We talked before about stretches for TMJ disorder and how they can provide you with pain relief. Today we’re going to go a bit further and give you a few exercise tips to help eliminate the pain in your jaw and other parts of your body.
Why should you start doing exercises for TMJ pain? Aside from the obvious explanation of alleviating the constant throbbing and discomfort you’re probably coping with on a daily basis, we hope to give you some advice that may alter your lifestyle from this point on. With that in mind, let us give you a few tips for the next time you’re exercising at home or at the gym. Lastly, we’ll examine Yoga and, when combined with other all-natural home remedies, how it can provide fantastic pain relief.
Let’s Get Physical, Physical …
So you’re at the gym, surrounded by mirrors and spray-on-tanned twenty-something-year-old fitness freaks that insist on grunting at the top of their lungs with each bench press. Hopefully you have your iPod with you to help block out this irritating world around you.
Let’s examine a few things to remember while you are exercising, for TMJ is sadly something you can’t just block out with music pulsing through your headphones:
- Don’t clench your jaw when you are lifting weights and doing exercises
- Make sure to keep your jaw relaxed and to focus on your breathing
- You’ll want to make sure your exercise regime is balanced. If you only work your chest muscles, you’ll pull yourself forward, thus creating bad posture, which increases TMJ irritation
- Help pull your muscles back in alignment by doing rowing and additional back exercises
- We’ve saved the best for last: once you are done sweating and stretching, spend a good 10 minutes in the sauna. It will relax your muscles, especially those in your jaw, after your workout.
What Exactly is the Lotus, Anyway?
Let’s say you don’t have enough time to make it to the gym (or you need a break from all the muscle heads). Yoga poses can prove to be great exercises for your temporomandibular joint disorder. Here’s a simple one you can start doing at home today:
- Position yourself in the Sukhasana (aka, the Easy Pose)
- Open your mouth and relax your jaw as much as you can without experiencing any pain
- Gently bend your neck and slowly tilt your head on your left shoulder. Now perform the exact same exercise on your right shoulder. Feels pretty awesome, doesn’t it?
- Continue to position your head in this manner from side to side for at least 5 minutes
Proper technique is critical when doing exercises for TMJ. Moreover, simple Yoga poses are fantastic home exercises that you can do in your free time to start attaining pain relief today. Give ‘em a shot and let us know what you think.
