Top 6 Natural Remedies for TMJ

Hey, guys. Dr. Josh Axe here. Welcome to Ancient Medicine Today. I'm here live, so excited to be here with you. So today's episode, I'm going to be covering 6 natural remedies to help you heal TMJ. And TMJ is a condition to where your jawbone starts to shift off more to one side.

Typically, you get clicking and this can actually lead to headaches, neck pain, and severe jaw pain, especially if it's not corrected over time. So on this video, I'm going to be going through the best diet, supplements, foods, essential oils, and natural treatments for healing TMJ and getting TMJ relief very, very fast.

And this is something I've actually worked with hundreds and hundreds of patients with over the years as practicing natural medicine and functional medicine here as well. And by the way, do me a favor right now, help me share this message.

There are millions of people, did you know this, there are millions of people right now Taking medications and just sort of, especially over-the-counter medications, trying to deal with chronic pain of TMJ, headaches, and neck pain, and they don't realize there's a very, very easy solution to fix.

So take a minute right now, punch your share button, click that share button, help me spread the word that food is medicine right now. Let's jump into treatment number 1, targeted exercises. Now, here is something I'm going to show you. This is one of the fastest, most effective long-term remedies. One of the biggest causes of TMJ can be from over-chewing on one side of your mouth.

So think about this. Notice this next time you're chewing food. If you are chewing something, do you chew on only the left side or only the right side of your mouth? There are many people who do not chew bilaterally. So here's what happens. They start chewing, let's say it's all the time on that left side of the mouth.

What happens is that masseter muscle right here, that big muscle in your jaw, starts getting really strong and tight and starting to pull to one side and the other side gets weak. So what you can do is this, go in a mirror and slowly open your jaw. Watch this for a second. Slowly open and close your jaw and see if your jaw shifts off to one side or another.

Let's say you're always chewing on that left side and that left side has become too strong and you know it. You start to see that jaw shift over the left side. What you're going to do is get a clothespin, okay? A clothespin. You're going to go to the open side and bite down on it. You're going to— not too hard, but just lightly bite down for 5 seconds, release, 5 seconds, release.

You're going to do that 5 times, 3 times a day. Many people do this while they're driving. They put a little clothespin in their car and do it while they're driving. That is actually going to be the biggest root— addressing the root cause and getting to the cure the fastest. Is figuring out why you are clenching down on one side more than another. Now, oftentimes it's chewing.

Another thing could be emotional stress. You're emotionally stressed so you're biting down. But I'm telling you, that targeted exercise with a clothespin is a remedy that doctors of chiropractic have been prescribing their patients for years. Now, number 2 here is posture.

Now, if you can start to get something called forward head posture— now, forward head posture, you should have a full curve in your neck. When your head starts to go forward like this from sitting at a desk all day, you know, nursing a newborn baby, carrying heavy things, these things over time can lead to poor posture.

When your neck moves forward, it puts pressure on the upper bone in your neck called the atlas bone. That in turn, that atlas is very connected to your jaw. It can actually cause your jaw to shift out of alignment and put damaging pressure there. So a few natural things for posture. Start doing exercises, especially things that open up your back and shoulders.

Getting some dumbbells and doing what are called reverse flies are good. Getting a cable or a band and doing rows are good. Also, anything where you're working your rear delts, your rhomboids, your back, pull-ups, things like that, opening up your chest, these exercises are going to be good as well.

The other thing is going to— going and getting work done by a chiropractor can also help improve your posture. They can actually adjust your jaw for TMJ. They can do specific adjustments to relieve stress in that back that can cause forward head posture. But improving your posture is key to getting rid of TMJ. Now, number 3 here is reducing emotional stress.

You know, for a lot of people, they tend to clench while they sleep. What I would recommend is take a healing bath at night. So here's what you're going to do, get a bunch of essential oils of lavender. I'd also get some peppermint, maybe some peppermint oil, rub it on your jaw, lavender and I would get Epsom salts, put it in a bath, soak in a bath before bed for 20 minutes, go to sleep.

I found in working with patients that greatly reduces emotional stress and tension and will reduce clenching or grinding of the jaw while you sleep. Now, sometimes people can get a mouthguard as well, can be beneficial, but to really get to the root cause, reducing emotional stress is big. Number 4, follow an anti-inflammatory diet. Now, here are some of the key nutrients you want to get.

In order to get rid of TMJ. You want to get lots of omega-3 fats in your diet, lots of enzymes, and lots of magnesium, okay? Those are the nutrients you want to look at. You might even take time right now and just search my name and the nutrient. Look up Dr. Axe magnesium food list, Dr. Axe omega-3 food list, and Dr. Axe enzyme-rich foods. And I have articles written on my website, draxe.com.

That goes specifically the top 10 foods in each and every one of those categories. So number 1, get more omega-3 fatty acids. You're going to find omega-3 fats in high levels in wild-caught fish such as salmon, mackerel, tuna, sardines. Most wild-caught fish is going to be high in omega-3 fats which reduce inflammation. Flaxseeds, chia seeds, hemp seeds, walnuts.

These are omega-3-rich foods that can naturally reduce inflammation. Also, I mentioned enzymes. Enzymes are found in high amounts in vegetables and fruits. So start eating more fruits and vegetables on a regular basis. And then also, I would say doing magnesium-rich foods. Dark chocolate is a magnesium-rich food. Pumpkin seeds are high in magnesium.

Certain types of red meat, spinach is very high, avocados. So go online, make sure you look up Dr. Axe magnesium. Magnesium-rich foods. You'll find my food list on there, but remember, get omega-3 fats, get enzymes, and get magnesium.

You might also consider taking a magnesium supplement, 500 milligrams a day, and an omega-3 supplement, 1,000 milligrams a day, to help you reduce inflammation and relieve that stress on that TMJ joint. Remember, magnesium is known as the relaxation mineral, so it can help relax. Yeah. A tight jaw.

Guys, if you're enjoying this live training right now, take a minute right now, help me spread the message because there are millions of people living with chronic pain in their neck, getting headaches and jaw pain due to TMJ. Take a minute right now, punch that share button, help me spread the message right now by sharing this info because there are millions of people, we can help them right now.

Number 5 here. Bone broth. You know, bone broth contains amino acids proline and glycine, as well as it contains chondroitin, glucosamine, and hyaluronic acid. Now listen, glucosamine, chondroitin, and hyaluronic acid—they can actually help lubricate and strengthen the connective tissue of your jaw. A lot of times, if you're a person with TMJ, do you ever feel like you have bone-on-bone pain?

Like there's this grinding happening in this area. Well, just like glucosamine and chondroitin and hyaluronic acid have been proven to help out with arthritis of the knee, carpal tunnel, pain in all of your joints. Well, listen, TMJ, TM stands for temporomandibular and then joint, it's the joint right there as well. So again, it's really helping heal that joint specifically.

Bone broth contains glucosamine. Chondroitin, and hyaluronic acid, all of which help you build healthy connective tissue and can actually relieve arthritic pain in your joints. So if you have TMJ, you absolutely want to start drinking bone broth every single day.

Now, you can buy bone broth frozen, you can make it yourself at home, or the most easy convenient way is going and buying a bone broth powder protein. So there's bone broth protein powder. Doing a scoop of that in a smoothie every single day is great for your body. And number 6, relieve pain the natural way.

One of my favorite ways of relieving— of natural pain relievers is using peppermint or wintergreen essential oil. You can make your own at-home muscle rub. In fact, I have a recipe for that on my website, draxe.com. If you just search or on Google search Dr. Axe muscle rub. I have a rub that includes— that's a mix of cayenne pepper and peppermint essential oil.

So have you ever heard of a product called Icy Hot? Well, Icy Hot gets things cool and warm that opens up arteries, which can actually help increase the circulation and the healing of an area. So peppermint oil with cayenne— peppermint oil is very cooling, cayenne pepper is very warming.

When you blend those 2 things together or peppermint oil with black pepper oil, those 2 together has tremendous benefits. So you can find my natural muscle rub online or just do peppermint oil with black pepper oil, mix those together with some coconut oil and do a 1-minute rub on that jaw. So really that jaw muscle right there, your masseter muscle, you simply get on there and massage that.

As well as your upper neck area, massage those 2 areas, can absolutely relieve TMJ pain there as well. Now, there are some other natural pain relievers internally. Turmeric or curcumin is very powerful, ginger, bromelain. So these herbs are naturally anti-inflammatory and great for reducing inflammation and getting you natural pain relief in the body.

But my biggest recommendation is taking All of these things together and I guarantee you're going to see phenomenal results in healing your TMJ heel.

Targeted exercise with the clothespin on the side of weakness, improving your posture with doing a standing desk is great, specific exercises to strengthen your back muscles as well as seeing a chiropractor, reduce stress, emotional stress, take that healing soaking bath at night.

Natural anti-inflammatory diet with magnesium, omega-3 fatty acids, and enzyme-rich foods, bone broth, and natural pain relievers such as peppermint oil mixed with cayenne pepper or black pepper essential oil. Mixing those together, giving yourself a self-treatment massage is great for helping heal TMJ.

And by the way, if you guys are enjoying and loving this live training, take a minute right now and press that share button. Help me spread the message. Hey, text this, email this, share this with someone you know and love who needs to know this information today.

And by the way, if you're not subscribed here, make sure you subscribe because I'm always doing live pop-ins and the latest videos on natural treatments, cutting-edge holistic health information. So make sure you subscribe here to our channel here as well. Guys, I hope you've enjoyed this live training video. This has been me, Dr. Josh Axe, talking.

About ancient medicine and natural remedies to help you heal TMJ fast.