Dr. Allyson Hurley's Blog

Counseling has finally helped me overcome my bulimia, and I’m glad for that… but my teeth have been ruined ! They are about half their healthy size, and in the front they no longer touch. They are also severely chipped because they’ve gotten so paper thin. My teeth also do not fit well where they do still touch. Also, the right side of my jaw protrudes out an inch every time I open my mouth to bite or chew. I’m pretty sure this is causing severe headaches for me on top of everything else.

I’d like to see a cosmetic dentist to improve my smile and the performance of my bite.
- Stacy from Oregon

Stacy,

First of all, congratulations on overcoming your disease. You have made truly great strides, and the worst is behind you. I anticipate things will just get better and better for you from this point on.

Bulimia is an appearance issue as far as your teeth are concerned. When there is very little tooth structure left, you need to have bonding technology used to restore your smile because standard cementation techniques may not be strong enough to hold crowns on your teeth.

And yes, your headaches are most likely caused by a TMJ disorder, which comes from your bite discrepancy. One other piece of good news is that most expert cosmetic dentists are also fairly well trained in treating TMJ disorders, which requires restoring your bite to it’s normal state. But brace yourself – you are probably facing needing porcelain crowns on most if not all of your teeth. But the end result, if you go to the right dentist, will be a beautiful, radiant smile.

- Dr. Hurley

This entry was posted on Wednesday, June 16th, 2010 at 2:17 pm and is filed under Smile Makeovers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Responses are currently closed, but you can trackback from your own site.