Trigeminal Neuralgia Flare-Up? Do This First (And Avoid This)

If you are dealing with facial pain, jaw tension, headaches or trigeminal nerve symptoms, this video is about what to do when the pain is already faring up. Because when the pain is high, most people make the same mistakes. They stretch harder, force the movement or push through. And that is what often makes the flare up even worse.

So today I'm going to give you a simple plan. First, we need to calm the system. Only after that, if the pain is lower, we add gentle nerve movement. So we need to have the calming first and mobilize second.

That is the order what matters. My name is Janne Säkkinen. I'm a physiotherapist and I've spent over 10 years working with the people who deal with the persistent pain and complex symptoms like these. My focus is to helping people to understand their bodies and heal with the safe, science-packed methods, not aggressive and quick fixes that often backfire.

And I've seen this principle help many people regain the control over the symptoms once felt confusing and scary. The golden rule. Important rule. If the pain is flaring up, your goal is not mobility ever.

Your goal is to reduce the threat and calm the nervous system. Everything what you do today should feel gentle and calming, never sharp, never forced. Part 1. Flare up relief.

First drill. Do nothing. Drill number one is the simple. Do nothing.

Sit or lie down comfortably. When your jaw is hanging slightly open, teeth are not touching themselves, tongue is relaxed. Now do absolutely nothing for 30 seconds. Just breathe normally in and let your jaw to be unclenched.

You'll be surprised how much tension drops when you give your system permission to stop. Drill number two. Long exhale breathing. Drill number two.

Long exhale breathing. Doing this, inhale slowly through your nose and when you now exhale, you need to be longer than your inhale. For example, if you inhale for 4 seconds, should be 8 or 12 seconds. Do this 3 to 8 times and keep it smooth and unforced.

Long, slow exhales sends a calming signal to your brainstem. They activate the rest and digest systems and it tells your nervous system that it's okay, you're now safe, we can calm down. Drill number three. Tongue detension.

Stay relaxed. Place the tip of your tongue, lie down and relax. Do nothing. Lightly behind your front teeth or lightly against the inside of your lower lip.

No pressing, just soft contact. Now breathe slowly for 20 to 30 seconds. When people are in a stressed state or in pain, the tongue and jaw often tenders up defensively. This position helps reduce the guarding response.

Drill number four. Gentle jaw contact. Find the thick chewing muscles on the side of your jaw, the masseters. Place two fingers lightly on each side.

Do not massage, do not press deep, just light contact. Hold for 30 seconds while you breathe slowly. And sometimes only the light touch alone is enough to signal the safety to your nervous system and after that it starts to reduce the tension. Drill number five is soft gaze visualization.

This is what activates certain brain nerves. The visual system connects strongly to the brainstem, which controls a lot of fight or flight tension in the jaw, head and neck. And here's how to reduce it. If your pain is on the right side, you block the right side eye with your hand, but you need to keep both eyes open.

Then you place your left hand in front of you with the thumb facing up. Focus on the thumbnail. Now slowly bring the thumbnail closer to your face until it's about 10 centimeters from your eyes. Then move slightly away from the mid light until it starts to feel a little harder to focus.

Then straighten up your elbow so the thumb moves further away and then bring it back to the mid line and back towards your face again. Keep your jaw relaxed the whole time and keep your breathing slowly. Do one direction for the third second and notice the response. You can also reverse the directions or try small movements slightly up or down to see what is best for you.

If you want a deeper explanation for this why it works, leave a comment down below. I have a Finnish video about the topic and I can translate it to you if you want the English version. Now it's time for the micro reassess. Now pause, ask yourself.

Does my face or jaw feel better or same or worse? If it's better, even little that is great. If it's the same, also good. That means you are not provoking the threat.

Or if it's worse, simplify. For example, do only the breathing exercises or do only the do nothing drill. During the flare up, anything what makes your pain worse is no go. So only when the pain has settled down even slightly to the next phase.

Part two. The trig animal neuromobilization. Only if the pain is lower. Now the pain is lower, we can gently improve how the trig animal nerve moves and slides.

This is called neuromobilization or nerve glides. If you want to remember one thing, this is not a nerve stretch. It's a gentle glide and goal is to encourage the normal motion without tricking any dangerous signals. So first, we need to baseline check.

Before you start, do quick baseline check. How tight is your jaw at rest? Any facial pressure? Any headache intensifies?

Any neck or shoulder tension? And remember this because we need to compare these after the treatment. Testing of the trig animal nerve. Simple version.

First, we need to test a non-symptomatic size to test what feels normal. Example. If your symptoms are at the left side, we need to test the right side first. So sit upright.

Gently pull your cheek backwards. And that is called net retraction. Now when you have it, you need to tilt and think that your nose is center of the rotation, your whole neck. After that, open your mouth slightly, just enough to put one finger between your teeth.

And then glide your nose to the center of the rotation. And then glide your nose to the opposite side. And do it slowly. Notice the feeling and the range of motion and then repeat the same idea on the symptomatic side.

But be really kind with it. Slow with small movements and here is the key principles. If you want to test before, always test after. If the glide improves and symptoms reduce, you are moving in the right direction.

And here is a mobile ization option for the flossing idea. For the nervous system flossing for the trigeminal nerve, now we need to do this kind of stuff. Use the same position, but we need to add small variations. Think like flossing a teeth.

Minor pull release, minor pull release. You can change the tension slightly by adding small upper neck rotation, small probe or retraction of the head, or small jaw movement side to side, or small movements forward and back. Find the smallest movement that gives you light tension, not pain. Pain should stay under 5 out of 10 and if the symptoms spike rapidly, you are doing it too much.

Do this for one or two minutes and you can repeat it in every second or third hour while you are awake. If the soft tissue makes the glide easier, do that first and then glide afterwards. If you really want to kick in the parasympathetic nervous system during this glide, you can add the breathing. So if the glide feels comfortable, add the long exhales while you do it.

Inhale before the movement and do slow extended exhales during the glide. And calm input equals better output. If the glide feels comfortable, add the long exhales while you do it. Inhale before the movement and do slow extended exhale during the glide.

And calm input equals better output. After that you need to do the reassessing. So now check again. Jaw tension, better, same or worse.

Facial pressure, better, same or worse. Headache intensify. Neck and shoulders, better or same, means that you are in the right track or if worse, reduce the range of motion or stay longer in the first part series. Here a thing what not to do when you have trigeminal irritation.

If you aggressively stretch the jaw or face, you are doing it wrong. No forceful nervous stretching or head jerking. No heavy cleansing or straightening exercises. No push through the sharp pain.

No pain, no gain doesn't apply here. And all of those don'ts come down to the one principle. Reduce the threat of your nervous system. Remember, if the pain is high, calm first.

When the pain is lower, mobilize it gently. That order alone prevents many flare ups. Your symptoms are not all in your head. That is the nervous system problem and the nervous system pain can be retrained.

Stay consistent with the gentle input and over time the flare ups usually become less intense and less frequent. And once you have had 7 pain free days, you can drop the exercises off and return them only if needed. And if you want to have easy instructions how to simply maintain your chewing muscle, click the link and see you at the next one.