Hi. I'm new, although I've been reading lots of info here for the last few days, when it came up in the google search :-) after looking for some answers to the strange symptoms I just started to have.
Over two weeks ago I started to have teeth aches on my right side, which quickly turned into pretty strong pain, coming and going, mostly during the night. What was very strange - the pain could move between the teeth, or include both upper and lower teeth at the same time. It would come quickly and leave as quickly as it came. I thought that it must be my wisdom tooth, which is cracked for about a year or so, but has never given me any pain. After just two days, the pain increased significantly, and I was feeling like having root canal work being done without any anesthesia. Also, the pain started to reach toward my temple, and became a strong drilling and icing pain. Then toward my nose (or back of my sinus cavity?), jaw, gums. The teeth are still the worst, but the temple became very sensitive and I was really puzzled.
Then I found this site. :-) and :-(. Reading on TN1, I suddenly remembered that some time ago, maybe a month or so, I did have two electric like shocking, very short zig zagging pains coming from the front of my ear and going down my jaw. It was so painful, but so short, that I sort of froze not knowing what has happened.
I called my dentist today very reluctantly, because he has already told me few times before that I should think of taking my wisdom teeth out, since I am missing two of my bottom teeth, and the wisdom teeth have moved, are twisted, and the rest of the teeth are dislocated because of it. I just thought that if I lived like this for a long time, about 20 years, I can still live like this until I die. I also had a month or so, abut three years ago, when I had my teeth guard made due to tension and tmj problems. It wasn't severe, just tension in muscles. After hearing my story today, and me mentioning that it might be TN, my dentist was more convinced that it has to do with tmj problem. :-) He looked at my xrays which were done during last cleaning visit, and said that he doesn't see anything wrong with my teeth, but that my wisdom teeth should be taken out, since they might be the cause of it all. He also prescribed Prednison and Vicodin.
As of today my trigger points which I can recognize, just after one week of having this problem, is touching temple area, hot and cold food/drinks, eating in general, loud noise doesn't help and laying down and sleeping is almost impossible. I slept sitting up for the last few nights, as laying down would start another attack almost immediately. I do have some pain in between, but it is dull and insignificant in comparison to those 2-1o minutes flares. A week ago I thought my pain was level 7-8. Today I think that that that pain was about 5-6, because now it seems stronger, and comes back with a greater frequency.
I just took Vicodin, after thinking about it for 2 hours, and after having three attacks in two hours. That's how much I hate drugs. :-) But I need to sleep longer than 2-4 h tonight.
I admire so many people here who went and go through all this excruciating pain in life, and still are able to encourage others.
I still hope that maybe it's just my teeth going nuts :-( or my tmj is so flared that is radiates and pushes the blood vessels which are compressing my nerves, and that it will go away soon.
Thanks for reading.