Re: To Cammie - tongue thrust

[Guest guest]

To answer you directly, nope, I don't know about the various types of

tongue thrust gadgets. The ones I have seen photographs of are wired

into the upper brace, and I would imagine that they need to be there

24/7 to break this particular set of habits.

What you say makes sense to me, but I'm no doc.

You might ask YOUR docs whether a mild dose of amytriptaline (Elavil,

I think) would be helpful with the clenching. Taken in small doses,

it's a pretty gentle muscle relaxant, I think.

Best,

Cammie

> It's Cammie, yes.

>

> There are retainers, and there are special devices that help you

> train your tongue not to do what it's used to doing. The retainers

> are usually either Hawleys (plastic plates, with wires embedded;

the

> wires go around your teeth in the front and keep things in place)

or

> Essex, which are what I have. These latter are little acryllic

bits,

> made with heat and vacuum, by stretching a sheet of plastic over a

> mold of your teeth. And there's another kind, too -- the wire

that's

> bonded to the back side of your teeth, upper and or lower.

Virtually

> invisible, these latter two, but they keep reminding the teeth

where

> they need to be.

>

> As for the devices to discourage tongue thrust, they sound pretty

> awful to me -- a series of prongs or rigid loops to insist that the

> tongue not go where it's not sposed to. But I have known some folks

> for whom they work.

>

> C.

>

[Guest guest]

To answer you directly, nope, I don't know about the various types of

tongue thrust gadgets. The ones I have seen photographs of are wired

into the upper brace, and I would imagine that they need to be there

24/7 to break this particular set of habits.

What you say makes sense to me, but I'm no doc.

You might ask YOUR docs whether a mild dose of amytriptaline (Elavil,

I think) would be helpful with the clenching. Taken in small doses,

it's a pretty gentle muscle relaxant, I think.

Best,

Cammie

> It's Cammie, yes.

>

> There are retainers, and there are special devices that help you

> train your tongue not to do what it's used to doing. The retainers

> are usually either Hawleys (plastic plates, with wires embedded;

the

> wires go around your teeth in the front and keep things in place)

or

> Essex, which are what I have. These latter are little acryllic

bits,

> made with heat and vacuum, by stretching a sheet of plastic over a

> mold of your teeth. And there's another kind, too -- the wire

that's

> bonded to the back side of your teeth, upper and or lower.

Virtually

> invisible, these latter two, but they keep reminding the teeth

where

> they need to be.

>

> As for the devices to discourage tongue thrust, they sound pretty

> awful to me -- a series of prongs or rigid loops to insist that the

> tongue not go where it's not sposed to. But I have known some folks

> for whom they work.

>

> C.

>