind that covers all your upper teeth/gum like a sport guard) may also increase the intensity of jaw clenching. The system is a piece about the diameter of a pencil, which goes between your upper and lower front teeth ER GUMS LAH TU. If you bite on this, your teeth ER GUMS OK OK TERLUPA PLAK don’t have high intensity contact, and your muscles contract only slightly. The doctor used the wax mold to figure out exactly how many milimeters he wanted to add in thicknes.Now the thought of bolih aku makan durian tak jap lagi ahahahaha came into my mind.
Finally, they did two types of therapy on me. I didn’t really enjoy either, couldn’t feel anything while it was happening, and don’t feel any difference now that it’s after 7 hours.. The first was ultrasound therapy. The assistant used an ultrasound thingy to rub cold gel all over both sides of my face for five minutes each. While the assitant was doing this, the doctor left the room to get me this thing called a Terbite my term lah tu hehehehehe. It’s a U-shaped piece of rubber that goes between my upper and lower teeth er gums lah tu. For five minutes at a time (he said definitely before bed, and maybe another time, like driving to or from work), I’m supposed to clench and relax with this in my mouth. The theory is that it will tire out the muscles (so they don’t clench as much on their own), but no real damage will be done because there is this rubber layer between my er gums /teeth sikit sangat. Then the second therapy they did was Diadahmy my term lah tu, which is basically a sound wave therapy. It was only done on the left side of my head eh dia ingat i sakit otak kut ahahahaha. The doctor and I both wore ear plugs, and he held this gun-like thingy to the side of my head. It made a really loud noise, and something about the sound waves was supposed to be good for my jaw. He had me wear the Terbite thingy and clench and release while he was doing this, and the thing was held right next to my ear adoi bising betui kuat lah juga the bunyi macam keretapi nya whistle and clanging. He also gave me my ear plugs back at the end, which I assume means I’m supposed to bring them back next time in case he does Diadahmy again.
When I was all done, the doctor and I went out to the front desk together. He said my next appointment should be for an hour and fiften minutes, and he wants it to be in a week, no more than two weeks. Well, I don’t know if that’s going to happen. Also, this doctor doesn’t do anything with insurance. I have to pay them up front, and then they just give me a form that I can send to my insurance to be reimbursed. I’d been told that the cost of the consultation would be about RM600, which was true, but… then they added the Terbite and Diadahmy and the ultrasound, and it came out to more like rm900. Ugh. (Which I may or may not even be reimbursed for!) They also gave me a form with the costs of everything they plan to do at the next visit. I was looking over it, and it didn’t look so bad, probably about RM600 again… Then I looked again. IN SMALL LETTERS near the edge of the page was an 8cm=.RM1800! If my insurance isn’t going to cover this, I don’t know about going back there for a RM1800 centimeter of plastic, you know?
So, overall, it went really well. The doctor noticed things that others had missed, and didn’t think I was crazy in the least. In fact, I thought I had a pretty minor case, but out of four options for the severity of the patient’s condition – not bad,pertengahan, terover, and banyak susah – he has categorized me as manjah ahahahaha new category included after my visit adoi kata nurse tu lah bukan duktor dia kata banyak susah lah hehehehehe. He was friendly (so were the rest of his staff!) and thorough, and although his office is a pain to get out of at rush hour, it’s relatively easy for me to get to, even from work dekat rumah and opis. So… we’ll see. We’ll see what my insurance company says, we’ll see if anything is covered (or goes towards my deductible, more likely), and we’ll see if I go back. I guess I would like to CUBA2 TRY2 lah kalau ada improvement why not,nah tu dia cerita kat doktor tadi.ALL IN ALL INSYAALLAH SEMUA OK.THANKS ALL FOR THE DOA AND PRAYERS.
moral of the story look after your teeth if ada teeth tak dak TMJ,my friend SWEET MARIE and LEE TORONTO no problem gigi best punya ahahahaha take care all.
NOTE:TMJ IS SHORT FOR temporomandibular joint
My version :TMJ IS Temporomenmandibulatjoint this one for OWC/KJHI/MLC members.
