1/20/12
what do others do.....
I have been having problems when my pain has just been spiking from a 4 to an 8/9 lately. Not predictably either. and When it does this I am not prepared. When my pain first started I did a lot of grinding my teeth. I ended up chipping one tooth and cracking another which had to be capped. It was only partially successful. I still have to be very, very careful with it now as it is very fragile and still hurts; often on nights that I am in a lot of pain I wake up to a VERY tender tooth. My dentist has wanted me to get a bite guard and I will as soon as we can afford it. Which will have to be soon if these pain flares keep happening. I haven’t had this for a long time.

Anyways my question is related to all this. Now when I am at the 9/10/11 layers of pain i find that I am, in lieu, of clenching my teeth, I am biting my inner lip! To the point of biting off tiny pieces...oh its horrid......

I can't stand this - but in-the-moment of that severe pain I relish the feeling of the pain of biting myself versus the pain of my arms being crushed and ground around.

Does any one else do this? How do you regulate it? I feel like a person who hurts them self on purpose - but I am sincerely just semi-cognizant of what I am doing. I don’t want to make this a habit. I stopped the teeth grinding, but now this lip chewing has popped up. I am not able to stop and calm myself down with meditation, because it jumps so quickly. I take my pain meds when it happens but they take 40-60 mins to work, and it is during this time that I put holes in my inner lip. Uh, is ther any alternative to this? Have other people done this when thier pain gets bad? Thanks