This £20 buy helped me to stop grinding my teeth in my sleep
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Ever since I can remember I've been guilty of grinding my teeth.
When I shared a room with my sister, until the tender age of six, and then on countless family holidays afterwards, she would wail at me in the night: "Stop grinding your teeth," or announce loudly at the breakfast table, "I didn't sleep last night because Anya was grinding her teeth."
For years though, I wasn't really aware of it, because, as you've probably guessed, it happened at night, but as I got older it began to cause more problems.
I would wake up most days with a headache, caused by clenching my jaw together for hours on end as I slept, and my actual teeth started to grind down and become smaller and painful.
I'd always resisted the idea of a mouth guard, worried it would be uncomfortable or make me feel sick or, worse, that I'd somehow swallow it in the night (hello, anxiety, my old friend).
But a few months ago, my husband told me he had had enough. Not of my mess making, or the fact I left a trail of clothes between the wardrobe and the bathroom, but because I made an ear-twitching squeaking noise as I around my teeth at night.
So, rather than invest thousands in a mouth guard made to fit by a dentist, I spent £20 on a Time2Sleep Mouth Guard for Grinding Teeth, that came with four in the packet and had racked up over 7,000 reviews on Amazon.
People referred to them as "amazing" and "life-changing", and so, given that they arrived the next day with Prime and weren't bank-breaking, I took the plunge.
A night guard is basically a retainer. It fits in your mouth and prevents you from being able to grind your teeth together. The Time2Sleep version is fully mouldable to your jaw for a more comfortable fit and and has been medically approved too.
I won't lie, it felt weird for the first few nights, and I didn't enjoy the feeling of removing it in the morning, but, I must admit, I did enjoy the new-found feeling of freedom in my jaw.
Rather than waking with it feeling stiff and sore, it felt a lot more loose and free, and the headaches that I used to get around my jaw and running up toward my ears started to slowly dissolve.
It wasn't an overnight process and I helped it along its way with gentle jaw massage, but I'm getting better sleep, my teeth aren't painful anymore and my jaw has stopped clicking.
Plus, I notice that the absence of a tense feeling around my jaw makes me feel generally more relaxed.
For under £20, I think that's pretty impressive.
Buy it: Time2Sleep Mouth Guard for Grinding Teeth | £19.90 (Was £21.99) from Amazon
Find out more information on teeth grinding on the NHS website.
